Florida’s Newport Guitar Festival today announced the multiple events and artists to appear at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino and Hard Rock Live, April 16-18. As a tribute to the world’s most popular instrument during International Guitar Month, the Festival celebrates both the visual and sonic milestones of the guitar with hundreds of unique guitars on display, intimate demonstration concerts, seminars hosted by acclaimed guitarists and much more!
Considered to be the world’s largest modern guitar festival, Florida’s Newport Guitar Festival will bring the finest luthiers and vintage dealers to South Florida to celebrate the “Golden Age” of modern guitars. Joining the celebration are four iconic faces in the music industry – Ed King, Lynyrd Skynyrd’s original guitarist and composer of the most famous riff in Southern rock and roll history, Sweet Home Alabama, Laurence Juber, lead guitarist of Paul McCartney’s Wings, Phil Keaggy, internationally acclaimed guitar soloist, and Muriel Anderson, one of the world’s foremost guitarists and host of Muriel Anderson’s All Star Guitar Night, which will close out the Festival Sunday night at Hard Rock Live.
Visitors will fill Hard Rock Live, where hundreds of vendors will display vintage masterpieces and extraordinary one-of-a-kind modern guitars available for purchase, at prices ranging from $400 to $400,000. Over 30 distinguished guitarists including Mary Flower, Paul Asbel and Michael Chapdelaine will perform mini-concerts throughout the duration of the festival, to demonstrate the various guitars on display. Guests will also have the opportunity to try out their favorites inside both “quiet” and “loud” sound rooms.
Tickets cost $20 (1-Day Pass) or $50 (3-Day Weekend Pass).* All seats are reserved and available at the Hard Rock Live Box Office, open Tuesday – Saturday from noon to 7 p.m. and on Sunday & Monday – only open on event days at noon. Tickets also are available at all Ticketmaster outlets online at Ticketmaster.com or charge by phone: 1-800-745-3000. Doors open one-hour prior to show start time. *Additional fees may apply.
To learn more about Florida’s Newport Guitar Festival, please visit www.NewportGuitarFest.com.
Featured Events:
Muriel Anderson’s ALL STAR GUITAR NIGHT®
Muriel Anderson’s ALL STAR GUITAR NIGHT® brings together some of the world’s finest acoustic and electric guitar players from around the globe onto one stage, for a concert that is sure to astound music lovers of all genres. This year’s line-up includes Muriel Anderson, Laurence Juber, Tierra Negra, Phil Keaggy, Ed King and many more.
Ed King’s “Limited Edition: Ol’ Red Re-Issue Guitar”
Ed King, the original Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist and composer of the most famous southern anthem in rock and roll history, Sweet Home Alabama, will premiere his long awaited “Limited Edition: Ol’ Red Re-Issue Guitar.” King will be available to sign autographs and perform a few Lynyrd Skynyrd favorites throughout the festival.
Martin Guitar Company and Martin Braun Watch Collaboration Prototype
C. F. Martin Guitar Co. and Martin Braun Watches will unveil a special edition Martin Guitar, highlighting the elite world of guitar and watch collecting. This is the first-ever collaboration between a boutique watch company and a guitar company.
Sonic Sitka Project
Master luthier, Denis Merrill will display the initial results of his Sonic Sitka Project. Merrill has provided identical Sitka spruce to a host of the nation’s finest guitar builders to compare the sound quality from using the same top wood in a variety of acoustic guitars.
This exhibition commemorates the 1997 Smithsonian Exhibition of Guitars, which is regarded as the launch of the modern age of guitar building. The Blue Guitar Exhibition at the Festival will display a wide variety of acoustic and electric guitars, as well as amplifiers, all in the color blue, celebrating the finest and most creative minds in the modern guitar industry from around the world.
Bruce Petros Guitars: Tunnel 13 Project
Secrets from the “Last Great American Train Robbery” of the 1920’s will be exposed as the Petros Tunnel 13 Redwood™ guitars are giving voice to the remarkable Redwood of Tunnel 13. After 120 years standing silently in Tunnel 13, absorbing the sounds of the thousands of trains and hundreds of thousands of people that passed beneath, the mysterious wood with a rich history is ready to unleash its voice.
Hundreds of Unusual Guitars
From the dynamic “Bird Fish” to guitars with video screens, and acoustic guitars built from million year old woods from as far away as New Zealand to electric guitars modeled after one of the most expensive automobiles on the planet, the Bugatti Veyron, Florida’s Newport Guitar festival offers music and art lovers an opportunity to witness the “Golden Age” of modern guitar building first hand. This is the world’s largest modern guitar festival, where the multitude of one-of-a-kind guitars for the public to play and purchase is incomparable to any other festival of its kind.
