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David Bromberg Quintet (RESCHEDULED) with Roger Street Friedman

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For Americana godfather David Bromberg, it all began with the blues.

His incredible journey spans five-and-a-half decades, and includes – but is not limited to – adventures with Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jerry Garcia, and music and life lessons from seminal blues guitarist Reverend Gary Davis, who claimed the young Bromberg as a son. A musician’s musician, Bromberg’s mastery of several stringed instruments (guitar, fiddle, Dobro, mandolin), and multiple styles is legendary, leading Dr. John to declare him an American icon. In producing John Hartford’s hugely influential Aereo-Plain LP, Bromberg even co-invented a genre: Newgrass

David Bromberg Quintet

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Artist Bio

“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” – T.S. Eliot

“There’s only two kinds of music – ‘the Star Spangled Banner’ and the blues.” – Willie Nelson, quoting renowned fiddler Johnny Gimble

For Americana godfather David Bromberg, it all began with the blues.

His incredible journey spans five-and-a-half decades, and includes – but is not limited to – adventures with Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jerry Garcia, and music and life lessons from seminal blues guitarist Reverend Gary Davis, who claimed the young Bromberg as a son. A musician’s musician, Bromberg’s mastery of several stringed instruments (guitar, fiddle, Dobro, mandolin), and multiple styles is legendary, leading Dr. John to declare him an American icon. In producing John Hartford’s hugely influential Aereo-Plain LP, Bromberg even co-invented a genre: Newgrass.

Add in a period of self-imposed exile from his passion (1980-2002), during which he became a renowned violin expert, and Wilmington, Delaware’s cultural ambassador; top that off with a triumphant return to music-making, and you have an amazing tale leading back to one place: the blues.

Now, with The Blues, the Whole Blues, and Nothing But the Blues, his first release for Red House Records, Bromberg and multi-Grammy-winning producer/accompanist Larry Campbell (Dylan, Levon Helm, Paul Simon) focus on the music David discovered in high school, when, circa late 50s, he was introduced to a friend’s dad’s collection of blues 78s. He’d only just taken up guitar as a means to pass the time while in bed with the measles.

“I loved those 78s so much,” says David, “I taped them on a portable reel-to-reel, so I could listen at home and learn.”

That love is evident in The Blues, the Whole Blues and Nothing But the Blues. The album is both blues primer and an opportunity to witness a master embracing this distinctly American music with passion and grace.

“There’s a lot of different types of blues on there,” Bromberg notes. “We decided to start it off with a dyed-in-the-wool blues [Robert Johnson’s “Walkin’ Blues”], but there’s also country blues [“Kentucky Blues”], and gospel-influenced blues [“Yield Not”].”

Bromberg, a onetime sideman himself, is quick to give props to his long-running road-and-studio cohorts: Butch Amiot (bass), Josh Kanusky (drums), Mark Cosgrove (guitar), Nate Grower (fiddle), and Peter Ecklund (cornet). Of producer, arranger, multi-instrumentalist, fellow Reverend Gary Davis acolyte, and old friend Larry Campbell, he says, “To use a baseball analogy, Larry is like a star at any position in the infield, because he can play them all.”

Since meeting in the early 80’s, Campbell and Bromberg had crossed paths many times. They finally worked together in Levon Helm’s studio for David’s 2013 return-to-form Only Slightly Mad. “He wanted to do a Chicago blues album then,” Larry says. “But we decided to remind folks of what he does better than anyone: the whole gamut of Americana, the full Brombergian. And we got some new fans. For this one, we went back to the blues, and made use of David’s great vocabulary in all veins of the genre.”

Bromberg’s guitar work remains a marvel; amped electric lead – both slide and fretted – and delicately powerful acoustic fingerpicking propel these songs with the same force that made him the go-to guy for acts ranging from the Eagles to Link Wray to Phoebe Snow. This is a man who can go full-on Chicago gutbucket with “You Don’t Have to Go” (a Bromberg original), then slay with the jazz inflections of Ray Charles’ “A Fool for You,” rendered here intimately solo. Although Bromberg points out he’s not the same guitarist he was before his two decades away from performing and recording. “I play differently,” he says. “I can’t play as fast, but playing slower gives me more time to think about what I’m doing.”

“He’s always able to plug into the emotion of a song,” Campbell says. “He’s incredibly inventive as a player. Sometimes restrictions can be good.”

