“Less than two minutes into the show the band had the audience in the palms of their hands and for the next 90 minutes or so they took us on a comedic and musical rollercoaster ride that went from the hilarious to the spiritual, including an emotional show-closing rendition of Silent Night that brought the audience to its feet for a three minute standing ovation.
The audience loved them. The sponsor loved them. Even my dog loved them and he doesn’t love anybody except the beagle next door.
How would I describe their performances? I guess I would say, they’re like watching a musical earthquake. There’s a lot going on up on stage physically, musically & comically. And, they brought the house down.”
Russ Page
Executive Director of the Piscataquis Chamber of Commerce
and Producer of Saturday Night in Dover-Foxcroft for the Center Theatre
“The Half Moon Jug Band is one of the most entertaining shows I have ever had the pleasure of experiencing! They mix incredible musical ability with side-splitting comedy into a one-of-a-kind stage show. This makes them a true triple threat of entertainment. They are a guaranteed hit!”
Michael Miclon
Artistic Director
The Oddfellow Theater
Buckfield, Maine
THE STORY
The Half Moon Jug Band is a four-man musical mob of desperadoes hijacking the plodding freight train of folk music, steaming it up the mountains of rock ‘n roll, through the vaudeville pass, and down across the valley of country music before wrecking it in the middle of a rubber chicken farm on the outskirts of town. Their weapons of choice: guitars, banjos, mandolins, hefty bass riffs and rotund sing-along choruses. But they’re no bluegrass band; they also wield mighty kazoos, trumpets, harmonicas and thumping drums.
Jug band music is homemade music. You won’t hear it on the radio, you won’t see it on MTV and you can’t get it at Wal-Mart. It’s a creamy, sonically concocted casserole of American music. You’re not sure exactly what’s in there, but boy it sure tastes good. Musical labels are useless. If it sounds good, if the audience claps, if it feels honest, then it’s jug band music.
The band thrives on interaction with their audiences. For the HMJB it’s not just about standing on stage playing songs. It’s about singing, dancing and making people happy. They do whatever it takes to put on a show for all ages, studding every performance with jokes, stories and mandatory sing-alongs. No one gets out without singing. No one.
The Half Moon Jug Band started as a merry band of sidewalk subversives entertaining passersby and annoying shopkeepers on Exchange Street in Portland, Maine more than ten years ago. Now they can now be found on the road playing concerts and festivals all over the northeast like New Year’s Portland, the Maine Festival, the Old Port Festival, the Prescott Park Folk Festival, the Oddfellow Theatre, the Winthrop Performing Arts Center, the Maine Lobster Festival, Burlington’s strange 3rd of July Fireworks extravaganza, the Fryeburg, Deerfield and Cornish Fairs, and many town concerts too numerous to enumerate here.
The HMJB has made many live appearances on television and radio including WCSH’s 207, WGME’s Daybreak, WMPG’s Local Motives and WCTN’s Shine.
WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING
The Portland Phoenix
• “The Half Moon Jug Band are progressive and contemporary, frenetic and crazed… the silliness is infectious and intellectual, the music is heart-pounding.”
• “The Half Moon Jug Band: the most upbeat ambassadors we could ever hope to have. Playing a conglomeration of bluegrass, folk, rock and roll and circus music, the HMJB brave the coldest afternoons just for the chance to play music for the people…”
• “Yes, you should heckle them. It makes things more entertaining. But don’t get all snooty if they heckle back.”
The Portland Press Herald
• “This is some seriously fun, toe-tapping, frantically paced music… I quickly became a believer.”
• “The Half Moon Jug Band came onto the stage… several minutes late, but the wait was forgettable once the music started. The local band dove into a raucous, kazoo-dominated rendition of the classic “Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight?”
• “The rowdy music was slightly at odds with the solemn interior of the old church.”
The Bollard
• “The Half Moon Jug Band has come a long way from their early days busking as a three-piece on Exchange Street. But in the ways that matter most, they’re the same goofy guys having a blast playing damn fine music.”
The Casco Bay Weekly
• “The Half Moon Jug Band has gained some measure of renown playing the streets of Portland’s Old Port for the past few years. The HMJB’s whimsical brand of acoustic music has delighted numerous shoppers and irritated some shopkeepers.”
• “While the term “acoustic music” is often a euphemism for folk music, the HMJB calls what it does “homemade music.” The members certainly aren’t folk purists, using drums and electric bass, and there’s none of the sanctimony the folk scene has become famous for.”
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