Black Swamp Arts Fest 2015

Wednesday, September 9, 2015 SENTINEL-TRIBUNE
2015 Black Swamp artS FeStival
By DAVID DUPONT
Festival Program Editor
The juried art show at
the Black Swamp Arts
Festival continues on the
upswing.
Brenda Baker, who
chairs the festival’s visual
arts committee, said that
while the number of appli-
cations was down slightly,
“the overall trend” over the
last few years has been
up.
This year the festival
received 286 applications
to fill its 112 booths. In the
end, 108 were accepted
with four artists occupying
double booths. That
includes the eight award
winners from last year who
automatically are accept-
ed.
“We expected that as
the applications went up
and the overall quality of
the show got higher, some
applicants who regularly
got in but haven’t in the
past few years would stop
applying,” Baker said.
The artists’ sales remain
steady, and that keeps the
festival 67th in the top 100
annual rankings compiled
by Sunshine Artist, the
leading journal for art fair
exhibitors. That’s the same
rank as last year. In 2014
the average sales were just
shy of $2,600. That’s a
dramatic rise from the
toughest year of the reces-
sion when average sales
dipped below $2,000.
Baker said the festival’s
ranking has held more or
less steady, while other
area festivals have seen
more fluctuation and even
dropped off the list. The
magazine,shesaid,referred
to the Black Swamp Arts
festival as “a perennial
feature in the top 100.”
Festivalgoers seem to
like how the art show is
going.
“Most of the feedback
we receive regarding the
festival is people are very
happy with a change of art-
ists and they like to see the
increase in quality,” Baker
said.
How this affects some
local artists “depends on
the personality of the
jurors,” she said.
Artists who live within
30 miles of Bowling Green
have the option of entering
the Wood County
Invitational. The show
includes 52 spaces and is
located in the Huntington
Bank parking lot at the
corner of Clough and South
Main streets.
The show is being coor-
dinated by a newcomer to
town and the festival.
Andrew McPherson
arrived in Bowling Green
with his wife, who is purs-
ing graduate studies in phi-
losophy.
(See ART on 4)
Art show retains
top 100 ranking
2014 winners
• Amy Beeler, Best
of Show, jewelry
• Marge Meserve,
best 3D for her enam-
els
• Xiao Xia Zhang,
best 2D for traditional
Chinese embroidery
• Ellen Smith, sec-
ond place, for furni-
ture.
• Yan Inlow, third
place, embroidery.
• Honorable men-
tions: Allan Teger, for
black and white pho-
tography; Chris
Plummer, lprintmak-
ing; and Jack Pine,
for glass.
Enjoy the
BlackSwampArtsFestival!
City of
Bowling Green

SENTINEL-TRIBUNE Wednesday, September 9, 2015 – Page 3
By EMILY GORDON
Sentinel Staff Writer
Growing up in Bowling
Green and graduating from
BGSU helped shape Erin
Holmberg’s colorful per-
sonality and prepared her
for a career in art.
Now a designer at
Owens Community
College, Holmberg is say-
ing “thank you” to her
hometown for its artistic
influence by designing the
poster for this year’s Black
Swamp Arts Festival.
“There’s a feeling of
happy anticipation when
the posters pop up around
town because it’s a sure
sign that we’re preparing
for our favorite weekend,”
Holmberg said. “I was
thrilled to create this year’s
poster and to be part of the
fun.”
Holmberg’s design
emphasizes the historic
downtown setting of the
festival along with its fam-
ily friendly atmosphere.
(See POSTER on 6)
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(Continued from 2)
With a master’s in fine
arts in painting from Ohio
University, joining the
visual arts committee
seemed like a good way
for him to get involved in
his new community.
The Wood County show
is a great way, he said, to
maintain a local presence
at the exhibit.
That helps the festival,
he said. “The local artists
bring their fanbase. That’s
an instant influx of peo-
ple.”
The other local presence
is just across Clough Street
where Bowling Green State
University art students dis-
play their work.
Luke Sheets, one of the
festival’s two judges with
Catherine Royer, first
experienced the festival
selling ceramics in the stu-
dent show. He received his
MFA from BGSU in 2000.
He’s continued to be
involved in the show over
the years. This is his third
time as a juror. And he and
his wife would come to the
festival as often as they
could. He and Royer will
return to decide on the
winners. The festival
awards $5,350 in prizes.
“The Black Swamp Arts
Festival is a good size,”
Sheets said. Large enough
to offer variety, but not so
large that it’s overwhelm-
ing.
“One of the advantages
of Black Swamp is that it’s
been around so long,” he
said. “You have an educat-
ed public. ... It makes it
easier for young artists to
get their work out there.”
Sheets said he person-
ally doesn’t have the
patience to do the art cir-
cuit. “It’s a lot of work to
man a booth.”
Those booths will fea-
ture more glass this year,
Baker said. Glass making
is becoming more accessi-
ble to artists, she said.
There was also an uptick
in fiber and textile.
Jewelry has always been
a mainstay, but it is now
being balanced out by other
media.
The artists, Baker said,
“continuously comment on
the community and the
hospitality.”
That combined with the
high sales, Baker said, “is
why we generate a lot of
word of mouth.”
Art
J.D. Pooley/Sentinel-Tribune
Art lovers take a Sunday stroll through the Black Swamp Arts Festival juried art show in
2014.
The 2014 Black Swamp
Arts Festival poster
designed by Will Santino,
a Bowling Green native
now of Madison,
Wisconsin, was cited by
two judges in the Sunshine
Artists magazine’s festival
poster competition as their
favorite.
Judges like 2014 poster
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By DAVID DUPONT
Jeweler Amy Beeler has
blossomed at the Black
Swamp Arts Festival.
The show is a special
place for the artist who
grew up and still lives just
a few miles north of
Bowling Green, and not
just because she won best
of show in 2014.
Beeler creates jewelry
inspired by natural forms.
Using the lost wax method,
she burns away seed pods
and other flora and then
casts their shape in silver.
She started her career as
an art fair artist at the fes-
tival, first exhibiting in the
Wood County Invitational
Show. Five years ago, she
successfully applied to the
juried show on Main Street,
and has done well there. In
2010 she won a second
place award and received
honorable mention honors
in 2012.
Her best of show award
at last year’s show marked
a year of growth in which
she had a solo show at the
University of Maine.
The work exhibited in
Maine and later at River
House Arts in Perrysburg
is large scale and sculptur-
al, meant more for display
than personal adornment.
Beeler said working in that
scale has influenced all her
work.
“This allowed me to go
back to art for art’s sake,”
she said during the
December show in
Perrysburg.
Beeler found herself
concentrating more on
shading and texture, and
that attention to finer detail
is demonstrated in the
work she sold at art fairs.
The two sides of her work
“feed off each other.”
And that, Beeler
believes, is what led to her
string of winning six
awards within a single sea-
son in 2014.
