Sweet Ghosts w/ Caleb Caudle
($15-$20 Tickets | 7pm show) Join us for a special Concert by Sweet Ghosts’ full band, with opener Caleb Caudle, solo singer songwriter.
**Sweet Ghosts** is the project of singer-songwriter Ryan Alfred and vocalist Katherine Byrnes. At once familiar and mysteriously unique, they combine “stunning, unpredictable harmonies” (Tucson Weekly) with a colorful instrumental palette where acoustic folk instruments blend with orchestral touches and subtle Brian Eno-inspired synthesizers, with songs that “sound like late afternoon…when winter’s coming” (MySpiltMilk.com).
Their second album, “An Endless Blue”, builds on the foundation of their “gloriously heartwrenching debut” (Zocalo Magazine). Recorded mainly in a single 3 day session with Steven Tracy (St. Cecilia Studios) at the console, the album is built around live takes of the 6 piece band, featuring Angelo Versace (piano), Ben Nisbet (violin), Gabriel Sullivan (bass), and Winston Watson (drums). The result is a warm, colorful album that flows like one complete piece, moving from gentle, contemplative songs to darker, more turbulent moments. Also featured are a string quartet led by Ben Nisbet, and sonic contributions from Karima Walker (electronics) and Mike Moynihan (woodwinds).
Ryan and Katherine are both veterans of the thriving Tucson music scene. Ryan has travelled the world as the upright bassist and harmony singer in the celebrated Tucson band Calexico, toured with Telluride Bluegrass Festival winners Run Boy Run, and has produced recordings with the likes of Ryanhood, Carlos Arzate, and Gabriel Sullivan. As a sound engineer, he has toured with The Jayhawks, Nick Lowe, The Swell Season, and many others. Katherine has traveled to China as the lead singer of The University of Arizona Big Band, as well as a stint as a background singer for Americana star Amos Lee. She has an album of duets with famed pianist-arranger Jeff Haskell (Linda Ronstadt), and routinely headlines theaters all over the southwest singing the music of Carole King, Barbra Streisand, and Janis Joplin.
Together, they have toured as far east as New Orleans, as far north as Seattle, and crossed the southern border for a concert in Hermosillo, Mexico, sharing their unique brand of Americana. They’ve opened shows for Calexico, AJ Croce, Head For The Hills, and Shane Alexander, as well as live spots and airplay on radio stations like LA’s KCSN, Tucson’s KXCI, New Orleans’ WWOZ, and many others.
Their band for their Century Room debut Angelo Versace (UofA Dept of Jazz Studies) on piano and Colin McIllrath on bass.
**Caleb Caudle**
Forsythia, the latest studio LP offering from Caleb Caudle, is a portrait of his truest self, of the artist at his most solitary and reflective. Thematically, it meets anticipation for the unknown future with nostalgia for the past, and reconciles both with meditation in the present. It paints a vision of who Caudle was, is and will hopefully be someday. The album, recorded at Cash Cabin and produced by John Carter Cash, features acclaimed session players Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush, Dennis Crouch and Fred Eltringham, and the vocal talents of Carlene Carter, Elizabeth Cook and Sarah Peasall McGuffey. Due to circumstances beyond his control, Caudle saw Forsythia as possibly his final album, and somehow turned that fear of the unknown into his most meticulous and expertly crafted collection of songs to date.
On his last release, Better Hurry Up, Caudle found himself feeling like time was moving too fast. For nearly a decade, he was consistently writing, recording and releasing new material then touring it around the world while working on the next project. The hustle of being a musician left little time to pause and think ahead further than the next album cycle. In 2019, he and his wife left their home state of North Carolina to move to Nashville. He jumped in and began working with bucket-list collaborators at his dream studio, the Cash Cabin, shortly after their arrival. By early 2020, with a new home base in a community of musicians, a few years of sobriety under his belt and the release of his best album yet imminent, Caudle was prepared for the next phase of his career. But a few days before Better Hurry Up came out, a devastating tornado ripped through Nashville; a week later, just before he was set to depart for a lengthy tour, the world went into lockdown.