Center for the Arts bringing the Kingston Trio to Grass Valley

The Kingston Trio will play at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Grass Valley on April 16.

The Kingston Trio spearheaded a boom in the popularity of folk music that continues today.

WHO: The Center for the Arts presents

WHAT: The Kingston Trio

WHEN: Friday, April 16, 8:00PM

WHERE: Veterans Memorial Auditorium, 255 S. Auburn Street, Grass Valley

TICKETS: $35 Bleachers
$45 Floor
$65 VIP Includes: Reserved seating and parking, one drink coupon,
pre-show meet & greet
Tickets at:
The Center Box Office - 530-274-8384 ext 14
Briar Patch - 530-272-5333
Cherry Records - 530-823-2147
Tickets online at www.thecenterforthearts.org  

The Center for the Arts commitment to bringing world-class performers to
Nevada County is at the heart of their mission.  As a result, Grass Valley's
Veterans Memorial Auditorium was filled to the rafters for The Center's
presentation of the Smothers Brothers in October.  Following on that success
the Center will present folk music pioneers, The Kingston Trio, on Friday,
April  16.  The Kingston Trio is one of the few groups today that has
survived the many changes in the world of music. They have remained
consistent in their sound, which explains their constant popularity.

The Motherlode of the Sierras is home to a vibrant arts community with
residents such as world renowned composer Terry Riley, the late folk
activist Utah Phillips, avant garde musician Joanna Newsom, poet Gary
Snyder, slide guitarist Roy Rogers and many more.

True to it's name, The Center for the Arts with it's Main Stage Theater, Off
Center Stage black-box theater, gallery and dance studios, has become a hub
of activity for artists and performers in every genre.  To encourage art
lovers to join in, the Center is partnering with local inns and restaurants
to create discount packages for visitors who wish to stay overnight for the
Kingston Trio's Grass 
Valley concert. Please contact The Center for more information.

There are a handful of performers who have redefined the content of popular
music at critical points in history. The Kingston Trio are one such group,
transforming folk music into a hot commodity and creating a demand for
acoustic guitars and banjos and singing songs in harmony. On a commercial
level, from 1957 until 1963, the Kingston Trio were the most vital and
popular folk group in the world. The trio spearheaded a boom in the
popularity of folk music that suddenly made it important to millions of
listeners. Without the enviable record of popularity and sales that they
built up for folk music, it is unlikely that Columbia Records would ever
signed an unknown singer/guitarist named Bob Dylan, or to put Pete Seeger
under contract, or for Warner Brothers to record Peter, Paul and Mary. 

The group was founded in 1957 in Palo Alto, CA.  They were booked into the
Purple Onion, a leading night spot in San Francisco, opening for comedienne
Phyllis Diller.  The result was a series of sold-out shows leading to a five
month engagement, from June to December of 1957. During that summer, Capitol
Records producer Voyle Gilmore, who had previously recorded Frank Sinatra
and the Four Freshmen, saw them play at the Purple Onion, and a seven-year
contract was signed soon after.  The group followed the Purple Onion
engagement with a national tour that took them to successful engagements in
Chicago and New York. During this tour, the group recorded its debut album
including a brace of classic Kingston Trio songs such as "Scotch and Soda,"
"Hard, Ain't It Hard," and "Tom Dooley." The latter song became a single in
July of 1958 spending October through January in the Billboard Top Ten,
selling over three million copies and becoming one of a handful of records,
such as Elvis' "Heartbreak Hotel" and the Beatles' "I Want to Hold Your
Hand," that transformed the musical landscape. 

Their residence in San Francisco was now at the much more prestigious Hungry
I, and it was there that they recorded their second album, before a live
audience in the summer of 1958.  By that time, they had broadened their
repertory as well, to embrace R&B as well as folk songs. The Trio made the
cover of Life magazine on August 3, 1959, and were voted the Best Group of
the Year for 1959 in the pages of both Billboard and Cashbox magazines, and
were presented with two Grammy Awards.  The Trio's record of hits continued
unabated.  They defined the entire folk-pop genre in much the same way that
the Beach Boys defined surf music and the Beatles later defined the entire
British Invasion.  The Trio's youthful exuberance and mix of upbeat
sensibilities and traditional songs seemed perfectly of a piece with the
dawn of the Kennedy administration, and their music a veritable soundtrack
for college life during the era.  The group happened to catch a performance
by the trio Peter, Paul and Mary, and heard their rendition of a Pete Seeger
song entitled "Where Have All the Flowers Gone." The Kingston Trio recorded
their own version of the song which became a favorite for millions of
younger folk listeners who had come along in the years since "Tom Dooley."  

