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Jim Lauderdale (USA)

  • Wesley Anne 250 High Street Northcote, VIC, 3070 Australia (map)

“Jim Lauderdale is a consummate entertainer, a sharp dressed man as well, a terrific songwriter and a great singer." – George Strait

“Jim Lauderdale could easily be called a renaissance man. He’s a great singer, great guitar player and there’s no way you could miss his work as a songwriter.” – Ricky Skaggs

“He’s a man of great style, an exceptional songwriter and tremendous singer” – Elvis Costello

Jim Lauderdale is a 2-time Grammy winning music legend, an A-list Nashville songwriter whose songs have been hits for George Strait, Blake Shelton, The Chicks, Gary Allan and more. His eclectic catalogue of albums runs the gamut of roots styles, from bluegrass to R&B to his first love, traditional country music, on his 35th LP ‘Game Changer’.

From the start of his career, Jim Lauderdale has been creating his own musical world. Too expansive, eclectic and creatively curious to fit into any prescribed genre boxes, he innovated what is now called Americana music, long before there was a term for it. Everything about the man and his music is classic and timeless, but he’s a total original. The McCartney-esque melodies sung in his aching high lonesome tenor, the fiercely authentic bluegrass songs with mind-expanding psychedelic lyrics… nothing about Jim’s music can be reduced to a single influence, and no other songwriter would fuse these classic strains of tune-craft into such unexpected but immediately satisfying combinations.

The scion of a preacher dad and music teacher mom in rural North Carolina, Jim’s world was turned upside as a kid when he saw the Beatles’ explosive debut on Ed Sullivan, rewiring his creative mind. Teaching himself a variety of instruments, Jim explored songwriting as a teenager, fueled by a musical diet that ran the gamut from George Jones to the Grateful Dead, Al Green to the Stanley Brothers.

Although he never got to work with his idol Gram Parsons, who Jim immortalized in his classic signature song ‘The King of Broken Hearts’ (also the title of a feature documentary on Jim), Lauderdale has realized that great dream of any musician – to stand shoulder to shoulder making music with his biggest inspirations. His duet albums with bluegrass icon Dr Ralph Stanley earned Jim his first Grammy award, he penned albums worth of bluegrass gems with the late Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter and he’s on a short list that includes Paul McCartney and Burt Bacharach as a writing partner of Elvis Costello.



It’s no wonder that artists from Willie Nelson to John Oates line up to collaborate with Jim, hoping to snare some of that Lauderdale magic. After all, his songs have helped sell millions of albums for artists like George Strait, the Chicks, Patty Loveless, Lee Ann Womack, Blake Shelton, Solomon Burke, Gary Allan and Vince Gill. Classic songs like ‘Where the Sidewalk Ends’, ‘You Don’t Seem to Miss Me’, ‘Hole in My Head’, ‘Halfway Down’, ‘We Really Shouldn’t Be Doing This’ and many more have come from his pen.

Earlier Event: 8 March
TRIVIA WITH SPARX
Later Event: 10 March
Lily Jones Trio