Larry Keel & Natural Bridge
Larry Keel & Natural Bridge
LEXINGTON, VA
Country / Americana / Bluegrass
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Bio
Larry Keel and Natural Bridge
Connecting traditional songs of yesterday with their own original and inventive sounds of today, Larry Keel & Natural Bridge create astonishingly powerful acoustic music rich in heritage, heart and hot licks! Keel and his ensemble are intent upon taking their instruments and their voices to their fullest potential for emotion and amazement. While paying respect to the legacy left by the forefathers of bluegrass, Keel bridges the gap between traditional and contemporary American Mountain Music. Larry Keel & Natural Bridge includes flatpicking guitar master Larry Keel (guitar, vocals), Jenny Keel (bass fiddle, vocals), Mark Schimick (mandolin, vocals), and, Jason Flournoy (banjo, vocals).
About
Audiences across the globe are repeatedly rendered slack-jawed with astonishment by the overwhelming creative power of Larry Keel and his band. Like some massive musical storm that has taken on a life of its own, Larry Keel and Natural Bridge continue to gather strength and intensify. Batten down the hatches or prepare to be blown away in the perfect storm, a raging musical maelstrom of swirling innovations. The extended forecast is calling for tonal tornadoes of epic proportions made more dangerous by syncopated sound cyclones scattered with bursts of colossal chord changes and intermittent harmonies. For those in the direct path of this vast vortex of energy, expect to be further battered by sonic tsunamis fed by raging rhythms. Keel advisories will remain in effect until after the second set.
The audience at a Larry Keel performance is not simply being entertained; instead, they are having their hearts and brains happily steamed in a boiling cauldron of blazing instrumentation and BRAND NEW original sounds. Driven jamming is linked in flawless cohesion to brilliant and multiple variations—this band is anything but ordinary! A band of kindred spirits who share a common musical vision, Larry Keel and Natural Bridge is: the beautiful, cheerful steady backbone-Jenny Keel (bass fiddle, vocals), the atomic, off the chain fireball-Mark Schimick (mandolin, vocals), the charming, crescendo pickin' stud-Jason Flournoy (banjo, vocals), and, of course, the MAD, marquee headlining maestro-Larry Keel (guitar, vocals).
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Any discussion involving the current badass manifestation of Larry Keel and his band must start with an abridged (no pun intended) history of where Larry has already been. Guess what, he's been damn near everywhere.
Larry Keel made his debut on Nov. 25, 1968 in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, a location steeped in the rich heritage of Mountain Music and Mountain Ways. Immersed in a talented musical family, Larry was weaned on an American legacy of Bluegrass songs played on Bluegrass instruments. For that upbringing, we can all be thankful.
In his late teens, Larry would next sharpen his flatpicking chops in Japan of all places. A rigorous and grueling performance schedule at the Tokyo Disney Theme Park would initiate young Keel to both the joys and vagaries of professional musicianship.
Upon his return stateside, Larry embarked on a relentless and purposeful pursuit to further expand and hone his talents. To this day he remains a tireless troubadour, resolved in his quest to bring his unique musical vision to the world. Keel spent the early 90's traveling extensively with a passel of likeminded musicians, appearing nationwide at music venues and festivals. These early tours of over a decade ago culminated with Larry receiving two prestigious awards at the venerable Telluride Bluegrass Festival. This honored recognition among peers provided the first glimpse of the powerful creative potential which would eventually place Larry Keel at the forefront of today's musical pioneers.
Early on, Larry established himself as a notorious experimenter of unassailable intensity and talent. During a career spent weathering the changing tides of traditional bluegrass, roots reggae, and even the currently emerging Indie-Alt scene, this visionary maverick has combined raw flatpicking virtuosity and prolific songwriting with a non-stop performance calendar. The result is a dynamic and evolutionary musical force which stands in ongoing defiance to all genre expectations. Yeah, that's a mouthful, but the only constant with Larry's distinct artistic niche is that he keeps it always and forever beyond categorization. Don't bother trying to pigeonhole the music of Larry Keel. He's untamed and untamable.
His influences have an eclectic breadth and depth which casually jumps from such stylistic extremes as The Kentucky Colonels to Peter Tosh to Green Day. A one-of-a-kind innovator, Keel has the enviable ability to weld apparently incongruous musical sensibilities into a seamless powerhouse of ass kicking energy. He has the foundation to work effectively and fearlessly with the Music of Life itself---music in all its forms.
Of course, given Larry's level of technical mastery, fortified as it is by a strong shot of brazen individuality, he has inevitably drawn a crowd of legendary peers and heroes. The impressive list of musical icons who have shared the stage or collaborated with Larry Keel reads as a solid testimony attesting to the status of his talent. These legends include: Tony Rice, Sam Bush, Vassar Clements, Curtis Burch, Peter Rowan, Darell Scott, Jim Lauderdale, Jack Lawrence, Tony Trishka, Mark Vann, Vince Herman, Mike Marshall, Darol Anger, David Grier, Brian Sutton, Norman Blake, Chris Thile, Keller Williams, and probably others.