Seminars with the Industry’s Greats
Guests of the Festival are welcome to bring their own guitars and learn from some of the world’s most renowned soloists. Phil Keaggy will illustrate the art of looping; Laurence Juber, long time guitarist for Paul McCartney, will instruct clinics on how to play “Beatles style”; noted guitar builder Charles Fox will give a free lecture on getting into the guitar building business; Kinloch Nelson will provide seminars on alternate tunings, “mapping the fingerboard,” and tone dynamics, and Paul Asbel will be lead clinics on a variety of aspects of Fingerstyle guitar.
McKnight Guitars: Spar Sitka Unsilenced
Coast Guard patrols discovered the top of a ship’s mast from the late 1890’s in a cave off the Pacific coast of Washington nearly 30 years ago, in an area notorious for shipwrecks during the Alaskan gold rush. McKnight Guitars, one of only three luthiers in the world who has possession of the treasured mast, will uncover its rendition of the wood’s beauty in sight and sound. As described by Denis Merrill, “The soul of the Spar Sitka is finally finding its voice, a century after it first set sail.”
Over 200 Mini Demonstration Concerts
A collection of the best solo artists will demonstrate show guitars in 20 minute continuous segments throughout the festival on three different stages at the Seminole Hard Rock Hollywood. All will be free with the price of admission.
What’s It Worth? – Blue Book Publications, Inc.
Guests of the festival are invited to bring in guitars to be appraised by Blue Book value experts. Additionally, guests will have the opportunity to sell guitars to professional dealers.
Featured Artists:
Andy Whahlberg
A self-taught guitarist, Andy Whahlberg has been traveling the county playing the Harp guitar since the age of 14. Since then, Andy’s musical career has spanned over 25 years, more than 3000 concerts and performances nationwide, 4 albums and hundreds of television and radio appearances. Andy has performed on stage with groups such as Chicago, Spyra Gyra, Firefall, Hall and Oates, Don McLean and the Spinners. In his own recording studio he has created soundtracks and scores for numerous television, radio and movie projects. His most recent works include the soundtrack for the PBS Special Florida’s Historic Lighthouses and the motion pictures “Captiva” and “Jericho”.
Ed King
Ed King is best-known as the guitarist for psychedelic rock band Strawberry Alarm Clock and Southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd. King met the members of Jacksonville, Florida-based Southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd when the band opened up for Strawberry Alarm Clock in early 1968. It wasn’t until 1972 that he joined Skynyrd, replacing Leon Wilkeson on bass, who left the band briefly. Wilkeson rejoined the band, and King switched to guitar, creating the triple-guitar attack that became a signature sound for the band. His guitar playing and songwriting skills were an essential element to the band’s first three albums: Pronounced Leh-Nerd Skin-Nerd, Second Helping and Nuthin’ Fancy. King co-wrote the Skynyrd hit song “Sweet Home Alabama” and it’s his voice you can hear counting off the tune before launching into his famous Stratocaster riff. King, along with all pre-crash members of Lynyrd Skynyrd, was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006. He now lives in Nashville, TN and is “quite happily retired”.
Fernando Perdomo
Miami guitarist, Fernando Perdomo combines progressive pop and classical for a unique sound that has earned him a steady stream of international and local performances, some produced by Emilio Estefan. Perdomo accompanied international Mexican superstar Paulina Rubio in her 2009 music video “Cause & Effect” and he has recently released his first solo guitar album, which will debut at Florida’s Newport Guitar Festival.
Kinloch Nelson
A solo fingerstyle guitarist/singer, Nelson creates a synthesis of folk, jazz, classical, American popular music, and original compositions. His programs range from J.S. Bach to the blues and may include references to Miles Davis, Schubert, Flatt and Scruggs, The Ventures, and the occasional TV theme.
Kinloch Nelson began performing in 1969. His nearly 40-year career has run the gamut from solo classical and folk concerts in coffeehouses and folk festivals to club dates with jazz, country, rockabilly, rock, and rhythm & blues bands. During this time Nelson has played with such notables as Tom Paxton, Amos Garrett, Luther Alison, Buddy Guy, and long-time influence Danny Gatton.
Laurence Juber
As a young working musician in London, England in the 1970s, Laurence Juber got an extraordinary, life-changing break when Paul McCartney picked him to become Wings’ lead guitarist. Juber spent three years recording and touring with the band. During that time he won a Best Rock Instrumental GRAMMY® for the track “Rockestra” from the Wings album, “Back To The Egg.” After Wings folded in 1981, Juber embarked on a career as a solo artist, composer and arranger, and soon developed a reputation as a world-class guitar virtuoso, being voted #1 by Fingerstyle Guitar magazine. Juber’s DVD “Guitar Noir” is DVD Etc. magazine’s top pick for surround-sound 5.1 audio and earned a 2005 CEA “Demmy” award for sonic excellence. His solo guitar arrangement of “The Pink Panther Theme” is featured on the Best Pop Instrumental GRAMMY®-winning album “Henry Mancini-Pink Guitar”. His arrangement of “Stand By Me” was featured in the “Diamonds Are Forever” TV commercial.
