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Live Music: Erik Koskinen Trio
April 19 @ 8:00 pm
Erik Koskinen is an American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer, whose music is not categorized by sub-genres. Stylistically he is on his own while heavily influenced by American roots music. The rhythmic integrity and musical tone is as important as the lyrical content and the artistic intent. Koskinen has reverently entered the anthology of uniquely crafted wry songs with the likes of Woody Guthrie and Ry Cooder while speaking as plainly as your neighbor. The Minneapolis Star Tribune calls Koskinen “the real deal” and “The Best country songwriter in Minnesota”
Dandy L. Freling based in Milwaukee, WI is a boot stompin’ finger pickin’ folkie and highway-kind traveler combining a touch of the high and lonesome hollers of the Appalachian hill people with the low-down, dusty grooves of the cosmic cowboys, Dandy has created a unique songwriter banquet sure to satisfy the hunger of any weary passerby. A boot stompin’ finger picker with remnant hollers of the greats of our past – Don’t be afraid to stop awhile, and fill up your plate, there’s plenty to go around.
“Koskinen’s a lights-out guitar player and his band is as good as any band in the country. But he’s also a top-shelf writer, with a blade-sharp wit and love songs so real and tender they seem to transcend the form. I know of few writers whose relationship to their own landscape, in this case the rural north, is so elemental, and so integral. His songs feel like weather. People know him in Minnesota, where most bar bands seem to cover at least one of his songs, but otherwise he’s still one of the best kept secrets in the country. He sings about an America that doesn’t get much play anymore, the one where the people at the bottom can’t quite get ahead, and where working people aren’t cartoon props in a culture war, but shrewd human beings living hard lives, and hard loves. His songs have the diamond-hard clarity and simplicity of Tom Petty, and like Petty, Koskinen can sing a literal statement without metaphor or ornament, and make it move like poetry.
The spiritual hunger in rock ‘n’ roll that came from blues and gospel is still a hunger in these songs, and if you listen hard, you can hear that lean coyote voice — wary, feral, full of fierce delight — lighting up the wee hours from somewhere out on the prairie.” – Jeffrey Foucault
About the venue: 50 ticketed guests will be admitted for seated viewing. 20 Standing Room Only tickets will be available on the day of the event for $25.
