Cathy
and Dave with Bob Dyer Album Release Concert in June:
a Tribute to Bob Dyer
Cathy
and Dave with Bob Dyer
A gaggle of friends and colleagues of the late Bob Dyer will
gather for an album release concert for “The Wandering Fool: Songs by Bob
Dyer Sung in Tribute by his Friends” on Saturday, June 7, at 7 p.m., at
Thespian Hall in Dyer’s hometown of Boonville. The well-known songwriter, poet
and historian passed away in April 2007, and longtime cohorts Cathy Barton and
Dave Para spent the better part of the past year producing the 78-minute CD
featuring 19 cuts by local musicians and friends of Dyer’s. The concert will
feature as many artists on the album as possible plus some additional guests.
Barton and Para produced the album for Dyer’s Big Canoe Records label with
financial support by the Turner Hall River Rats for the Arts, of which Bob was a
member. To purchase the album, visit:
http://www.bigcanoerecords.com
“Cathy and I thank the River Rats for raising money for this project that is
very dear to our hearts,” Para says. The months we have worked on it has been an
emotional journey, and we’re honored that so many of Bob’s friends and musical
comrades have contributed so much. We’re looking forward to getting as many of
them together as possible at Thespian Hall.
Barton and Para worked on most the songs recorded at Pete Szkolka’s studio in
Columbia, but contributions came from five other studios to accommodate the
artists. Columbia’s Radio Ranger, Steve Donofrio, greatly contributed to the
studio production. Donofrio produced the Lee Ruth tribute album “Everybody’s Got
Love” for KOPN radio in 2003, and Steve helped achieve the objective to get a
variety of musical interpretations and styles of Bob’s songs to give them
flight.
Artists on the album who will appear June 7 include:
Leela Grace, who did a sparkling rendition of “Talking Waters; Barton and Para,
who recorded “Bingham's Song” featuring Steve Litwiller on clarinet; David Lynn
Grimes who created a bossa nova version sang the title cut “The Wandering Fool;”
Rocket Kirchner and Mark Risch who sang “Huckleberry Finn”; Bartholomew Bean who
rendered Bob’s talking blues song of the legendary “Jim the Wonder Dog”; --
Violet Vonder Haar who recorded a striking version of “On a Day Like Today”;
Michael Cochran who offered a spirited arrangement of the keelboatman song “Mike
Fink”; Lee Ruth, who recorded the seldom heard “From a Star”; Rick Hocks, who
produced a multi-layered rock-setting of the Overton legend “Phantom Black
Carriage”; Ed Trickett who first dubbed Bob “the bard of Boonville” and recorded
the later favorite “One Last Time.” Also Boonville First Christian Church
Chancel Choir, directed by Janice Bradshaw, will perform the late Paul
Drummond’s choral arrangement of “River of the Big Canoes,” which was recorded
in May 2007 by Drummond’s choir at Central Methodist University. Bradshaw,
Boonville schools’ choral teacher for 35 years, substituted to teach Drummond’s
choral literature course at the college this year following Drummond’s death in
August 2007.
Other songs on the CD include: “Flood Song,” a most original delta-blues
arrangement Bob’s song about the Flood of 1993, by Jerry Foster; “Gooch's Mill”
an instrumental take by fiddler David Wilson on Bob’s “Wild Child of Gooch’s
Mill”; “The Last Man to Hang in Missouri,” by John Schneller and SRE in a full
rock version of Bob’s historical ballad; “The Death of Sitting Bull,” a live
recording of Bob Dyer at Thespian Hall in 2003 when the song was relatively new;
“Here I Go,” a song from Bob’s “Bermuda Triangle period” sung by Paul & Win
Grace; “The Dry Waltz,” recorded by Don Cooper living and teaching now in
Connecticut; “When the Rains Come Down,” recorded by Joe Newberry and Big
Medicine.
The concert starts at 7 p.m. at Thespian Hall on Saturday, June 7. Tickets cost
$10 and will be available at the door or by calling 660-882-5523.