The University of Tennessee at Martin will host the band known as 27bstroke6 during the 2019 Family Weekend Food Truck Night, scheduled to begin at 5 p.m., Sept. 27, in Virginia Weldon Park in downtown Martin.
All community members are invited to the concert and family festival, which kicks off UT Martin’s Family Weekend, Sept. 27-29. In addition to live music and local food trucks, families will also be able to visit the balloon animal artist and a caricaturist. There is no charge to attend this event, and food vendors will have price options posted.
27bstroke6 got its start at UT Martin in the mid-1990s as the rhythm section of the UT Martin jazz band. University alumni Matt Adams, guitar; Micah Barnes, bass; Julie Hill, percussion; Jay McCutcheon, drums; and Andy Whillhite, guitar and keyboard, originally took the name to join a Battle of the Bands competition. Since then, they have evolved into a jazz-fusion group with influences from rock-and-roll and world music.
The band has opened for artists such as Bob Dylan and Paul Simon, and their most successful original hit, “He,” appeared on Billboard’s Top 100 list of songs in 2001. Special guest Art Edmaiston from the Gregg Allman Band will join the group during the Sept. 27 performance.
Edmaiston is a longtime member of the house band at B.B. King’s Blues Club in Memphis and often visited UT Martin jazz band rehearsals when he was in the area, ultimately meeting the members of 27bstroke6. He has performed around the world with a short list of musicians such as Bobby “Blue” Bland, Justin Timberlake, Wayne Newton, the Memphis Horns, the Bo-Keys, the Coasters and others.
For more information on UT Martin’s Family Weekend festivities, visit utm.edu/familyweekend.
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