The Geomatic Attic has had a nice run of sold out shows, including this years edition of the Highway 3 Roots Revue, Nov. 30 at the Geomatic Attic, though it wouldn’t have been sold out if it had been at the University Theatre as originally planned.
But the Geomatic Attic is a better venue to get up close and personal with for Leeroy Stagger, Dave McCann and John Wort Hannam for their annual intimate evening of stories, songs, jokes and reminiscences.
All thre
e of the Southern Alberta based songwriters, who all moved here from afar, are parents and husbands now, so their works reflected more newfound contentment and domesticity than usual.
But first, three quarters of the local musicians featured on a new compilation recorded at the University of Lethbridge called the Horizon Sessions, played solo sets.
Bryan Bradfield, a Lethbridge Folk Club mainstay, was up first playing some acoustic blues on his dobro including a nice version of St. Louis Blues.
Talented young guitar fingerpicking prodigy Fei Fei Du humbled many of the guitarists in the audience with years more experience by playing some blazing Chet Atkins inspired fingerpicking blended with lots of jazz and even some classical music. He showed the audience how he makes one guitar sounds like three by first plucking a bass line with his thumb, then a rhythm by tapping on his guitar's body then melodies with his other fingers. He shyly looked down at the floor he introduced as “first song I ever wrote” and saying it wasn’t very good. “Fireworks” featured a blur of harmonics inspired by a visit home to China during the Chinese New Year's celebrations. If the first song he wrote “wasn’t any good,” I’d be impressed to hear what he thought was a good song.
Ryland Moranz plucked the banjo for a couple of original bluegrass and folk songs. He’d later lend his banjo and mandolin prowess to several of Leeroy Stagger’s songs with the Highway 3 Roots Revue.
The Highway 3 Roots Revue was exactly what the audience expected — three talented songwriters stripping down their songs to the bare essentials. As usual, each songwriter took a turn to sing one of their songs while the other two added extra instrumentation and background vocals.
Leeroy Stagger kicked things off by dedicating one of his crowd pleasers “I Believe In Love” to Murray Nelson, a beloved local musician who passed away from cancer last week.
Dave McCann followed with “Rolling Down the River.”
John Wort Hannam added “one day he’d like to write a hit song and buy Nova Scotia,” which lead to a pleasant performance of “Good Night Nova Scotia,” one of the highlights off of his latest CD “Love Lives On.” The title track of that album was the highlight of the next set, which was contemplative songs about family and stories about the trio's experiences as new parents. Stagger’s “You Can’t Have it All” was outstanding.
The next round featured more serious songs. Stagger contributed his song about an outlaw biker “Stormy” which featured Ryland Moranz on banjo while Hannam added an impassioned version of “ Man of God‚” his song about residential schools.
McCann contributed a beloved story about driving down to Nashville to record an album with his band the Ten Toed Frogs and fearing for his life while filling up with gas in east St. Louis which ended up in a name change to Dave McCann and the Firehearts. The crowd favourite “Standing in the River” followed that.
Then it was time for special guests. Bryan Bradfield returned to stage to add dobro to Stagger's “Radiant Land” as Ryland Moranz added some mandolin.
He and Hannam later added two banjos to another of Stagger’s songs.
John Wort Hannam invited Fei Fei Du on stage to add a beautiful guitar solo on his number.
McCann played a highlight called “Snake Bit,” to wind down the show as the trio went around one more time. All three of them
played on a beautiful version of “Beautiful House,” which Stagger dedicated to Geomatic Attic’s Mike Spencer and to everybody who came to the show on a Monday night.
McCann added one of my favourites “Headlights and Halos” off his latest CD “Circle of Light” to wind down his potion of the show while Hannam thanked Fei Fei Du, Bryan Bradfield and Ryland Moranz for playing.
