Mickey Hart is best known as an integral part of an extraordinary expedition into the soul and spirit of music, disguised as the rock and roll band the Grateful Dead. A student of Ustad Allah Rakah (Ravi Shankar's tabla player), he added various strains of non-Western music to the Dead's general atmosphere. Over the years, he has been involved in many musical and archival projects, most notably the band Global Drum Project, and the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress's "Endangered Music Project." He is the author of several books, including Drumming at the Edge of Magic. As half of the percussion tandem known as the Rhythm Devils, Mickey and Bill Kreutzmann transcended the conventions of rock drumming. Their extended polyrhythmic excursions were highlights of Grateful Dead shows, introducing the band's audience to an ever-growing arsenal of percussion instruments from around the world. Exposure to these exotic sounds fueled Mickey's desire to learn about the various cultures that produced them. The cumulative rhythmic experiences of Mickey’s many years of banging on things masterfully will be on display as The Mickey Hart Band makes a stop at the Calvin Theatre on Tuesday July 8th, part of a 20 city summer tour that includes many of the nations premiere festivals. The ensemble will feature Steve Kimock on guitar, George Porter Jr. on bass, Jen Durkin on vocals, Walfredo Reyes Jr. on drums, and talking drum master Sikiru Adepoju. Keyboardist Kyle Hollingsworth of String Cheese Incident recently joined the tour.Contest! Buy a Mickey Hart ticket at the box office and drop your name in the hat for a drawing to win all 6 new of these CDs: The Shout! Factory has (re)-releases six of Hart’s extra-curricular (non-Dead specific) releases, dubbed The Mickey Hart Collection. Many of these initially made their first digital appearance on Rykodisc about 20 years ago and have now been remastered and deluxed up by Shout! Factory; the guys that used to run Rhino Records. They are on display at the box office and that's where you can enter the contest.
1 comment:
The Mickey Hart show absolutely SUCKED last night. The vocalist was off key , the bassist was just plain horrible and there was no coherency within the band. The volume was too loud and the soundboard was having a difficult time controlling feedback. It sounded like the first practice session of a garage band. We left before the end of the second set. They couldn't even do covers that well, even of Dead material. We named it Mickey Hart and the ADD band. On the plus side the guitarist was phenomenal.
Post a Comment