California Guitar Trio on tap for Lone Pine Concert/Dinner

November 19, 2010

The Old West will meet the new frontier of guitar-driven live music; tradition will collide with innovation; and familiarity will make way for ground-breaking entertainment as one of the Eastern Sierra’s most popular fund raisers returns to Lone Pine.

“There is something very different and exciting about the music for this year’s Lone Pine Concert/Dinner in the Rocks,” Lone Pine Film History Museum spokesperson Chris Langley said earlier this week.

Langley announced Wednesday that the California Guitar Trio, a critically acclaimed somewhat commercially underrated band that wowed so many at a recent Eastside community concert, has been tapped to perform its unique brand of music in the Alabama Hills on Saturday, June 4.

“Many look forward to this event each year that represents the finest food, service and scenery you can find almost anywhere, in the U.S. and across the world. This year it will be very special,” Langley said.

“When the shadows grow long in the Lone Ranger Canyon in the Alabamas, the lights come up to illuminate the rocks, and the eclectic music of the California Guitar Trio drifts through the romantic night, it is really something that should not be missed.”

The California Guitar Trio, or CGT, is Paul Richards of Salt Lake City, Burt Lams of Affligem, Belgium and Hideyo Moriya of Chiba, Japan. The Trio first met in England in 1987 while studying with iconic King Crimson guitarist Robert Fripp. After touring together as part of Fripp’s League of Crafty Guitarists, the three guitarists convened in Los Angeles and founded CGT in 1991.

They play a mixture of classical, rock, blues, jazz, world music and progressive, as well as the quintessential California musical genre, surf music.

The band celebrated its 20th anniversary in October with the release of a studio album titled, “Andromeda.” The CGT also landed a feature article in the March 2011 issues of Guitar Player Magazine.
According to their web site, the Trio’s music is characterized by “guitars weaving and (the) intricate knot work of interlocking parts to form a whole. Richards, Lams and Moriya can create music that sounds like it is performed on a kind of ‘super-piano’ and other time unfolds in an ethereal, otherworldly psychedelia.”

In space, CGT’s music was played to wake the astronauts aboard the NASA space shuttle “Endeavor.” Here on Earth, the trio’s music has been featured extensively on NPR, NBC’s Olympics coverage and various CBS, CNN, and ESPN TV programs.

“CGT will provide a wonderful accompaniment to the evening light of the Sierra and the Hills for the dinner,” Langley concluded. “The sit-down dinner will feature the specialties of several regional restaurants and chefs.”

Tickets are on sale at the museum web site, www.lonepinefilmhistorymuseum.org, or by calling the museum at (760) 876-9909.