Taking your show on the road has a completely different meaning for muscians Ben Sollee and Taylor Ho Bynum.
Separately, the two are bicycling to their schedule of far-flung gigs. For cellist/vocalist Sollee, it's a cross-country tour. For jazz trumpeter Bynum, it's bike tour to concerts in New England.
Although it's unusual, they're not the first. They'll be following in the virtual bicycle tire tracks laid down by the Ditty Bops four years ago.
The Los Angeles-based girl band duo known for their music, as well as their love of bicycles, took off on their cross-country bicycle performing tour in 2006. At the time, band member Abby DeWald said that it was better to move their bodies “than sit in a mush pile in the back of a dirty van.”
Ditch the Van
Sollee and his three-person road crew left San Diego on the Ditch the Van Tour 2010 in August. Since then they've traveled by bicycle to concert dates all over California, hopped a train for performances in Colorado, and driven to Baltimore where they started their bike tour to gigs in the East.
Sollee told the Adventure Cycling Association (one of the tour's sponsors along with League of American Bicyclists and Kentucky Coffee Tree Cafe):
“Safe, clean bike lanes and pedestrian ways help communities to be more livable. We can see and feel the difference from our saddles and the stage. Communities that support livability initiatives also tend to support the arts and the people come out to the shows.”
You can go to the Ben Sollee website to see videos from his tour or check out the tour schedule. There are still dates left in Maryland, Pennsylvania and Kentucky.
Traveling trumpet
Another musician who is pedaling his talents this fall is jazz trumpeter Bynum. The New Haven, Conn., based jazzman is taking a solo tour around New England venues and collaborating with combos along the way on the Acoustic Bicycle Tour.
Because he's got to carry everything, Bynum downsized to a pocket trumpet because it's smaller and lighter weight than his usual horn.
Bynum plays an avante garde style of jazz that many people haven't been introduced to, but he's hoping the magic of showing up by bicycle will draw them out. He told the Boston Herald:
“One of the things that’s been great is that because of the strangeness of the idea, it’s attracting people who wouldn’t normally go to an experimental music concert. But when people hear that there’s this guy who just biked from Maine to play a pocket trumpet, that might bring them out.”
Just because he's on the road, it doesn't mean that he gives up practicing. He said that playing his exercises by a lakeshore can be the best part of the day.
Bynum started his tour on Sept. 10 and has almost daily gigs throughout New England. Check his calendar at the Taylor Ho Bynum website. He's also writing a blog. Also, here's an interview from NPR.
Here are a couple of videos from Ben Sollee, top, and Taylor Ho Bynum.
Ditch the Van Bike Tour – Chapter 4 from marty benson on Vimeo.
Taylor Ho Bynum with Lorenz Raab
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