The Trio were still doing standing-room-only business into 1962 and early
1963.  They still had an ear for good songs -- "I'm Going Home" was as fine
a folk-style single as anyone recorded in 1964, and they subsequently did
excellent recordings of works such as Tom Paxton's "The Last Thing on My
Mind" and "Where I'm Bound," as well as Gordon Lightfoot's "Early Morning
Rain." 

In 1981, as part of a concert taped for a public television broadcast, group
members gathered together into a sort of Kingston Trio mega-group of Bob
Shane, Nick Reynolds, Dave Guard, John Stewart, George Grove, and Roger
Gambill, with Mary Travers as host, with Lindsey Buckingham -- a longtime
Trio fan -- as special guest. The untimely death of Gambill in the late '80s
led to Nick Reynolds rejoining, and the Kingston Trio have kept going since
into the 21st century. Today the Trio -- in its 53nd year as of 2010 -- has
consisted of Grove, Bill Zorn (late of the Limeliters), and Rick Dougherty
(also a Limeliters alumnus). 

********************

Rick Dougherty has over 30 years of experience as a guitarist, songwriter,
performer, arranger and director but he is best known for his soaring tenor
voice.  He began playing guitar in college with a particular interest in
finger-styles, and within a year he was appearing in local coffeehouses in
Pasadena.  Besides possessing a beautiful voice, Rick is a seasoned
entertainer. He plays the banjo, guitar, bass and piano superbly; he is also
a songwriter and arranger, and possesses a flair for comedy which fits in
perfectly with that facet of The Kingston Trio's appeal.

********************

George Grove was born in Hickory, North Carolina on Oct. 9, 1947. He
attended Wake Forest University where he majored in music. While at Wake
Forest, he spent several summers entertaining U.S. Military personnel In
Alaska and Europe.  After graduating in 1969, he played trumpet and piano in
the Army Band for two years, and spent time in Nashville working as a studio
musician. In 1976, Bob Shane invited him to join The Kingston Trio.  
In his time away from touring with the group, George arranges and scores
orchestral music, produces albums for other artists, and does session work
as a musician and vocalist. George lives in Las Vegas.

********************

Bill Zorn has won national awards in television as a teenage variety show
host, toured the world with three of the country's top folk groups and
produced albums in England and America.  He has also acted in British dramas
and comedies, provided voiceovers for documentaries and cartoons, and
published dozens of his own songs.  
After four years as leader of The New Christy Minstrels and four years in
The Kingston Trio, Bill moved to England in 1977.  In his 20 years there he
had a hit record, a successful folk band and more. He came back in 1997 to
help revive the Limeliters, and after seven years with them he is now
enjoying his current adventure-once again touring with The Kingston Trio.

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BILLBOARD MAGAZINE
5 #1 Albums
46 weeks at #1 on the Billboard Charts
1262 weeks on the Billboard Charts
114 weeks in the Top 40
14 Top 10 Albums
4 Consecutive #1 Albums
17 consecutive Top 40 albums

BILLBOARD TOP 40 HITS
500 Miles
A Worried Man
Across The Wide Missouri
Ally Ally Oxen Free
Bad Man's Blunder
Blowin In The Wind
Desert Pete
El Matador 
Everglades
Greenback Dollar
Hard Travelin
Hard, Ain't It Hard
It Was A Very Good Year
Lemon Tree
M.T.A.
Raspberries, Strawberries
Reuben James
Scarlet Ribbons
Scotch And Soda
Seasons In The Sun
South Coast
The Patriot Game
The Reverend Mr. Black
The River Is Wide
The Tijuana Jail
The Wreck Of The John B.
They Call The Wind Maria
This Land Is Your Land
This Little Light
Tom Dooley
Try To Remember
Turn Around
Where Have All The Flowers Gone
Wimoweh
You Don't Knock
Zombie Jamboree