Listeners can actually hear what the years have given Bromberg in the spartan, acoustic “Delia.” Bromberg originally covered this traditional nugget on his 1972 self-titled debut – a live, solo rendition with a spoken-word break. The new version features Campbell and Bromberg in the studio, revisiting Bromberg’s live arrangement from their occasional duo tours. It is mesmerizing, with gravitas only experience can bring. “Larry and I have played ‘Delia’ a lot,” Bromberg says. “I love what he does on it.”

Longtime fans will notice another difference: Bromberg’s voice; he’s really singing. The vocals cover a broad range: impassioned, vibrato-laden testifying; pew-jumping soul shouts; soft, confident, crooning; and, of course, his peerless raconteur chops (particularly in “You Been A Good Old Wagon”).

“When I first started,” Bromberg says, “singing was something I did between guitar solos. But during the period I did so little performing, I took some voice lessons, and now, I know more what I’m doing. I love singing now. Love it.”

Larry Campbell was impressed at the newfound vocal chops, too. “He is a better vocalist than ever,” he says. “He’s strong, and present. None of the songs took more than three takes. And he was able to take the old folk song ‘900 Miles’ [a “railroad song” made famous by Odetta and Woody Guthrie], and turn it into an electric blues that’s a real high point of the album for me.”

Although he remains the proprietor of the beloved David Bromberg Fine Violins in Wilmington, Delaware – “I love my shop,” he says – Bromberg makes time to tour with his quintet, and he’s already included every song in his live repertoire (save “Yield Not,” which requires a choir), from The Blues, the Whole Blues and Nothing But the Blues. As ever, he brings his characteristic devotional intensity to the music, invigorating his surprise third act with the same passion he felt as a teen, spinning those blues 78s, just before the road called.

Roger Street Friedman

Roger Street Friedman is a singer, songwriter and activist based in Sea Cliff, New York. Up until 2014, Friedman was leading the life of a professional and a family man. As a kid he played music and developed a passion for the recording studio. As often happens, his life took a left turn when he was in his mid-20’s and he left music for a career in retail merchandising. It was only after the loss of his father and mother in 2004 and 2006 respectively, and the birth of his daughter in 2006, that he was struck by the realization that his passion and talent for writing, performing and recording songs had not diminished.

“When my dad passed away in 2004 it really hit me that this was not a dress rehearsal. Then just before the birth of my daughter,  we lost my mom suddenly.  I was vacillating between the depths of sadness and the heights of pure joy and love. I was in such a raw state… and in that emotional maelstrom the muse that I’d suppressed for so long re-emerged with a vengeance. I started writing again and it led me to the realization that music is my true path and that I still have a lot of work left to do,” shares the Sea Cliff, New York-based artist.

After issuing his debut, The Waiting Sky, Friedman made the decision to move his life in the direction of music full time.  “It was scary, but I had gotten to a point where, to be myself, I had to give music everything I had,” Friedman says. “You only get one shot in this life, you have to go for broke…” Champions for the album included No Depression, American Songwriter, Relix Magazine, MSN, The Alternate Route, Elmore Magazine and the New York Daily News.

His critically acclaimed 2017 follow-up, Shoot The Moon, contained 13 masterfully crafted tracks that capture the ephemeralness of life through revealing the poetry in the humble moments. Be it relationship struggles, pining for the innocent times of childhood, and self-growth after loss, Friedman crystalizes these feelings through deeply personal lyrics that resonate broadly in content and messaging. Shoot The Moon, is a full-emotional spectrum collection of vivacious and reflective vignettes from real life that recalls the pop-rock singer-songwriter tradition of Jackson Browne, Marc Cohn, Randy Newman, Colin Hay, Bruce Hornsby, and Mark Knopfler. The album reached #2 on the Roots Music Report Americana Country Album Chart, while the album’s first single, “Everyday,” won second place in Unsigned Only's Songwriting Contest in the Americana category (and honorable mention in Folk/Singer-Songwriter).

In March of 2019 Roger released “Sun Never Sets”, a song and video dedicated to immigrants and immigration reform.  Collaborating on the project were Peter Yarrow, Tom Chapin, Joel Rafael and Guy Davis. 2019 also saw Roger perform at the Clearwater Folk Festival, Huntington Folk Festival and The Falcon Ridge Folk(Grassy Hill Emerging Artist) festival, and at shows up and down the Northeast and South.  Friedman also performed at the 2019 NERFA conference in a coveted “formal” showcase, and his third full-length album, produced by Larry Campbell, is currently near completion and expected to be released in the spring of 2020.

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