Bluebird

We did so many things in Nashville, that I really didn't have enough time to write about most of them so I'll just comment on them over the next couple of days as I have some free time.

One of the highlights of the trip for me was a visit to the famous Bluebird Cafe. This is a very small intimate venue that has showcased local songwriters and musicians for over 25 years.

It is a staple of the Nashville music scene and has hosted a lot of musicians that polished or developed their craft there. People like

Garth Brooks
Kim Carnes
Carol King
Kris Kristofferson
Faith Hill
Cowboy Junkies
Bonnie Raitt

and on and on and on.

We were treated a In the Round session comprised of four musicians that are loosely related due to three of them being on the same record label.

Tom Kimmel

Brent Moyer

Hugh Moffat

Hunter Moore

They would take turns playing one of their original songs and the other musicians would either reverently listen or join in for some harmony or guitar work.

Our seats were so good that Christine could literally reach out and be able to touch the shoulder of one of the performers.















Brent Moyer






























Christine with Hugh and Brent in the background















L to R (Hunter, Tom, Hugh)

The performers were all different but each were extremely talented professional musicians.

My impressions were that Hunter had the most polished "craft" in terms of construction of a song. He demonstrated a variety of styles like a downhome blues number, a funny semi-conversational toned song and an almost spiritual song about his childhood.

I thought Brent was the best guitar player of the bunch and would play a lot of the solos for the others. His songs were more bar room country romps. Feel good numbers but then he wowed me with a very sweet romantic ballad.

Hugh had the purest singing voice. He also had some very amusing anecdotes to his songs. His songs were mostly mournful love songs that tended to strayed a little too close to being over the top but I'm a sap so I loved them. One of his fans, played an CD of a 10 year old album to the top DJ in Australia who liked it so much that he played it non stop. Next thing you know, one of the songs is the number 1 tune down under. Hilarious. He's had some famous musicians record and perform his songs including Dolly Parton, Alabama, Merle Haggard, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band.

Tom was the favorite of Christine and I and I personally think he is a genius. He has a sort of raw singing voice and his songs just cut right to the quick of you. I bought a CD of his music and he explained it is an album comprised of rough first or second cut recordings of his songs. He then recorded more polished versions but his producer actually preferred the raw versions of the songs and encouraged him to use those instead. I have to agree with his assessment. Great stuff.

A very enjoyable evening and another reason to love Nashville.