Beeler said she is “try-
ing to challenge the viewer
with concepts of wearabil-
ity.”
There is a teacher with a
theatrical fair who wears
some of the larger pieces.
The festival offers a
venue to trace her develop-
ment. “People like to see
the progression of my work
and see what is new, what
is the latest thing I’ve been
working on,” she said
recently.
“We still have custom-
ers that find us now that
we met there and some of
your first work went to
them,” her husband, Neal
Harmon, said.
While she exhibits else-
where, Bowling Green
remains a home base.
“People always ask me if
I’ll be at Black Swamp.”
That connection goes
back to her start in jewel-
ry.
She grew up on a farm
in Oregon, just a few miles
from where she lives, and
she cultivated a love and
interest in nature.
Beeler went to Bowling
Green State University
intent on studying biology
until she took metalsmith-
ing as an elective. Working
with master metalsmith
Tom Muir sparked her love
of the craft.
Still, she said, “I was an
obstinate student.” That,
she noted, made it even
sweeter when Muir was
one of the two judges who
awarded her Best of Show
at last year’s festival.
In college her goals
were modest — graduate
and go work for jewelry
store. Beeler did just that.
But after five years, and
several employers, she
found the work stifling.
She said she learned about
the craft from those she
worked with, but she want-
ed more.
She cut back her hours
to part time and started
doing her own work. Again
her goal was simple: “Build
up a clientele” and supple-
ment sales with repairs.
When she created a
necklace using local seed
pods, “I felt like I was onto
something.”
Festivalgoers and judg-
es certainly agree.
Amy Beeler shines as fest’s best
J.D. Pooley/Sentinel-Tribune
Amy Beeler won Best of Show in 2014.
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(Continued from 3)
The 2004 graduate of
the School of Art with a
Bachelor of Fine Arts with
a focus on design and art
history never doubted
she’d become an artist, as
she was creating and
designing at a young age,
she said.
Attending the Black
Swamp Arts Festival every
year not only encouraged
Holmberg to pursue her
dream of designing, but
also helped reinforce her
love of small town living.
“It’s become part of our
local fabric and identity,”
she said. “It’s great to run
into friends and neighbors
while perusing the art,
music, and food.”
Her relatable experience
as a “townie” can be seen
in the poster, which cele-
brates the spirit of commu-
nity as much as the award-
winning art.
“To me, the festival is
about people, so the poster
celebrates the people and
events that we all love,”
she said.
“It also struck me that
the festival not only has
something for everyone to
enjoy, but that the fun also
spans both day and night.
This led to the sun, moon,
and stars hanging large
over the city.”
While some artists pack
up and move away to
California, New York or
even abroad for the sake of
their art, Holmberg’s
enduring love for Bowling
Green motivated her to put
down roots in the place she
knows and loves best.
“After college I moved
out of state for six years,
but I came back to my
home town to be closer to
friends, family and to start
a family of my own,” she
said. “Bowling Green is a
small town with so much
to offer. I love it here.”
Poster
Photo by Walter McKeever
Erin Holmberg designed 2015 festival post-
er.
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By EMILY GORDON
From abstract expres-
sionism to kinetic sculp-
tures, young art lovers will
learn about several art
forms and the artists who
developed them at the
Kiwanis Youth Arts Village
at the Black Swamp Arts
Festival.
The goal of the village
is for kids to learn about
artistic styles and artists
while making art they can
proudly display at home,
said Matt Reger, youth art
chair.
“Each art project this
year is focused on a differ-
ent artist. Kids learn about
them as they do the project
and see how their project
connects to the artist,” he
said. “The emphasis is on
making art but also giving
kids a real understanding
of art.”
The activities include
making mobiles inspired
by the work of Alexander
Calder, portrait painting in
the style of Vincent Van
Gogh, creating pipe clean-
er “dancers” modeled after
those painted by Edgar
Degas, painting with mar-
bles to resemble the work
of Jackson Pollock and
shadowbox construction
simulating the work of
Louise Nevelson.
Fan favorite activities
such as tie dying T-shirts
and paper hat making, a
nod to Mary Cassett’s mil-
linery muses, will also be
available this year, Reger
said.
But kids won’t be the
only ones having fun
exploring different artistic
styles in the village.
Bowling Green State
University students will
once again be on hand to
help kids make their proj-
ects.
Architecture and con-
struction management stu-
dents, along with members
of the Wood Working
Guild, will show kids how
to build a wooden toy.
Meanwhile, English
students will help kids
craft poems out of words
(See KIDS on 8)
Masters to inspire
kids to create fridge
ready masterpieces
Listeners have already
gotten a taste of Barbara
Bailey Hutchison’s voice:
She’s the pitch-perfect
sound of several
McDonald’s commercials.
Singing jingles promot-
ing hamburgers or
Hallmark greeting cards or
Sears is just a small part of
a career that dates back her
dorm room at Michigan
State.
Then an art major,
Hutchison would play her
guitar and sing for herself.
She’d started singing pub-
licly in junior high.
Her roommate was
insistent she get back on
stage. The dorm had a cof-
feehouse. Hutchison
remembers her saying:
“Come on down and you’re
going to play.”
“I believe music choos-
es you more than you
choose it.”
So she set aside her art
career as she played more
and more. Hutchison hit
the college circuit, and was
a four-time winner of cam-
pus entertainer award. She
also played the White
House.
In a recent telephone
interview, she said the big-
gest crowd she ever played
for was here in Bowling
Green.
In October, 1994, she
opened for comedian Rita
Rudner at Anderson Arena,
playing for 7,500.
Hutchison will be back
in the neighborhood to
play two shows on the
Family stage, Saturday at
11:45 a.m. and Sunday at
10:30 a.m.
As a performer, she
said, “it’s about entertain-
ing and connecting with
the crowd. That’s the most
important thing for me and
music sure is a great way
to do that.”
She does that with a
mix of originals and work
(See VOICE on 8)
Hutchison’s pitch-perfect voice
featured twice on Family Stage
On stage
Family Stage:
Saturday, 11:45
a.m. & Sunday
10:30 a.m.
Enoch Wu/Sentinel-Tribune
Daniel Schuman, of Bowling Green, constructs a duct tape top hat
with help from his friend McKenna Seman, in 2014.
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(Continued from 7)
cut from newspapers, mag-
azines and books.
While there’s plenty to
do in the village this year,
there are fewer projects for
kids to complete compared
to past festivals.
The decision to down-
size from between 10 and
15 projects to nine was
made in effort to promote
quality over quantity,
Reger said.
“In years past, the goal
was to have as many art
projects as we could do.
Now we’re transitioning to
having each project be a
quality project,” he said.
“It’s not just something to
do; it’s meaningful.”
Fun, yet educational
performances will also be
held on the new Youth and
Family Theatre stage in the
Wood County Public
Library to add to the fami-
ly oriented spirit of the
festival, Reger said.