It is perhaps Larry's eminent songwriting skills which are the most magnetic characteristic attracting these legends into his circle. As Tony Rice has said of Larry to sold out crowds in America's premier concert halls,”This cat really knows how to write songs...” Yeah, you're right Tony. Del McCoury enjoyed Larry's “Mountain Song” to such a degree that he had to record it on his Grammy-winning release, The Company We Keep. Not to be outdone, Tony Rice vows to record an album of Keel's music one day. Rice isn't the only one who wants to record with Larry. You will be hearing some magnificent surprises in the near future as plans are in the works for Larry to team up with some of the most hardcore and acclaimed songwriters and musicians today.
Larry Keel, what then? Pure energy, Precision, Accuracy—all encased in a hard callous honesty. Keel has placed his finger on the pulse of a new sound. The songs fit the times and are helping to define them. With an eye and ear for the ironic, an integrity of common speech: he has found that truth makes its own song and its own music. People change. Society changes. Larry Keel changes. Somehow he is able to strike a nerve with our complex modern situation yet still convey the FUN, delight, and simple satisfaction which is captured in the age old necessity of the primal mysteries: a wood fire, walking on a mountain trail, pulling a fish from a cool clear stream. Larry's songs run a gauntlet of storytelling finesse; peopled with murderous outlaws and drunken renegades as well as Honest Abe and ole Albert Einstein. Together, the plots and characters brilliantly color in Keel's outside-the-lines arrangements.
One of Larry's great strengths is that he realizes that no matter how compelling an artist's past might be, in the end what matters is that the music is always evolving---keeping it fresh, vibrant, even volatile. He takes pride in the opportunity of turning on today's youths to the power and weight of Bluegrass tradition but, not to the point of demanding their allegiance to that tradition. Larry is convinced that the best way to preserve Bluegrass music while moving forward into the 21st century is to hand it down to the youths of today in a form to which they can easily relate. Promoting Mountain Music, nationally and internationally, through a completely new and original musical language has become Larry's answer to preserving Bluegrass from suffocating and dying a stagnant death.
Keel is a natural leader for this mission. With youthful spirit and youthful mischief (picture a twelve year old with a sack of illicit fireworks), Larry's performances are borderline dangerous, punctuated by explosions of frenzied guitar licks and unexpected moments of sheer craziness. When things get raging hot, Larry laughs and throws gasoline on the fire. No doubt, he is the baddest mo-fo on 6 strings, offering a conflagration of high octane musical mayhem.
In the hands of Larry Keel, an acoustic guitar becomes a vehicle of fuel injected expression. He plays with immense force. Even on slower songs and ballads his solos roll with the majestic force of a giant creeping glacier of truth, powerful and beautiful, an almost imperceptible peaceful sliding...no, but hammering and knocking, thunderous—then...pauses, silences of glory, finally crashing, soaked in awe. Holy shit! Can you imagine the fast songs?
Larry has been known to throw tempo tantrums: thrusting crescendos of high excitement, fury barely contained, careening cadences of chaos, thrilling to blood and nerve and heart; his hands a blur of attack. When this happens, things frequently get broken. Metaphorically, during these epiphanies of flatpicking insanity, Larry likes to take his guitar, go way out on a limb, and then JUMP. He goes screaming off into the sonic void of his own creation, abusing a song's rhythm, alarming his bandmates and the audience, but always miraculously managing to land firmly back on stage, still in the correct key and never missing a beat. Of course, his guitar is usually left in tatters with a dangling tangle of popped and broken strings which were unavoidably seared by the scorching heat and pressure of Larry's instrumental tirade. People stare in awestruck disbelief and wonder what the hell they just witnessed.
Finally, no examination of Larry's extraordinary musical talents would be complete without a few words about his voice. His haunting baritone commands attention and serves as a comforting counterbalance to the bedlam he inflicts on guitar. The sonorous decibels crawl deep into the listeners' ears emphasizing the emotional level of the songs he sings. There's no confusing Keel's voice with anyone else. It's mellow as a fine aged whiskey but has the kick of clear corn liquor. He pours his vocals thick and rich with subtle quavering inflections that will send chills down your spine. The stories and images within the songs are suddenly invoked by quiet intonations at the microphone. And, if that doesn't work, Larry commonly and effectively resorts to yelling at the top of his lungs. Both techniques have their appropriate application. Regardless of the volume or topic of a song, Larry brings it to life with an unmistakable growling as if a very large and very mean dog were lurking in the shadows.
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by Larry Keel & Natural Bridge
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