Album Notes

Singer, Songwriter, guitarist Samuel Tyrone Cotton grew up in Louisville Kentucky. His Grandfather’s rough, beautifully arresting
singing grabbed the young Tyrone’s full attention. His grandfather was a baptist preacher. He sang with a near illegal charm. He
cast a spell. There was always music around. Cotton’s mother loved gospel and R&B, and his fi rst concert experience was BB
King, who thrilled and captivated the youngster with his playing and his tale weaving.
Cotton took up the guitar at 13, and it became the central focus of his life. By 15 he was playing in garage bands. He began to
realize that the music within him was making him feel emotions that he could share and communicate with others. Music became
his vehicle of expression.
Cotton has moved audiences in every size venue from New York University to the Kyoto International Folk Festival in Japan,
where he has toured four times. After opening for Rahn Burton, former pianist for jazz legend Rasahn Roland Kirk, Burton said
“Tyrone can play his music anywhere in the world. If it were not true I would not say it.”
After a Louisville performance, Beat-legend Lawrence Ferlinghetti approached Cotton to tell him, “You’re the real thing.” Historian
Douglas Brinkley was blown away by Cotton’s performance at an INSOMNIACATHON music and poetry Festival. And legendary
composer, musician, author David Amram, who has heard Cotton several times, said in his usual animated manner,” He’s amazing!”
Cotton’s style, in part, was born while studying classical guitar in college. Also around this time he began playing blues and folk
blues in coffee shops and small venues, mixing blues with classical. He employed classical techniques such as a right hand classical
fi nger style, playing arpeggios of chords instead of strumming. He also began to sing. He developed a love for words, especially the
work of Langston Hughes, and began to realize their power. The desire to play music, to sing, and to tell a story was born.
For Cotton, the blues was a point of departure. He mixed it with folk, rock, jazz, and pop. He explored. He assimilated the sights
and sounds of his ever-expanding environment and made them his own. He found his voice, and a new blues was born.
There is no other performer, no other sound or voice or style, quite like Tyrone Cotton.
He is an original.
On this recording, produced by Danny Kiely, Louisville KY based Tyrone Cotton is accompanied by a truly stellar group of
musicians. Keyboardist Gabe Dixon, (Paul McCartney, Gabe Dixon Band), guitarist Steve Ferguson (founding member of the
legendary NRBQ), guitarist Tim Krekel (Jimmy Buffet, Billy Swan), drummer Tommy Hambridge (Susan Tedeschi) and harpist
known only to us as "Jellyroll" Johnson. In addition to Ferguson and Krekel many other Louisville natives present here include
drummer Paul Culligan, guitarist Mark "lupe" Hamilton, keyboardist Pete Petersen, saxophonist Reid Jahn, and Danny Kiely on
double bass.