The weekend line-up
includes a 1940’s style
radio comedy show fol-
lowing a concert by the
Black Swamp Players, a
performance by Julie’s
Dance Studio and a read-
ing of “The Seussification
of Romeo and Juliet” by
Horizon Youth Theatre.
The new stage will help
the village and the festival
become bigger and better,
Reger said.
“You can go to different
arts festivals and they’re
great, but there’s nothing
like the Black Swamp’s
emphasis of involving kids
in the arts. It’s just not
there,” he said.
Eli Buser, Perrysburg, stands near a tower
of boxes during last year’s festival.
(Continued from 7)
from her fellow songwrit-
ers. “I have lots of song-
writer friends. If I find a
wonderful song written by
someone else that has
something to say, I’ll add it
to my repertoire,” she
said.
Often she discovers
songs that are more humor-
ous than what she writes.
She recorded her first
album in the mid-1970s,
when she’d accumulated a
enough songs to go togeth-
er.
Those songs, though,
seldom make it into a show
unless someone requests it.
And then she said it’s a
matter of remembering it.
Beside she’s interested
more in songs about fami-
ly, the state of the world,
“what I’m experiencing
now.”
That includes returning
to visual arts. She’s done
papermaking workshops
for children, and is now
expanding that to painting
workshops.
Those “have completely
snowballed,” she said.
She’s also painting for her-
self. “I’m going to take on
painting again.”
She tends to draw and
use watercolor, since those
travel better.
Working with children
in visual arts complements
her work singing for kids.
For her the art and music
all come from the same
place inside of her. “I name
paintings after lines in
songs.”
Voice
Photo by Dal Cooper/provided
Barbara Bailey Hutchison will perform twice
on the Family Stage.
Kids
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By EMILY GORDON
Things are about to get
messy for area high school
students during this year’s
Rotary Chalk Walk at the
Black Swamp Arts
Festival.
On Saturday, 24 teams
of five students each will
have just a few hours to
create chalk murals on
Main Street.
The 8-by-10 foot murals
are expressions in the I
Madonnari style, an Italian
street painting tradition
dating to the 19th century,
said Kate Kamphuis, chalk
walk co-chair.
This year’s festival
marks four years of the art
competition, which was
created specifically for
high school students. “The
youth arts and adult areas
are fantastic but we real-
ized not too long ago that
there wasn’t really any-
thing for high school stu-
dents to do,” Kamphuis
said. “This event is geared
toward them, and it’s got-
ten big enough to have its
own social media pages.”
The event also serves to
help keep the arts in
schools, with prize money
donated by the Bowling
Green Rotary Club going
directly to the schools’ art
departments.
“Due to budget cuts, we
know schools’ art depart-
ments are the first to go.
Our goal is to put money
back into our schools’ art
departments, to give back
some of what they’ve lost,”
Kamphuis said.
The murals are judged
by the team’s creativity,
being able to finish in time,
and the ability to transfer
an idea from a piece of
paper to real life on the
street. Any bumps, grooves
or cracks in the pavement
of their “canvas” can be
incorporated into the
mural, as well as any color
on the ground, like yellow
street markings, she said.
The first prize-winning
team’s high school will
receive $500, while the
second will get $250 and
the third $100.
When Eastwood High
School’s team won first
place in the competition in
2013, the school purchased
a throwing wheel with the
prize money, she said.
The fact that those who
come to the festival get to
see artists at work is a huge
draw. “It’s great for the
festival goers to get to see
art being made in front of
their eyes,” she said. “The
fact that the artists work on
the ground to create these
beautiful murals, some-
times in 90 degree heat, is
awesome.”
There will be pizza and
beverages for participants,
as well as live music.
There’s also a space for
little kids in the audience
to doodle with chalk on the
ground in a separate space
away from the judged area.
“They see the big kids
doing it and they want to
be like the big kids. They
inspire them to make art,”
Kamphuis said. “But adults
want to do it, too. You’d be
surprised.”
Participants have from
noon to 4 p.m. Saturday to
design and create their
masterpieces on the pave-
ment, as well as make an
artist’s statement on paper
describing their interpreta-
tion of the year’s theme,
which is diversity.
The color drawings of
the designs in the state-
ments give judges some-
thing to work with in case
of rain, Kamphuis said.
“It’s sad but kind of
amazing to see the murals
in the rain because when
they start to fade, the way
the colors run becomes art,
too,” she said. “Having
them get walked on or
washed away just adds to
the experience.”
Chalk art event brings color to the streets
Lake High School student Kristen Robnolte, works on a chalk
street mural in 2014
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The Black Swamp Arts
Festival depends both on
local monetary contribu-
tions as well as community
sweat equity.
More than 1,000 volun-
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present the event.
Some on the festival
committee work year-
round planning the event,
others take a few hours out
from enjoying the festival
to monitor the beer garden,
give artists a break or help
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own.
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By DAVID DUPONT
Sentinel News Editor
Sacred steel — a style
of gospel music played on
steel guitar — has been a
regular sound at the Black
Swamp Arts Festival for
10 years.
Back in 2005 Calvin
Cooke, an elder in the
genre, drove down from
Detroit to play a Sunday
afternoon.
Since then the festival
has also hosted The
Campbell Brothers,
upstarts The Lee Boys, the
sacred steel all-star group
The Slide Brothers and last
year, the style’s break out
star Robert Randolph.
This year the Slide
Brothers make an encore
visit. The sacred steel sum-
mit session features Cooke,
Darick and Chuck
Campbell and one of the
legends of the music,
Aubrey Ghent, the nephew
of the style’s founder,
Willie Eason, who with his
brother Troman brought
the steel guitar into the
church in the 1930s.
The band was assem-
bled by Randolph to spot-
light those who inspired
him.
Before his festival show
in 2014 Randolph said that
Cooke could have been as
big a star as he’s become,
if he’d ventured further
from the confines of the
church.
These musicians have
been jamming the gospel
at House of God conven-
tions for years.
Still Ghent said in 2013
that getting them all together
(See STEEL on 15)
Sacred steel
legends return
On stage
Family Stage:
Saturday, 4 p.m.
Main Stage:
Saturday, 10 p.m.
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By DAVID DUPONT
The key to finding a
distinctive musical style is
failing at copying the styles
of your idols.
“We aspire to be what
our heroes are, and we fall
short,” said Ewan Currie,
songwriter for The
Sheepdogs. “Wherever we
land, that’s out style.”
The Canadian band
found its inspiration in the
classic rock of the 1960s
and 1970s — Creedence
Clearwater Revival, The
Kinks and the like.
Currie and his fellow
founding members bassist
Ryan Gullen and drum-
mer Sam Corbett didn’t
care about any musical
fads. “Basically we liked
a lot of old music. We
wanted to play old school
style and that’s basically
what we’ve done for 11
years.”
