April Verch Band will bring folk song and dance to Barking Legs Theater on Sunday, May 4, at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $12 in advance and $15 the day of the show.
Review for the April Verch Band:
When April Verch comes to town, it’s time to put on your dancing shoes and throw some plywood down. Fiddling, singing, and dancing (sometimes simultaneously) the traditions of Canadian Folk and Old-Time Appalachia alike, Verch and her talented band celebrate their folk, bluegrass, and old-time roots in every show they play. Driven by bassist/clawhammer banjoist Cody Walters and the virtuosic guitarist Hayes Griffin, together the band is a super-talented trio, pulling even the most staid audiences to their dancing feet.
There’s a deeper tradition the band celebrates, too. Verch was raised in the musical melting pot of Canada’s Ottawa Valley, a region known for its Franco-Celtic flavors, but it was the dance-filled, old-time, country and western gatherings her parents took her to that led Verch to begin stepdancing at age three, and picking up the fiddle at age six.
Since then she’s won numerous awards for her fiddling – by the time she graduated high school she’d won the Canadian Open Old Time Fiddle Championship, and while attending Boston’s prestigious Berklee College of Music, she won the Canadian Grand Masters Fiddling Competition, making her the first woman ever to take both of her country’s two top contests.
Her latest album, Bright Like Gold, showcases her diversity, virtuosity, and in many ways, her own life story, with original compositions, country classics, stepdancing and the folk songs of her youth. “Those are my roots,” Ms. Verch explains, “For a while, I didn’t want to play them anymore. I grew up on them. They weren’t cool. Now I’m at a point where I’ve been away from them long enough to realize their value, I miss them, and I want to share them.”
Ms. Verch won’t mention to you that she’s a JUNO Award nominee, or that she was chosen to represent her country and tradition by performing in the Opening Ceremonies of the 2010 Olympic Winter Games. Her talent and ability to entertain stands up (and dances) all on its own, with a fun time guaranteed.