Tom And Neil

Tom and Neil are multi-instrumentalists, singers and songwriters who have explored the nooks and crannies of old-time country music, country blues and honky-tonk. Their most recent album, Scoundrels, Trains and Tragic Romance is a celebration of the American roots music they've been playing together for almost five decades. Their other recent album, All Around the Mountain, was recorded at four concerts throughout the Adirondack Mountains.

Tom and Neil had their first gig together in high school as part of "Hootenanny '63" — a touring revue that featured the Jug Band and Tom Rush. Neil went on to fiddle with the Spark Gap Wonder Boys, world champion old-time string band at the Union Grove Fiddlers Convention. Tom moved to Philadelphia, where he joined Blues Power as a guitarist and singer.

Tom and Neil had their first musical reunion during the sessions for Tom's 1976 album on Takoma Records. By then, Neil was a regular member of the David Bromberg Band. Since then, Tom and Neil have gotten together often to play coffeehouses and concerts at colleges, arts organizations and libraries.

Neil's love of traditional bluegrass led him to gigs as fiddler with the Yankee Rebels, the Joint Chiefs of Bluegrass and (most recently) as mandolin player with Vermont-based Big Spike Bluegrass. Tom played mandolin, guitar and clawhammer banjo with Big Trout Radio, an acoustic trio that also featured Artie Traum and Chris Shaw.

Their recent CDs and current series of concerts mark another musical reunion of two friends who came out of the Cambridge and Newport folk revival of the 1960s and have gone on to make their own unique musical statements. It's an irresistible mix of old-time string band music, roadhouse tear-jerkers, country ragtime and back-porch humor from two guys Sarah Craig of Caffe Lena has called "masters of their craft."

"Two wonderful musicians and singers . . . Impeccable musicianship. Their enthusiastic audiences are having a great time." — Mark Sustic, Burlington Free Press

"These guys just get better and better . . . The real feel of the old-time string bands." — Robin Caudell, Utica Observer-Dispatch

"It might look and sound laid-back, but these are real pros. Don't let the gray hair fool you . . . Killer stuff that will simply lay you out." — Midwest Record Review

Here are a couple of photos that prove the old French adage "Plus ça change et plus c'est la même chose" ("The more things change, the more they stay the same"). One shows Tom and Neil at the old Towne Crier Cafe, sometime around 1976. The other is from a 2006 concert at the Edwards Opera House. Both shows were on the hottest night of the year--only the cows are different!


Tom and Neil at Caffe Lena, October, 2009. Click for larger image. Photo by Andrzej Pilarczyk