Culture
Mountain Stage Host To Play In Marietta
By: Mark Hellenberg
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Larry Groce will join Todd Burge and Jess Kauffman at Marietta, Ohio’s Adelphia Music Hall on Friday, Sept. 30.
For nearly 30 years, Larry Groce has been the artistic director and host of NPR’s Mountain Stage. The program showcases a wide array of national and international artists and genres ranging from African to Zydeco. American singers and songwriters are a mainstay of the show and Groce is from their ranks. Larry is a Grammy-nominated songwriter and had a 1976 top ten hit with his song “Junk Food Junkie.” He also garnered a gold record and four platinum records for his children’s albums on the Disney label.
Todd Burge, a longtime singer and songwriter, promotes concerts throughout the Ohio Valley. Marietta’s Adelphia Music Hall, located in the Galley Restaurant, is one of the venues that Burge books and he is responsible for assembling the cast for Friday’s “Songwriters in the Round.” According to Larry Groce, “Around West Virginia, he’s probably the ‘dean’ of all the singer/songwriters…the finest that we have”.
Besides Groce and Burge, Jess Kauffman from the Athens-based band, Duke Junior and the Smokey Boots, will round out the lineup. Kaufmann’s songs range from folk and country to blues and jazz. The three songwriters, who are from three different musical generations and backgrounds, will join one another for the first time.
“Songwriters in the Round” starts at 7:30 p.m. at the Adelphia and will be followed at 10 p.m. by Duke Junior and the Smokey Boots and another band, 600 lbs. of Sin. Larry Groce will be in Athens, Ohio when Mountain Stage returns to Ohio University’s Templeton-Blackburn Memorial Auditorium on the campus on Oct. 9.