In that time the rockers
from Saskatoon,
Saskatchewan, went from
teens just learning their
instruments, to a top
Canadian act with Juno
Awards and gold records to
their credit. They did it rid-
ing an old-school rock
groove reimagined for their
own purposes.
The band now includes
Currie’s brother Shamus
on keyboards and trom-
bone and Rusty Matyas on
guitar and vocals.
Currie said in a recent
telephone interview that
none of the founders had
experience playing in
bands before they decided
to start one when they were
19.
Currie had played clari-
net and piano. “That’s what
my parents put me in.”
Those instruments, he said,
“are lame if you want to
play rock.”
So he picked up guitar
in high school, and a few
years later The Sheepdogs
w e r e b o r n .
“We had pretty definite
ideas what we wanted to
do,” he said.
From the start the band
played originals, but also
“we learned a lot of covers
to learn tricks and licks we
could steal. That’s impor-
tant to do,” Currie said.
“The music from that
era is so much more invig-
orating,” Currie said. “It
came from people who
worked really hard and
perfected their thing.
Everything about it sounds
right. We did our best to do
the same thing.”
As their shelf of Juno
Awards (the Canadian
Grammys) attest, The
Sheepdogs have a large
following in Canada.
That was built on exten-
sive touring. “We just tried
to play live as much as
possible,” Currie said.
The Sheepdogs, Currie
said, have room to expand
their fan base in the United
States. The opportunity to
play at a festival such at
the Black Swamp Arts
Festival that showcases a
variety of musical styles,
fits well with the band’s
aims.
It gives musicians and
listeners the chance to find
some new music.
“We’re a band that
needs new fans,” Currie
said. “We might be that
discovery.”
Sheepdogs bite
into classic rock
On stage
Main Stage: Friday,
10 p.m.
OUR COMMUNITY AT ITS BEST
The Black Swamp Arts Festival reveals Wood
County at its best. Hundreds of volunteers work
together to make downtown Bowling Green ready
for artists and musicians from all over. Friends and
neighbors turn out in great number to enjoy the
festivities and celebrate our dynamic community.
Wood Countians have also united to
support another project that beneﬁts us all:
community-based behavioral health care for
all residents. Citizen support makes mental
health and substance abuse
assistance available for all
Wood County famlies.
Caring about our neighbors
keeps our community at it
best … and that’s something
to celebrate!
ENJOY THE FESTIVAL!

(Continued from 11)
in this ensemble
“brought about a special
spiritual feeling.”
His friendship with
Cooke goes back to the
early 1960s.
Slide guitar, Cooke told
the Sentinel before his
2005 appearance, was a
more Hawaiian style steel
sound at first.
Ghent and Cooke were
among the young genera-
tion, who were incorporat-
ing more popular rhythms
and harmonies into the
church’s music.
It was a sound that
appealed not just to the
Church of God faithful, but
to secular listeners of all
stripes. The elders were
jealous of the attention.
Ghent said when he was a
youngster he couldn’t play
outside at school assem-
blies and such.
“That’s the way of my
parents,” he said. “When I
was kid they were really
strict.”
He’d started playing at
6, and it was his grandfa-
thers, both deeply involved
in the ministry who bought
him his first lap steel.
His talent was discov-
ered by those outside the
church in 1992. He was in
a Miami music store to try
out the instruments.
“I messed around with
it and they discovered I
could play,” Ghent said.
Soon he was playing
festivals and shows
throughout the state.
The Slide Brothers, fol-
lowing the path blazed by
Randolph, Ghent, Cooke
and the Campbells, have
taken the music to major
international music festi-
vals.
The Slide Brothers
appeared on the Experience
Hendrix Tour, and covered
a couple of the rock guitar-
ist’s classics. Those aren’t
in the band’s regular reper-
toire, Ghent said. “It was
for that time.”
Instead the band focuses
on its core repertoire of
rousing hymnody that for
decades they’ve been rock-
ing for the Lord.
Steel
Folklore & Funfest
Saturday, October 17, 2015
4 - 9 pm
(419) 353-1897 | wcparks.org | /woodcountyparkdistrict
wagon rides, movie, popcorn, food, spooky trail,
live music, apple-cider pressing & more!
Scarecrow Workshop 10/8 (sign-up by 10/6)
Pumpkin Carving Workshop 10/15
Wood County Historical Center & Museum
13660 County Home Rd, Bowling Green, OH 43402
The Wood County Park District & FREE Family Fun.

Sonny Landreth has lots
of friends who play guitar.
Check him out on
YouTube and you’ll find
videos of him with the
pantheon of guitar virtuo-
sos — Eric Clapton, Mark
Knopfler, Peter Frampton,
to name a few. It’s compa-
ny he’s at home with, his
slide guitar soaring with
the best of them.
Landreth will perform
an 8 p.m. Saturday on the
festival’s Main Stage.
In a recent telephone
interview, Landreth, 64,
said his distinctive style,
which mixes finger pick-
ing and slide, as well as a
few other tricks, came from
listening closely to his gui-
tar heroes, and then listen-
ing to his own muse.
“You have to know what
your heroes are doing, and
at a certain point you have
to let go of that and not let
it take over.”
GrowingupinLafayette,
Louisiana, he was exposed
early on to all the styles
that hum in the bayou air.
He listened to Chet Atkins
and Wes Montgomery,
B.B. King and Jimi
Hendrix.
He got to hear the great
big bands who were still
on tour with their original
leaders. He heard jazz at
the New Orleans Jazz
Festival when it was still a
jazz festival.
His first instrument was
a conga drum. He was 7,
when his family visited the
store,. He won a raffle, and
his older brother tried to
convince him to buy a
record player.
But all he wanted to
know was how much was
that red conga drum in the
window.
So he started off as a
percussionist, adding a set
of bongos to his rig.
Later his friend Tommy
Alesi decided he wanted to
be the drummer, so
Landreth set aside his per-
cussive ambitions. (And
Alesi ended up as the
drummer for Michael
Doucet and Beau Soleil,
headliners at the 2010 fes-
tival.
Landreth also started
playing trumpet at 11, an
instrument he studied all
the way through college.
The horn had a strong
influence on style on gui-
tar, which he picked up at
13. He uses “phrasing more
like a horn player... There’s
an expressive more voice-
like quality to it,” he said.
All that music in the
bayou air was brought into
focus when a cousin from
Mississippi, where
Landreth was born, played
some Delta blues for him.
That’s when he heard
slide guitar.
“When I got into the
blues it just came togeth-
er,” Landreth said. “Now I
had a way to focus all these
different styles.”
His playing brought him
to the attention of zydeco
pioneer Clifton Chenier.
When Landreth was “in
my big discovery stage”
he’d heard about this guy
who played blues on accor-
dion. “I couldn’t fathom
that.”
