In musical performance, being the introductory musician for a hit artist is a tough role to fill. However, at the Brett Dennen concert on Feb. 14, the intro musician, Willy Tea Taylor took the crowd by storm.
Taylor, an up and coming Folk artist from Oakdale California, comes from a long line of cattlemen and his music reflects a working man’s perspective. Willy Tea’s soul is certainly as deep as his roots. His recent solo album, 4 strings, received a critical acclaim from The Independent Music Press.
Taylor was greatly loved and accepted by the sold-out Tower Theater crowd. Someone asked him “would you be my Garden Gnome?” He laughed and said “If you pay me enough I will.
His songs all told a story of life experiences. He talked about how he had named his guitar after his grandma Beverly and how he knew Brett Dennen they were neighbors and how they were good friends and grew up together.
After an award-winning introduction, Brett Dennen took the stage and the crowd roared with excitement. He told everyone he had just spent the day skiing Mt. bachelor and said how he loved Bend and how lucky we all are to have a big river and beautiful mountains to ski on. He started to strum the guitar and excitement rose again as he started singing. He played a string of hits and among them were “She’s Mine”, “Crazy”, “Out Of My Head”, “Sydney”, “Wild Child”, “Don’t Mess with Karma”.
Then he went on to speak of Willy Tea Taylor how he admired him, and also that he writes beautiful music. When I hear Dennen’s music it reminds me of Simon & Garfunkel. Dennen’s songs are about love peace happiness and a better world for us all to live in. Through powerful composition, Dennen’s music makes you reminisce about things past.
Dennen is part of the mosaic project a non-project organization that has been teaching peace and understanding to children in the San Francisco Bay Area, also he is a big supporter of the love hope strength organization. They are a organization who helps to build cancer centers around the world at concerts they take mouth swabs of people wanting to be on the donor list for bone marrow transplants for cancer patients.
Marie Nye | The Broadside
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If you would like to Donate to any of these organizations you can contact them via email at:
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www.lovehopestrength.org