St. Clair Productions presents slide guitarist/bluesman Kelly Joe Phelps in concert on Saturday, October 26, 8 p.m., at Havurah Shir Hadash, 185 N. Mountain, Ashland. Tickets are $20 in advance, $22 at the door, $10 for teens 12-17 and free under 12. Tickets available at www.stclairevents.com, 541-535-3562, or at the Music Coop in downtown Ashland.
Phelps is being inducted into the Oregon Music Hall of Fame on October 5. The Oregon Music Hall of Fame honors Oregonians who have made outstanding contributions to, or significant impact on the evolution, development, and perpetuation of the music industry.
A writer at the San Diego Troubadour described guitarist and songwriter Phelps as, "The Phantom Monk Of Folk- Blues," and rightly so. Over the past 17 years of recording and touring, Phelps has been talked about as much for his passionate, spirit-driven, lone musical ways as for the inventiveness of his playing and singing.
A New York Times concert reviewer wrote: "...his airy playing conjuring a pocket of supernatural space. He manipulated his fretboard to create eerie harmonics as he slipped from a mumble to a falsetto, as if to follow the soul beyond the physical realm."
On his latest CD Brother Sinner and The Whale. Phelps wrote lyrics that fuses poetry from the Book of Jonah and the vintage gospel blues of Mississippi John Hurt with aspects of the early gospel work of Bill and Charlie Monroe.
S. Victor Aaron in Something Else said: “Though he might have changed his playing technique for this record [laptop steel to bottleneck guitar], there’s nothing lost in the ease with he’s able to deliver those fingerpicked multi-layered harmonies. Blessed with a weary but warm vocal, Phelps … blends his voice and guitar into a single instrument so proficiently, it’s hard to hear them apart.”
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