He and a friend went to
a show. Chenier spied them
outside the venue and
“waved us in and sat us at
his table.”
The music Landreth
said “was so much more”
than he was expecting.
Chenier integrated all
kinds of elements in his
music.
A few years later
Chenier heard Landreth at
a jam session and let him
sit in with his band.
In 1979, Landreth
signed on full time. “It was
the highlight of my
career.”
When Landreth takes
the stage now, he tries to
touch on all aspects of his
career, pulling a few num-
bers from each album.
The songs that make the
cut are those “that have
evolved over the years.”
“Some songs just seem
to take on a life of their
own,” Landreth said. “I
just get out of the way and
let it happen. It’s a myste-
rious thing, a beautiful
thing, when it works.”
Sonny’s slide started in the bayou
On stage
Main Stage:
Saturday, 8 p.m.
Convenient,
accessible
care.
F A L C O N H E A LT H C E N T E R U R G E N T C A R E
Doctor’s office closed? Can’t get an appointment? Falcon Health
Center’s staff of physicians and nurse practitioners treat the
common illness or injury issues that need immediate attention,
but don’t require a trip to the emergency room. We welcome
members of the general Bowling Green and Wood County
communities (6 months or older), in addition to BGSU students,
alumni, faculty and staff.
Need prescriptions, blood tests, or x-rays? Full-service pharmacy
(including a drive-thru window), blood draw and radiology
services are also available with a physician’s order.
Urgent Care Hours:
Monday–Friday - 8 am to 9 pm
Saturday and Sunday - 9 am to 5 pm
Visit www.woodcountyhospital.org for specific lab, x-ray and
pharmacy hours.
838 E. Wooster Street | Bowling Green, OH
419-372-2271
woodcountyhospital.org
Patients are seen on a first come, first served basis. No appointment necessary.
Most major insurance plans and credit cards are accepted. Co-pays are due at the
time of the visit.
U R G E N T C A R E A T

By DAVID DUPONT
It’s been 10 years since
Chuck Prophet rocked out
on the Black Swamp Arts
Festival’s Main Stage.
Since then he’s contin-
ued to record including the
acclaimed “Let Freedom
Ring” and “Temple
Beautiful,” an ode to his
hometown San Francisco.
He’s produced records for
others, including the Jace
Everett’s “Bad Things,”
the theme song for “True
Blood.”
He’s played guitar,
toured, read books.
“A lot of songs, a lot of
gigs, a lot of miles, a lot of
laughs, a lot of fears, prob-
ably a couple vans,”
Prophet said of his life in
the past decade. “That’s
how it goes. How far can I
drag my teenage dream
into adulthood?”
In that time, Prophet has
continued to be on the
playlist for the members of
the festival’s performing
arts committee, so with
another powerful album
“Night Surfer” out last
year it seemed like time for
a return engagement.
Prophet’s happy to
return. “Playing outside
you can take your time,
you can soar a little more.
You take your time. You
can’t be in a hurry.”
The setlist will focus on
his last few albums as well
as his hit “Summertime
Thing.”
Hits are not what
Prophet is about. “People
kind of assume you want
to be successful.”
What matters to Prophet
is the art and craft of being
a songwriter, a profession
informed by his love of
American music in all its
diversity.
“The trick is to stay
excited about it,” he said.
He just wants to wake up
in the morning and still
have that urge to work. “I
kind of live for wrestling
something to the ground.
“If I’m lucky enough to
have a good song, get
something to stick to the
tape and come out the
speakers, then that’s a good
day for me.”
Those songs tell the sto-
ries of American charac-
ters, city bred, or city
drawn, their tales set to an
American soundtrack of
rock, punk, country, blues
strains, intoned in Prophet’s
gritty baritone that brings
to life Econoline vans and
girls who run with shot-
guns. The words and music
come from odd angles. He
has a love song that evokes
a great heavyweight fighter
Sonny Liston, who’s been
turned into a cultural
punching bag. Prophet’s
voice has an edge of cyni-
cism that’s always at odds
with a particular strain of
deep-seated American
romanticism.
All this is rooted in
Prophet’s teenage epipha-
ny at a punk rock show
with the Dead Kennedys.
That was when he was
16, that was more than 40
years ago, and the song-
writing still doesn’t come
easily.
Sometimes he feels like
he’s “pole vaulting mouse
turds.”
“I’m just a desperate
little man” who’ll try any-
thing to get the song going.
Maybe it’s trying to build
from a song title, or maybe
it’s turning on a drum
machine “and shouting at
the wall.”
“If you like what’s com-
ing back at you, you keep
doing it,” he said.
Best is when the words
and melody and chords
emerge together.
Prophet persists. “For
me if I can make a great
record, a classic, then it’s
going to make up for
everything I’ve done in my
life that’s stupid. I’m still
trying to make that
record.”
He feels he “tapped into
something special” with
“Temple Beautiful.”
(Later he helped pro-
duce a gala concert cele-
brating San Francisco.
Among those he recruited
was Telecaster maestro Bill
Kirchen, who he met at the
and who also returns this
year.)
“We’ve done it right”
with “Night Surfer,”
Prophet said. “I really
enjoy playing the songs.”
And as he performs the
dong, they evolve.
“It’s very rare that the
recorded version of the
song is definitive,” he said
“They get faster or slower.
The grooves change, the
melodies change. They
find another life on the
stage.”
Prophet rides teen rock dream back to BG
On stage
Main Stage:
Saturday, 6:15
p.m..
Community Stage:
Sunday, 2:45
p.m.
Photo Charles Homo/provided
Chuck Prophet will play two sets at this
year’s Black Swamp Arts Festival.
The Busy Thimble
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Open Mon.-Sat. 9-8; Sun. 11-5
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The Black Swamp Arts
Festival presents a wide
range of music, so wide it
defies definition.
The term Americana
comes the closest to
describing the festival’s
reach, and that makes
Telecaster master Bill
Kirchen a perfect fit.
In just one song, “Hot
Rod Lincoln,” Kirchen
covers the gamut of
Americana music. Starting
with Johnny Cash, Kirchen
roars through a high-pow-
ered revue of guitar styles,
American and otherwise.
He’s even been known
to throw in a bit of march
king John Philip Sousa, not
to mention a nod to tennis
star Billie Jean King, sum-
moning the pop of the ball
on the racket from his gui-
tar.
Like the festival he
defies easy categorization,
so much so he’s come up
with his own name for
what he plays “dieselbil-
ly.”
Kirchen, who played
the festival and Grounds
for Thought, regularly in
the first decade of the
2000s, will close out the
festival Sunday.
Kirchen said he’s always
modifying “Hot Rod
Lincoln.” He’s recently
brought in a bit of Santana
and Jorma Kaukonen, from
Hot Tuna and Jefferson
Airplane. That shows that
as much as he is widely
recognized as a guitar mas-
ter he remains as much a
student as he was when as
a kid growing up in Ann
Arbor, Michigan.