Mark Hambre
Inventor, performer, and teacher, Mark Hambre is both a recording artist and a talented performer. His music is melodic and complicated, thrilling Fingerstyle enthusiasts across the United States. Amongst guitar players, Mark is known for the invention of the “Neck Up” guitar accessory, which allows the guitar to be held in exactly the right position for comfortable and ergonomic playing. Neck-Up sets will be available at his Festival table.
Mary Flower
Yellow Dog Records recording artist Mary Flower is renowned for a uniquely personal vision of roots music that blends ragtime, acoustic blues, and folk – technically dazzling yet grounded in the down-to-earth simplicity of early 20th century American music. A Winfield runner-up and a Blues Music Award Nominee, she performs and teaches internationally.
Michael Chapdelaine
From New York’s Lincoln Center to the Cactus Cafe in Austin, from Milano to Bangkok, Chapdelaine continues to enchant, dazzle and surprise audiences and critics alike as he redefines the modern acoustic guitar with his amazing technique, “soulful” expressiveness, and versatility as a performer, composer and arranger/producer. His performances, played on both steel string and classical guitars, include musical styles ranging from blues to Bach to country to rhythm n’ blues as he wins his audiences hearts with breath taking technique and the poetic magic of his original musical portraits and landscapes.
Michael Isla
Michael’s musical palette varies from classical to contemporary acoustic. The music he composes is an eclectic mix of exotic flavors that take the mind, body and soul to the new dimension of Acoustica. His instrumental debut album Acoustica evokes the spectrum of human emotion through sonic architecture.
Widely respected as one of the world’s foremost fingerstyle guitarists and harp-guitarists, Muriel Anderson is the first woman to have won the National Fingerpicking Guitar Championship. She is host of the renowned “Muriel Anderson’s ALL STAR GUITAR NIGHT®” and founder of the Music for Life Alliance charity. Muriel Anderson has released numerous CD’s, DVD’s and guitar books. Her music can be heard in Woody Allen’s film “Vicky Cristina Barcelona.” and her “Heartstrings” recording accompanied the astronauts on the space shuttle Discovery. Touring in the USA and internationally year round, Muriel’s obvious joy of music and facility across musical genres is revered by guitarists and audiences worldwide. She enjoys touring as is evidenced by her “photos from the road” and “recipes from the road” on her website. Her recent CD with Tierra Negra “New World Flamenco” has already garnered rave reviews.
Paul Asbell
From his early years, playing blues on Chicago’s South Side, to his present multi-faceted career based out of northern Vermont, Paul has earned an underground reputation as a true “musician’s musician”. He has played and recorded with legends like John Lee Hooker, Earl Hooker, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Pops Staples, Otis Rush, Magic Sam, Junior Wells, and many others. He also appeared on the milestone recording “Fathers and Sons” featuring Muddy Waters, Paul Butterfield and Mike Bloomfield, as well as “The London Howlin’ Wolf Sessions” LP, featuring Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood and members of the Rolling Stones. Paul has taught for years at University of Vermont and Middlebury College, and has given master-classes at Skidmore College, Dartmouth College, Johnson State College, Marlboro College, and others. Past students have included recognized professionals in jazz, rock, folk, etc, including Phish songwriter/guitarist/icon Trey Anastasio.?
Phil Keaggy
Phil Keaggy is perhaps one of the most admired guitarists in music today. His fans range from those who aspire just to be able to play Keaggy’s mistakes, to professional musicians who have been strongly influenced by his style. And in between are those who don’t play guitar, yet find solace in his beautifully penned lyrics and memorable melodies. Phil’s solo career has spanned more than 30 years, and has included over 50 solo albums, both vocal and instrumental, as well as 8 releases with his band, Glass Harp. One of the most sought after studio guitarists, Phil also continues to sell out concerts all over the United States, with his ever-changing style, ranging from rock-and-roll to fully orchestrated instrumental compositions.
Roy Book Binder
A Blues Singing, guitar picking, song writing raconteur, and has been for the past 40 years. Roy has been interviewed by Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air, featured on the Emmy award winning segment of the PBS TV series EGG Art in America, and appeared more than 30 times on Ralph Emory’s highly regarded TV series Nashville Now. Book Binder has been included in THE BIG BOOK OF BLUES, as well as Blues Who’s Who. Roy has been continually touring across America in his tour bus, which has been his home for the last thirty years, as well as performing internationally.
Tierra Negra
In the world of modern Flamenco, few artists have attained the heights of Tierra Negra. In fact, so influential are these two German guitarists that they’re often cited as the protagonists of the Flamenco Nuevo movement. Leo Henrichs and Raughi Ebert, Tierra Negra’s founding duo, bring to their music elements of a huge palate of musical styles, infused with the infectious rhythm and melody of Rumba-Flamenco. They have toured Europe extensively, recorded eight albums, and are featured on countless international guitar compilations and films. Their first major USA tour with Muriel Anderson brought standing ovations at every concert. There is persuasiveness in the melody – an infectious groove and genuine passion in Tierra Negra’s music.