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January 4, 2017
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Musical melting pot
The Mike + Ruthy Band combine country twang, Cajun chug, R&B swing and gospel fervor The Mike + Ruthy Band will be performing as part of The Folkus Project at 8 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 6, at May Memorial Unitarian Universalist Society, 3800 E. Genesee St., Syracuse. He’s a songwriting guitar-slinger with a knack for clawhammer banjo. She’s a fiddler and uke-chanteuse who grew up in the American roots underground, the daughter of Grammy-winning fiddler, Jay Ungar. These two believe in the transformative power of a great live show. They write top-tier songs, tour with their peerless five-piece band (a sound they’ve taken to calling rural rock), and perform for audiences worldwide with a charm and on-stage ease that might make you think they’re your new best friends. When it comes to chemistry this fivepiece band from Woodstock, featuring Mike Merenda and Ruth Ungar from The Mammals, has plenty to spare. The Mike + Ruthy Band sets the indie-folk scene ablaze. Singers and storytellers, poets and parents, Merenda and Ungar tour with their children and band in tow, embodying a down-home approach to Americana. Bouncing between festivals and intimate venues, the troubadours bring harmonydriven fiddle and banjo tunes to more than 100 shows a year. Road-tested material such as the pair’s celebrated recording of Woody Guthrie’s “My New York City” cement Merenda and Ungar’s status as a national treasure. In 2016, Hudson Valley based songwriters Merenda and Ungar enjoyed a high-water mark year buoyed by critical acclaim for their June release, Bright As You Can (Thirty Tigers) and a commitment to touring once
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again as a crack five-piece ensemble - reintroducing a high-energy folk rock sound that they helped define in the early 2000’s. Mike + Ruthy are “musicians’ musicians” who have found fans and friends in the Americana world and beyond. As word of their well-loved record spread, the band quickly found themselves sharing bills with
industry luminaries as diverse as The Avett Brothers, Milk Carton Kids, Elephant Revival, Ani DiFranco and The B-52’s, setting the stage for a tremendous 2016 which included invitations to 15 major music festivals across the US and and Europe. Admission is $18. Advance tickets and more information can be found at folkus.
org. The Folkus Project is a nonprofit organization that fosters and promotes traditional, contemporary, and multicultural folk music in Syracuse and Central New York. To learn more about Folkus and the upcoming concerts, visit our web page at folkus.org or like us at facebook.com/FolkusProject.
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