He started playing folk
music on his mother’s
banjo.
But it was the more
electric sounds he heard
around town and further
afield that caught his ear.
Bob Dylan played a con-
cert in his high school, and
then the next year, 1965,
Kirchen traveled to the
Newport Folk Festival to
hear Dylan go electric.
Neither his hero nor
Kirchen turned back.
Starting with a stint
with Commander Cody
and his Lost PlanetAirmen,
Kirchen fashioned his
career as a guitarist extraor-
dinaire, He lent his
Americana sound to the
bands of Elvis Costello,
Emmylou Harris and Nick
Lowe.
As a solo artist he
honed his “dieselbilly”
sound. The name, Kirchen
said, derives from the
trucking songs that were
in vogue when he first
started listening to coun-
try music. Those songs
may not still be in fashion,
but Kirchen keeps their
spirit alive,
He told the Sentinel-
Tribune in 2005, “If I call
myself a dieselbilly artist I
can play whatever I want. I
made up my own genre.”
Kirchen keeps truckin’ with ‘dieselbilly’ sound
On stage
Community Stage:
Sunday, 12:15
p.m.
Main Stage:
Sunday, 3:30 p.m.
Bandleader Paul Cebar
really wants the audience
to get up and dance. “I’m
certainly happy to play for
people who are sitting,”
the Milwaukee-based
musician said. But he pre-
fers when they get out of
their seats.
“There’s a sweet
exchange going on. The
music gets richer. There’s
more interaction.”
Cebar is returning for
his third turn on the Main
Stage following perfor-
mances in 2002 and
2012.
The leader of Tomorrow
Sound said back in 2012:
“I learned to dance when I
went away to college. It
made me a much more
relaxed gentleman. I’d
like to help other people
lose their inhibitions and
foster some kind of com-
munity.”
The band draws from a
broad swath of Afrocentric
terpsichorean influences
from Cuba and the
Caribbean, New Orleans
and Africa.
He started out as a
Dylan-influenced folksing-
er, who moved into jazz
and blues.
Then on a trip to New
Orleans for that city’s Jazz
& Heritage Festival, he
was inspired by the lively,
danceable sounds of the
Big Easy.
Back at home he was
playing rhythm ‘n’ blues in
a dance hall.
Over the years the focus
of the band, even as the
personnel stayed more or
less constant, switched
over to originals.
“In the course of a live
performance, you start
improvising and find the
way you do some part of
the song can stand on its
own.”
Paul Cebar brings
dance grooves
to festival stages
On stage
Main Stage: Friday,
6:30 p.m.
Howard’s Club H:
Friday, midnight
BGSU SPEECH & HEARING CLINIC
Open to the Public ~ Serving All Ages
200 Health and Human Services, Bowling Green
419-372-2515
For more than 60
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pathology services
year round to the
BGSU community
and the General
Public including
infants, children,
teens and adults
of all ages.

By DAVID DUPONT
Safe to say, The
Infatuations’ relationship
with music lovers in
Bowling Green is not a
fling.
The Detroit-based rock
band has entranced local
music fans with appear-
ances at Black Swamp Arts
Festival (on the family
stage after a storm forced
cancellation of its main
stage set) and at Grounds
for Thought last fall for the
shop’s 25th birthday party.
The band returned to
Grounds earlier this year to
lay down live tracks for a
forthcoming live vinyl
release, the latest in a series
of LPs produced by the
shop.
The shows and record-
ing give the Infatuations
the chance to get their new
singer Kendrick Hardaway
on record, as well as wax-
ing some new songs.
“The people in Bowling
Green are super supportive
of us,” Draheim said.
Coming to BG “is like your
favorite aunt and uncle.”
The gig was the band’s
first since December.
They’ve been laying low
while they work on new
material, and giving some
newer Detroit bands a
chance for some of the
exposure that helped
launch The Infatuations.
The sets prominently
featured “#TheBeep,” a
light-hearted number about
an obsessive girlfriend
who keeps calling.
It’s a song that just begs
the audience to sing along.
That’s the kind of response
the Infatuations — also
featuring bassist wolf, gui-
tarist Nick Behnan and
drummer Bobby Myers —
have come to expect.
Other new songs are
“Monster,” “From Here”
and “A Girl Like You.”
All are worked up by
the band as a whole, with
everyone sharing ideas and
credit.
From the rehearsal
tapes, Draheim is confi-
dent the band won’t disap-
point.
The band has been gig-
ging for four years, after it
came together around
songs written by Draheim
and founding Infatuation
Marco Lowe.
“Playing all those
shows,” Draheim said,
“makes you a tighter band.
We can feel each other’s
instincts.”
Draheim said that after
playing so much in Detroit
the band has decided to
back off in their home mar-
ket, concentrating instead
on a few prime gigs such as
the Detroit Music Awards
show where the band scored
a best urban recording
award for its “Detroit Block
Party” and its own Detroit
Block Party.
Infatuations love BG
Kendrick Hardaway, lead singer for The Infatuations, performs with
bassist The Wolf at Grounds for Thought in March.
On stage
Main Stage: Friday,
8 p.m.
Family Stage:
Saturday, 1:10
p.m.
In 2014 the California-
based rockers Patrolled By
Radar got to spread their
wings on several stages.
They worked out in the
mid-day sun on the Main
Stage and then in night
lights at Howard’s Club H
for an after hours show.
They were back at noon
for a Sunday show on the
Community Stage in the
middle of the art show,
tamping down the volume,
but not the vigor of their
pub rock sound.
Patrolled by Radar got
started about five years
ago, evolving from the
remains of the band Five
Cent Haircut.
Songwriter and guitarist
Jay Souza and his “main
guy” guitarist Bosco Sheff
were joined by drummer
Ben Johnsen and Preston
Mann on keyboards.
The band’s sound,
Souza said last year, is
rooted in rock ‘n’ roll.
“It has all the underpin-
nings of the earliest rock
‘n’roll... country, the blues,
a good backbeat, rockabil-
ly. Those are the sounds
I’m drawn to, tube amps
and minimalism, that the
song being what carries it
all.”
Souza is a student of the
craft of songwriting. “It’s
amazing to me you can
listen to a song and it’s so
satisfying in the journey
it’s taking you on, you’re
astonished it’s only three
minutes long.”
He was inspired to start
writing by a stack of 45s
belonging to his cousin. He
was living with the family,
he said, but he and his broth-
er weren’t part of it. He took
refuge in the music.
By the time he was 15
and playing guitar in a
punk rock band, he had
become the guy charged
with writing the lyrics.
Souza is equally invest-
ed in the music he sets his
words to. “It’s exciting
when you can create a
change in the song whether
the bridge or the break
down and it goes so far
away from the song you
don’t expect it to be able to
come back. And if you’re
able to make it come back
in a way that’s pleasing
and rewarding, it takes the
audience away from the
melody and refreshes it in
a way that’s perfect.”
