Roger Salloom

ROGER SALLOOM RETURNS TO ACADEMY OF MUSIC (Northampton)

SATURDAY, AUGUST 23 WITH NEW CD & SPECIAL GUESTS

FOR ANNUAL FREE CONCERT CELEBRATION



Event Listing:

Event: Roger Salloom in Concert, with special guests Charles Neville, Jimmy Weider, Eric Olsson & Unit 7

Date: Saturday, August 23, 2008

Time: 7:00 PM

Venue: Academy of Music (274 Main St, Northampton, MA 01060)

Price: Free, general admission
FMI: (413) 584-8435



Since 1983 Florence-based musician Roger Salloom has presented a free concert – conceived in the spirit of San Francisco/1967 – in Northampton. This summer, the annual celebration is on Saturday, August 23 at 7:00 PM at the Academy of Music in downtown Northampton. As is the tradition, admission is free thanks to generous support from area sponsors.



This year’s show features Roger Salloom performing songs from his newest CD, LA TE DA, plus special guest performances by the venerable Charles Neville of the Neville Bros., Jimmy Weider longtime lead guitarist for The Band and Big Pink, and masterful songwriter Eric Olsson with the funk princes, Unit 7. This 25th annual free concert by Salloom was held for many years – and was the first rock and roll event ever – at the Pines Theater. Salloom’s long and prolific musical career brought him from his hometown of Worcester to some of San Francisco’s most prestigious venues over 40 years ago. It was there that his band, Salloom, Sinclair and Mother Bear, played The Carousel, The Fillmore and The Avalon Ballrooms alongside contemporaries Santana, Procol Harum and BB King. A cross between blues, roots, Americana, country, and soul, Salloom always speaks from his heart. He has a self-deprecating, humorous, everyman quality, mixed with a powerful sensitivity and depth of character.



La Te Da showcases Salloom’s incredible range of musical interests and his wide community of talented friends. In addition to a host of instrumentalists: Jeff Dostal, Jim Armenti, Tom Filiault, Craig Manning, Hal Benoit, Billy Klock, to name a few, the CD also features harmony vocals from Charles Neville, Eilen Jewell, Seth Glier, Grayson Caps and others. The songs’ stories cover worldly issues like religious killings and the freedom to vote, to more personal ones for Salloom: failed and successful relationships, living in poverty and single parenting. The song “So Glad I Made It” was written at the request of award winning filmmaker, Chris Sautter, who found Salloom’s life story so intriguing he went on to document it. His film, “So Glad I Made It, the Saga of Roger Salloom, America's Best Unknown Songwriter,” won 6 awards, was on the 2006 Grammy ballot, and received rave reviews across the U.S.


Artwork for La Te Da features a humorous drawing with text on the tray card from a syndicated piece Salloom and his son Salem did, named Leold. According to Salloom, the popular piece “came about two inches from being a TV show executively produced by Mike Scully, Executive Producer of The Simpsons, and Wes Talbot.

Roger Salloom began his music career by listening and learning. At 13 year-old, he was a banjo and guitar-playing novice whose influences were Pete Seeger, Jelly Roll Morton, Sonny Boy Williamson, Woody Guthrie, Hank Williams and Jimmy Rodgers. His career would include time on the San Francisco and Nashville music scenes – working with Guy Clark, Rodney Crowell, Richard Dobbins and members of Creedence Clearwater Revival before settling in Northampton in 1980. His musical associations were as fruitful as ever, playing with artists such as The Band, John Prine, Jonathan Edwards, Jerry Jeff Walker, The BoDeans, Joan Armatrading and Leon Russell. Over the course of the years, Salloom has shared the bill with artists such as Van Morrison, Santana, Cheech and Chong, Doc Watson, NRBQ, Maria Muldaur, Jonathan Edwards, Paul Butterfield and many others. Rolling Stone Magazine called Salloom “a superb story teller with a good sense of rhythm and a great sense of timing, and the music is incredibly infectious." Imagine Jack Kerouac, John Belushi, Lord Buckley, Lenny Bruce, The Diggers, and throw in Leadbelly, Jimmy Reed, Lonnie Johnson, Geoff Muldaur, Dan Penn...all rolled into one person, and you have a glimpse of this poet, singer-songwriter.