Jeffrey Trzeciak, Dean of the Washington University Olin Library System, loves the contemporary music scene in St. Louis. He says the diversity of the music culture in our city makes it possible to see and hear great bands every night of the week.
Trzeciak has connected Washington University to radio station KDHX and other organizations and is in the process of collecting materials related to the St. Louis music scene. Trzeciak says, "We hope to ultimately have a physical archive at the University and also a digital archive on the web. We have started more on the digital side by creating a website that scans other websites looking for materials related to St. Louis music. Right now we are archiving sixteen sites.”
Some of the groups that Trzeciak has introduced me to include The Brothers Lazaroff, Sleepy Kitty, Scarlet Tanager, and of course, Pokey Lafarge.
According to Francisco Fisher of KDHX, "David and Jeff Lazaroff could be a pair of telepathic siblings. But it’s more likely that the brothers' compatibility onstage comes from playing music and writing songs together since their high school days. The duo carried on composing as a team for more than a decade while David lived in Austin, Texas, all the while the songwriters continued to develop their roots-driven sound. Currently reunited in St. Louis, the fraternal front men are a staple of the local music scene and draw crowds all over town."
When I asked the Lazaroffs about their take on the St. Louis music scene, they said, "St. Louis has an amazing story to tell, and one that has not been told as well as the other great music cities (New Orleans, Chicago, Memphis, Nashville) running north and south through the heart of our country. With our central locale, St. Louis absorbed many of the regional styles throughout the country, but then turned those genres in new directions. From Scott Joplin to Chuck Berry to Ike and Tina Turner to Miles Davis, we are a city of music innovators not content to just play one style but to dig in and find where styles connect and crossover."
An article in Alive Magazine says that Lafarge is somewhere between a rock star and an Americana crooner and calls St. Louis home after living here for seven years. It goes on to say, "He's an externally proud advocate for middle America as evidenced by recent interviews with Rolling Stone and NPR's "Fresh Air," not to mention his countless tunes that pay tribute to the heartland and his band full of Midwest natives."
Lafarge says, "I'm definitely not following a trend. I never wanted to follow a trend. It's music of the past, for the present and of the future. It's attempting to be all-encompassing. We're not attempting to reinvent the wheel - it's learning from and being inspired by things that came before you."
Some of the popular groups include multi-media components. An article in the RFT refers to one of these groups, Scarlet Tanager as St. Louis's most adorable new band. Lead singer and songwriter Susan Logsdon says in the article, "At the beginning of this year we had been talking a lot about doing some creative project together. We didn't know what it would be, but we thought it would be cool to work on a big, elaborate, creative project just for fun. We threw around a lot of ideas including some kind of large scale installation art and short film ideas ranging from stop animation, Claymation, to puppetry." The result of all of this was the making of their video, "Tumbleweed."
Sleepy Kitty is an Indie Rock band which is making waves, especially after their recent feature on NPR Music. Originally from St. Louis Paige Brubeck and Evan Sult are now based on Cherokee Street in their self-described "Art Castle," a studio space. "Sleepy Kitty is a multi-media project: the two also collaborate professionally on rock posters, album artwork and fine art together.
Now, I'm no spring chicken, but these groups appeal to wide and diverse groups as evidenced in their performances all over town and in other cities as well and I find them stimulating and refreshing.
Nancy Kranzberg has been involved in the arts community for some thirty years on numerous arts related boards.