Patrolled by Radar
keeps focus on songs
On stage
Main Stage:
Saturday, 2:50
p.m.
Community Stage:
Saturday, 5:15
p.m.
Howard’s Club H:
Saturday, mid-
night
320 W. Gypsy Ln. Rd. Unit D Bowling Green, Ohio
419-352-5990
Carol Solether, FIC
Managing Partner/
Registered Representative
Carmen Christensen, FIC
Financial Representative
Jane Spoerl,
419-262-4402
Financial Representative

Studebaker John
Grimaldi was born in an
Italian-American section
of Chicago in 1962 and
started playing harmonica
at age 7.
Under the spell of
music he heard on
MaxwellStreet,Chicago’s
famed blues melting pot,
Grimaldi began perform-
ing as Studebaker John
and the Hawks in the
‘70s.
The band name refer-
enced the Studebaker
Hawk, a car Grimaldi still
owns today, and was also
intended as a tribute to
his friend, J.B. Hutto and
the Hawks.
John began playing
guitar after a life-chang-
ing experience of seeing
Hound Dog Taylor and
the Houserockers per-
form. “.Hound Dog start-
ed playing, hitting notes
that sent chills up and
down my spine.
“He was versatile and
powerful and would play
rhythm as well as leads. I
left there knowing what I
wanted to do. I had to
play slide guitar.”
A fixture on the
Chicago scene he was
tapped as a sideman for a
number of bands, includ-
ing recording with the
remnants of TheYardbirds
and the Pretty Things.
But Grimaldi realized
playing other people’s
music was unsatisfying,
so he set about writing his
own songs, and putting
his own stamp on the
music he loves.
Studebaker John brings
personal touch to blues
On stage
Main Stage:
Friday, 5 p.m.
Howard’s Club H:
Friday, midnight
Family Stage:
Saturday, 2:30
p.m.
Mike Love will play
solo at the Black Swamp
Arts Festival, but he won’t
be making music alone.
“I always refer to it as
making music with peo-
ple,” the native Hawaiian
said. “The crowd is as
much as part of the music
as the people performing
it.”
The energy of the musi-
cians joins the energy of
the listeners. “Everybody
becomes connected instant-
ly,” he said.
He’s looking forward to
performing a Sunday solo
show — just him, his high
tenor voice, his guitar and
loop pedals — Sept. 13 at
2 p.m. on the Black Swamp
Arts Festival’s Main
Stage.
“I always prefer to play
outdoors,” he said. “It just
always seems more condu-
cive to the flow of ener-
gy.”
But the music some-
times overcomes even the
most dingy, dark venue.
“I’m always grateful for
the opportunity to play,”
Love said.
He grew up on the east
side of Oahu surrounded
by music. “My music has
always been my family,”
he said. His father and
grandfather, a pastor, were
musicians. And he started
playing piano almost
before he could remem-
ber.
His father played some
gigs before settling in as a
teacher. His grandfather
incorporated music in his
ministry.
Love said the Islands
are inundated with all kinds
of music from around the
world. What caught his
attention was reggae.
His music “has its foun-
dations in reggae but it’s
infused with a lot of differ-
ent styles.”
The uplifting message
of reggae “clicked with
me,” Love said. “It had a
more spiritual nature,
music that was about some-
thing deeper.”
Maybe, he said, this
comes from his religious
ancestors.
That spiritual side “has
become the most important
part to me. ... The idea of
the music as a tool for
healing and growth.”
Love said: “Music is the
easiest way to connect us
all. I can walk into a room
with people I’ve never met
and make music with them.
When I realized that ele-
ment, that’s when it all
changed for me.”
Mike Love reaches out through reggae
On stage
Main Stage:
Sunday, 2 p.m.
Photo provided
Mike Love brings his Hawaiian bred reggae to the Black Swamp.
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Growing up in the
swampy regions of south-
ern Georgia, Randall
Bramblett got an early start
in music — piano at 4.
And he sang in church.
Saxophone and guitar
came later. By junior high
he was playing in a band
“making a little money on
the weekends” something
he continued well after
he’d moved north to
Athens, Georgia for col-
lege.
He’d already tapped
into the soul and blues
sounds coming over the
airwaves, the black radio
station. “This amazing
stuff was coming out at
night,” Bramblett said in a
recent telephone interview.
Much later he heard
Dylan and other folk song-
writers. By then he was in
college, nearing the end of
his studies in religion and
psychology, and it all
jelled.
“It had never known
that you could write about
anything as long as it was
powerful,” he said,.
With those streams —
toss in some Beatles to
boot — flowing through
his imagination, it‘s not
surprising he’s harvested a
career’s worth of powerful
songs.
The religion wasn’t
abandoned, not with songs
like “John the Baptist” and
“God Was in the Water,” a
song covered by one of his
biggest booster’s Bonnie
Raitt.
Bramblett fashioned a
career as a solo artist but
also as a much sought after
sideman, playing sax, gui-
tar and keyboards with
Steve Winwood, Gov’t
Mule, Gregg Allman,
Widespread Panic and
Levon Helm.
Now he’s focusing on
his own work.
His forthcoming “Devil
Music” digs deep into
those mysterious sounds
wafting into his south
Georgia bedroom. “It’s dif-
ferent from anything I’ve
done,” he said
It’s another step his
exploration of songwriting
“It’s the mystery and awe
of the thing coming togeth-
er,” he said. “It’s kind of
like being an archeologist
and discovering something
you didn’t know was there,
and it’s turning out to be a
little jewel.”
Bramblett said he gath-
ers “feelings, vignettes and
phrases. .. I don’t know
where it comes from I just
have to get in the mode of
receiving different kinds of
information.”
The mystery remains
even after the song has
come together. “A lot of
time I don’t know what the
song is about.”
Saints & devils meet
in Bramblett’s songs Violinist Jason Anick
thinks the Black Swamp
Arts Festival is just the
right venue for his band
Rhythm Future Quartet.
Both he and his co-
leader Finnish guitarist
Olli Soikkeli have played
the festival before —
Anick with guitar master
John Jorgenson and
Soikkeli with swing gui-
tarist Frank Vignola.
The festival, Anick
recalled was “kind of a
perfect model” for such an
event. The music covered
a range of styles and had
“all the other artistic
endeavors. ... The overall
presentation was great.”
“It’s great to come back
to a venue with familiar
faces,” Anick said. “You
build a rapport.”
Even better, he added,
“especially if you have
new material.”
The quartet is recording
a new album. And those
new pieces will get aired
out at the festival.
“I think it’s really
important to showcase
new material because you
really get a sense of how
it’ll work. They really start
to take form as you per-
form them live.”
