All Rights Reserved 2008
Rhythm & Roots
Concert Series
P.O. Box 32857
Tucson, AZ 85751
(520) 760-4135
info@RhythmAndRoots.org

“A master of high-lonesome.” The New Yorker

Friday, May 9 - 7:30pm
Museum of Northern Arizona, Flagstaff
Advance tickets $25
Click here to order online.

Saturday, May 10 - 7:30pm
Old Town Artisans – 201 N. Court, downtown Tucson
Advance tickets $27
Click here to order online.

Peter Rowan has been one of the most influential singers and songwriters in contemporary bluegrass and folk for over four decades. He is an original Bluegrass Boy, touring as lead singer and rhythm guitarist with the father of Bluegrass, Bill Monroe, from 1964 to 1967. In 1973 he formed the bluegrass band Old & in the Way with Jerry Garcia, David Grisman, Vassar Clements and John Kahn. A musical adventurer, he has blurred the boundaries between old-time country, folk, blues and rock styles. He has recorded more than 25 albums and written hundreds of songs, including “Panama Red,” “Midnight Moonlight,” and “Land of the Navajo.”

Old Town Artisans – 201 N. Court, downtown Tucson
Advance tickets $15
Click here to order online.

Ted Ramírez, Gilbert Brown and Michael Ronstadt present a powerful musical program filled with the history and lore of the Great American Southwest. Their music reflects the old West, a land of diverse cultures ranging from Mexican and American Indian to German and Irish. It's a reflection of the American cowboy with the sound of Spanish and Mexican influences. At any one performance, the group will sing in English, Spanish and various American Indian dialects while performing on a dozen instruments. The group has performed at The Kennedy Center, Philadelphia Folk Festival and annual tours to Europe.

"A powerhouse singer… Big Pete Pearson shouts and scorches with energy rarely found in artists half his age." - Jazz & Blues Report

You could travel to Chicago, Memphis or Macon, Georgia, and be hard pressed to find a blues belter as powerful and soulful as 71-year-old Big Pete Pearson. This band is proof that the blues is not dying of old age and uptown respectability. Pearson breathes fire into his songs, stoked by the urgency of the Rhythm Room Allstars and Promethean harmonica of Bob Corritore. Living Blues magazine calls Pearson, “one of the music's unsung masters," and describes his “voice as hefty as Big Joe Turner.” Come celebrate Memorial Day with Arizona’s King of the Blues.

Old Town Artisans – 201 N. Court, downtown Tucson
Advance  tickets $12
Click here to order online.

“Eliza Gilkyson is making folk music for the 21st Century, and it’s a delightful thing to hear.”  – Austin Chronicle

Friday, May 30 - 7:30pm
Museum of Northern Arizona, Flagstaff
Advance  tickets $20
Click here to order online.

Saturday, May 31 - 7:30pm
Old Town Artisans – 201 N. Court, downtown Tucson
Advance  tickets $22
Click here to order online.

Over the course of 13 albums, Eliza Gilkyson has become one of the most original and influential folk artists of our time.  Her music draws from gospel, blues, and folk rock that the Austin Chronicle described as "Tender and cathartic to the point of jubilation.”  Her recent songwriting artfully reveals the roots of progressive patriotism, where piercing imagery is couched in gorgeous melodies memorable enough to win her a Grammy nomination in the Contemporary Folk category and a place in the Austin Music Hall of Fame.

Eliza has appeared on NPR’s All Things Considered, Austin City Limits and toured with Patty Griffin and Mary Chapin Carpenter.

"This is world music that truly has international appeal!" – Music Connection

Old Town Artisans – 201 N. Court, downtown Tucson
Advance tickets $20
Click here to order online.

Willie Royal, the violin virtuoso from Willie and Lobo, has formed The Willie Royal quartet.  Willie will perform familiar original compositions and venture into jazz, salsa and world music with a dash of Middle Eastern music for flavor. Willie Royal writes, “I have been playing with Lobo for 16 years and it has been a great journey. I look forward to venturing into styles of music that bring in my whole history - I might even play the Orange Blossom Special. One thing for sure - it will be a great adventure!”  Rhythm & Roots welcomes the southwest debut of the Willie Royal Quartet.

"Nobody writes in the idiom better than Roy Book Binder. He is a master player, singer, writer and teller of tales… true tales.” - Jorma Kaukonen (Hot Tuna, Jefferson Airplane)

Old Town Artisans – 201 N. Court, downtown Tucson
Advance tickets $17
Click here to order online.

Roy Book Binder is a blues singing, guitar picking, song- writing real deal troubadour, and has been for the past 40 years. Back in the early 1960s, Roy learned his craft from the legendary blind street singer, Reverend Gary Davis.   After two years of traveling the folk-blues circuit with his mentor, Roy struck out on his own.

An Evening with Roy Book Binder is part storytelling, part hilarious educational experience and part performance with expert blues finger picking. Roy has toured with Bonnie Raitt, Hot Tuna, J.J. Cale and performed at The National StoryTelling Festival, the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, the Chicago Blues Festival, and MerleFest where he has hosted the acoustic blues stage for the past twelve years.

Bluesman Stefan George was a New Folk Award Finalist at the Kerrville Folk Festival, a Telluride Bluegrass Festival Troubadour Finalist and a holds multiple Tucson Area Music (TAMMY) awards.