Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Bruce Hornsby will be releasing a new album with his longtime band The Noisemakers on June 17th – and, ever the iconoclast, he’s trading his usual piano for a dulcimer to reinvigorate his songwriting approach. “Some may ask, ‘Why? What in the world?’” he admits. “What I’m doing here is not about virtuosity. It’s about a song and a singer.”
After getting bored with piano triads, Hornsby turned to the dulcimer for new inspiration. “My piano writing has become more strange, chromatic and dissonant,” he explains. “But on the dulcimer, I love the limited palette that you’re allowed to paint with. It’s just the white notes – it’s not even like a guitar, where the whole chromatic scale is on the fretboard. On the dulcimer, it’s just an old-timey instrument. It’s just scalar. So it limits your range and it makes you write real simple songs. I kept writing more and more, and all of a sudden, the record needed to be made.”
Hornsby produced and recorded the 10-track Rehab Reunion (on 429 Records) in his studio in Williamsburg, Virginia, along with J.T. Thomas (organ), J.V. Collier on (bass), Sonny Emory (washboard, cajon, drums), Gibb Droll (electric and acoustic guitar) and Ross Holmes (fiddle, mandolin). Legendary R&B artist Mavis Staples offers up a gospel performance on “Celestial Railroad,” while Justin Vernon of Bon Iver lends harmonies to the emotional single “Over the Rise.” (Check out the latter via Pitchfork.)
Horsnby & The Noisemakers will tour this summer to promote Rehab Reunion, and of course, it wouldn’t be complete without a stop at Hornsby’s own Funhouse Festival from June 23rd through 26th, where fans can enjoy performances of Rehab Reunion and 1986’s The Way It Is in their entirety. He will also perform a few shows solo and with Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder. Tickets and a full line-up for the fest are available here, and the band’s complete summer tour schedule is available on Hornsby’s official website.
Rehab Reunion Track Listing:
1. Over the Rise (featuring Justin Vernon)
2. Soon Enough
3. M.I.A. in M.I.A.M.I.
4. Tipping
5. Rehab Reunion
6. Hey Kafka
7. Tropical Cashmere Sweater
8. TSA Man
9. The Valley Road
10. Celestial Road (featuring Mavis Staples)
Bruce Hornsby & The Noisemakers 2016 Tour Dates:
April 16th – Wanee Music Festival – Live Oak, FL #
April 17th – Southern Ground Music Festival – Charleston, SC #
April 22nd – Ridgefield Playhouse – Ridgefield, CT *
April 23rd – Edgerton Center for the Performing Arts – Fairfield, CT *
April 30th – Chenery Auditorium – Kalamazoo, MI #
May 14th – Cherokee Creek Music Festival – Cherokee, TX #
May 15th – Stubb’s Waller Creek Amphitheater – Austin, TX #
May 17th – Orpheum Theater – Wichita, KS #
May 18th – Knucklehead’s – Kansas City, MO #
May 20th – Brenton Skating Plaza – Des Moines, IA #
May 21st – River City Casino – St. Louis, MO #
May 22nd – The Blue Note – Columbia, MO #
May 24th – The Palladium – Carmel, IN #
May 26th – Hard Rock Live – Cleveland, OH #
May 27th – Taft Theatre – Cincinnati, OH #
May 28th – DelFest – Cumberland, MD #
June 21st – Pisgah Brewing Co. – Black Mountain, NC **
June 23rd – Funhouse Fest (Phi Beta Kappa Memorial Hall) – Williamsburg, VA *
June 24th – 26th – Funhouse Fest – Williamsburg, VA #
June 29th – Eastman Theatre Kodak Hall – Rochester, NY #
June 30th – Ann Arbor Summer Festival – Ann Arbor, MI #
July 2nd – TBA – Minneapolis, MN #
July 3rd – Summerfest – Milwaukee, WI #
July 4th – City Winery (performing Rehab Reunion in entirety & more) – Chicago, IL #
July 16th – TBA – Sioux Falls, SD #
July 31st – Floyd Fest – Floyd, VA #
August 2nd – TBA – Jackson Hole, WY #
August 4th – TBA – Sandpoint, ID #
August 5th – The Wilma – Missoula, MT #
August 7th – Steamboat Free Summer Concert Series – Steamboat Springs, CO #
August 8th – Denver Botanic Gardens (performing Rehab Reunion in entirety & more) – Denver, CO #
August 10th – Sumtur Amphitheater – Papillion NE #
August 12th – Eaux Claires at Foster Farms – Eau Claire, WI #
August 25th – Cape Cod Melody Tent – Hyannis, MA #
August 26th – South Shore Music Circus – Cohasset, MA #
August 28th – New York State Fair – Syracuse, NY #
August 30th – Keswick Theatre – Glenside, PA #
September 3rd – Shenandoah Valley Music Festival – Orkney Springs, VA #
September 4th – Rhythm & Roots Festival – Charlestown, RI #
September 10th – Jay Peak Resort Stateside Amphitheater – Jay, VT #
September 24th – Greek Theatre (supporting Bonnie Raitt) – Berkeley, CA #
* – An Evening with Bruce Hornsby (Solo)
# – Bruce Hornsby & the Noisemakers
** – Ricky Skaggs & Bruce Hornsby with Kentucky Thunder