This new album,
Rhythm Future’s second,
will continue along the
path they’ve blazed since
Anick and Soikkeli found-
ed the band a couple years
ago. While devotees of the
gypsy jazz created by
Django Reinhardt in the
1930s, Anick and Soikkeli
have taken the style in a
new direction. They bring
in more contemporary
tunes, including blending
Michael Jackson’s “Billie
Jean” with the standard
“Summertime.”
They also compose new
music for themselves.
“We’re branching out and
taking acoustic jazz set-
ting ... and using that as a
palette and seeing what
textures we can create.”
Taking gypsy jazz new places
Photo provided
Randall Bramblett
On stage
Main Stage:
Saturday, 4:30
p.m.
Stones Throw:
Saturday, mid-
night
Family Stage:
Sunday, 1:10
p.m.
On stage
Main Stage:
Saturday, noon
Community Stage:
Saturday, 2:45
p.m.
Stones Throw:
Saturday, 10:30
p.m.
Family Stage:
Sunday, 11:45
p.m.
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419-575-4157
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Opening Doors To Ownership
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Please come out
and support
the
Black Swamp
Arts Festival

Since forming in 2000,
Tal National have been on
a quest to make it known
to the world that Niger is
not in fact Nigeria.
Besides everything else,
musically, the land-locked
Sahelian nation never went
through the same kind of
cosmopolitan musical
explosion that many other
West African nations did in
the 1960s post-indepen-
dence era. Only around the
turn of the century have
some artists from Niger
broken into the interna-
tional market.
While Tal National’s
2008 sophomore album “A
Na Waya” made them the
most popular group in
Niger, their following
album and first interna-
tional release “Kaani” offi-
cially established them
outside the continent. Led
by band leader Hamadal
Issoufou Moumine, Kaani
was a joyful barrage of
traditional Hausa and
Zarma vocals, soukous
guitars, reggae synths, and
percussion, all rolled up
into a decidedly rock aes-
thetic.
Tal National took great
pride in representing the
ethnic diversity of Niger in
their music and in their
large rotating cast of band
members.
Tal National celebrates sound of Niger
On stage
Main Stage:
Saturday, 1:20
p.m.
Community Stage:
Saturday, 4 p.m.
Family Stage:
Sunday, 2:30
p.m.
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David Luning had an
epiphany while attending
one of the best music
schools in the country.
He wasn’t in class at
Berklee College of Music
in Boston; he was hang-
ing out with a couple
friends drinking beer.
They played music by
John Prine and Old Crow
Medicine show.
Until then, he said, “I
didn’t particularly care
for folk music. I didn’t
know much about it.”
He was majoring in
film scoring.
These records, though,
caught his ear. “I was
blown away.”
Now Luning had a new
musical direction.
“Almost immediately I
talked to my parents and
said this is what I wanted
to do with my life,” he
recalled in a recent tele-
phone interview. He told
them: “I want to be a
singer songwriter and
sing Americana music.”
And to do that he
wanted to return home to
northern California.
His parents did not
agree, not at first at least.
When he went back
for winter break, Luning
played them “a song
about my trials and tribu-
lations in Boston. It was
kind of a sad song.”
The New England
winters, he noted, were
“extremely difficult for
someone who grew up in
the moderate climes of
northern California.”
The song was called
“Northern California,”
and that’s where he
stayed.
“My parents are amaz-
ing and unbelievably sup-
portive and let me do this,
this job.”
With the support of his
parents he started work-
ing on his songs. “I wrote
and wrote and wrote and
wrote,” Luning said.
Now the 28-year-old
has a catalog of original
songs, and is slowly
stretching out his per-
forming opportunities.
Playing open mikes,
recording a CD, “Just
Drop By.”
His mission to spread
the word on his songs, he
even ventured into the
“American Idol” scene,
and performed on the
show in early 2014.
“I knew I was different
than their typical
‘American Idol’ contes-
tant. I didn’t know how
far I would get,” he
recalled. “All I wanted to
do is get some exposure
for my music.”
The experience was
“weird.” He was in his
late 20s hanging around
with teenage pop singers.
It’s a reality show, he
noted, so what appears on
the screen “is not really
real.”
Still he got a good
response from the judg-
es.
“I love it,” Jennifer
Lopez said. “He has a
really, really beautiful
tone.”
Keith Urban told him:
“You have stanch origi-
nality, no one’s doing
what you do ... You’re a
good singer-songwriter,
story-telling guy.”
Luning finds way
as songwriter Laura Rain knew early
on that she wanted to be a
Motown performer.
Growing up in the
Detroit metro area, she was
exposed to a wide range of
pop and rock sounds at
home, and her parents who
“patronized the arts”
brought her to hear music
in the city.
“The music just grabbed
me,” she said. “I think it’s
in the water ... the music
that’s particular to Detroit.
We produce this kind of
soulful sound.”
Rain knew she wanted
to be part of that. “I saw
myself singing,” she said.
Still it took her a num-
ber of years and a couple
residencies in California to
realize that dream.
“Sometimes it was so
far away I didn’t know
what I could do to make
it.”
Then a few years ago
family issues called her
back to Detroit, and she
picked up where she left
off.
On June 6, 2012 — she
has that date pinned
down— her keyboard
player couldn’t make a res-
taurant gig, so she called a
musician who’d reached
out to her.
Within a week of first
meeting George Friend,
they were writing music
together. “What I lacked
he picked up. I never had
such success working with
someone,” Rain said. Now
fewer than three years later
they have released a third
album, “Gold.”
Those new tunes will be
heavily in evidence when
Rain and her backing group
the Caesars take the Main
Stage at the Black Swamp
Arts Festival
. Later in the day the
band will close out the
Community Stage with a
set at 4 p.m.
Even working as a duo,
they deliver a full-throat-
ed, throbbing Motown
sound. Adding the Caesars’
drums, organ and some-
times a bass fattens up the
groove.
The core is the collabo-
ration between Friend and
Rain.
“Sometimes we just sit
there and out of the blue
George starts playing. I
start singing and we better
have something record-
ing,” she said. “Sometimes
the songs come out com-
plete. ... The way I write is
almost automatic.
“I never really know
what the songs are about. I
try to write something that
will uplift people. I hope to
make them feel better when
they leave.”
Rain’s Motown dream comes true
On stage
Main Stage: Sunday,
12:30 p.m.
Community Stage:
Sunday at 4 p.m.
On stage
Main Stage:
Sunday, 11 a.m.
Community
Stage: Sunday,
1:30 p.m.
Local Author Anesa Miller is now a
Finalist for Best Regional Fiction
for OUR ORBIT
a novel set in 1990s Ohio
Available in BG at
Grounds for Thought Coﬀeehouse
Calico, Sage and Thyme Giftshop
At discount for Black Swamp Festival weekend!

Black Swamp Arts Fest 2015

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Black Swamp Arts Fest 2015