Red Bull Gypsy Cafe in Stillwater to chronicle red dirt music history, offer unique musical performances
The Red Dirt Rangers
From Wednesday’s Life section of The Oklahoman.
Red Bull Gypsy Cafe to chronicle red dirt history on The Farm
The Stillwater event will include the filming of a mini-documentary at the site where the musical genre was born, plus a music festival Friday on The Strip.
STILLWATER — Several pioneering red dirt musicians are going back to The Farm this week to revisit their roots and, of course, make music together.
The two-day Red Bull Gypsy Cafe will bring more than 30 longtime players and promising newcomers to the musical movement’s birthplace of Stillwater for the filming of an online mini-documentary on Thursday, followed by a public music festival Friday at four venues on or near Washington Street, also known as The Strip.
“They’ve assembled a lot of the guys and gals that came through The Farm, which was a musical starting place for a lot of people in our scene,” said John Cooper of the Red Dirt Rangers, who is helping Red Bull organize the event. “The Farm was there for 20 years, and it was a music house and a place where people gathered. Bands formed there, and songs were written there, and friendships were bonded there. It was just a place for musicians to be … so the magic’s going to happen in the place where the magic started, right out there at The Farm.”
A mix of rock, country, folk and more, bluegrass, blues, Western swing and honky tonk, red dirt is the first genre that will be chronicled for a new online docu-series called Red Bull Roots. The series will travel to various parts of the country exploring the origins of different genres of regional music, with mini-documentaries for each one eventually going online.
Cody Canada
“It was shocking, and I was honored that they picked Stillwater,” said Cody Canada, former frontman of Cross Canadian Ragweed and singer/songwriter/guitarist for The Departed. “It seems like Stillwater would have got forgotten, but I’m glad they paid attention and did their homework.”
Red dirt reminiscing
On Thursday afternoon, the musicians will gather west of town at The Farm, where a film crew will document a private story-swapping and jam session. The main musical tenant at The Farm was the late Bob Childers, known as “the godfather of red dirt music,” although many lived or congregated there over the years. The last year someone lived there was 1999; the house was abandoned when it burned down in 2003. But the shed dubbed the Gypsy Cafe, where much of the jamming took place, still stands.
Cooper moved into the house when he was an Oklahoma State University student, lived there for seven years and “paid rent for another couple of years because it was cheap.” while his band became established.
“That’s where I learned to play and write songs,” Cooper said by phone from his Payne County home. “It’s kind of all getting back to where it started for a lot of us.”
Despite the tight-knit nature of the red dirt scene, the performers rarely get to spend time together unless they are sharing a bill because they are so busy touring. So, Thursday will be a welcome chance for them share memories of The Farm with each other and the younger generation of red dirt players.
“The legacy of what came out of there just continues to grow,” and grow and grow,” Cooper said by phone from his Payne County home. “This scene needs some documentation; there’s not a lot. I don’t think people really understand what happened at that place and all the music that has come out of there and still continues to evolve.”
Rooted in The Farm, the red dirt movement grew up as a communal music scene, he said. The Red Dirt Rangers benefited from the tutelage of Childers, Tom Skinner, Greg Jacobs and a host of other singer-songwriters, who advised them how to craft songs, what promoters to deal with and what clubs to play.
“They showed us the ropes,” Cooper said. “Then when Cody and (Jason) Boland and Stoney (LaRue) and those guys started showing up, we passed that knowledge that we had on to them.” And that’s what really binds our scene together, and it’s the thing I love about it the most: It’s not a competition between us … when one of us does good, the whole scene rises together.”
Stoney LaRue
Canada hopes Thursday’s filming will give the musicians a chance to reenact those heady early days of playing and storytelling and “just be us.” He treasures memories of riding his bike out to The Farm, writing songs before and after his bar gigs and getting a bellyful of home cooking at the Sunday potlucks.
“I was sitting in a lawn chair watching Tom Skinner play in the Gypsy Cafe … and had no idea it was coming, but over the microphone he asked me to get up and sing a couple of songs,” And I’ve still to this day never been as nervous,” Canada recalled by phone from the road in St. Louis, Mo. “I’ve had the awesome opportunity to play a lot of things and do a lot of things, but that was the most nervous I’ve ever been in my life is getting up in front of all those people in Stillwater.”
The event will mark Canada’s first trip back to his spiritual hometown since he was struck in the head with a liquor bottle at a 2010 show during the Tumbleweed Dance Hall’s Calf Fry.
“Every time we pulled into Stillwater, it felt like home again. That’s where I met my wife, that’s were I met Jason, that’s where I met Stoney, that’s where I met everybody and learned to do what I’m doing. That night I got hit with that bottle, it broke my heart … and it lost its luster to me,” he said. “This thing is gonna patch it up for me, I think.”
Red dirt duets
On Friday, the Red Bull Gypsy Cafe goes public, with live music playing at four venues starting at 7:30 p.m. into the wee hours of Saturday morning. Unlike most red dirt festivals, the organizers are pairing the players into duos, giving the fans and players alike a singular musical experience. For example, Cooper and fellow Rangers Ben Han and Brad Piccolo will be playing in three separate duets, with Han pairing with Jacobs, Piccolo with Skinner and Cooper with LaRue “because we have a real long history. I got Stoney his first raise, and he still crows about it.”
“It is unusual, but that’s how tight our scene is. … That’ll be fun, man, because I don’t ever get to see Piccolo play unless I’m standing right next to him,” Cooper said with a laugh. “We’re such good friends with all of these people that they know our songs and we know theirs.”
Jimmy LaFave
In some cases, the duet partners have never met. For instance, Canada will be paired with a newcomer with whom he’s never crossed paths: John Parker Millsap, 18, of Purcell, whom Cooper met at the Tuesday Night Music Club in Cushing and calls “one of the finest young performer/songwriters I’ve ever seen at that age, ever.” Fellow headliner Jimmy LaFave will perform with another young player, Chris Bell, whom he has never met.
“Just give me a stage and I’m there,” Canada said with a laugh. “It’s crazy … but that’s cool. I’m ready.”
The approach will allow the festival to highlight the breadth and continuity of the red dirt scene, Cooper said.
“Right now, there’s more good young talent than I’ve seen in a long time coming through Stillwater to be performers. And they look us up. They find me, just like I found the guys I wanted to talk to,” Cooper said.
All the money made from the sales of wristbands and tickets Friday will go to starting a Red Dirt Relief Fund, which will aid musicians facing financial hardships. It’s an issue close to Cooper’s heart since he and his bandmates were badly injured in a 2004 helicopter crash.
“This is very exciting for me,” he said. “We had a lot of benefits that were thrown by friends of ours all over the country. It was amazing the outpouring of just love and concern. … This will let people know who are hurt that people care.”
Red Bull Gypsy Cafe
The Red Bull Gypsy Cafe will have live music from 7:30 p.m. Friday to 1 a.m. Saturday at four venues on or near The Strip (AKA Washington Street) in Stillwater. For more information, go to www.redbullusa.com/events.
The College Bar, 319 S Washington
8 p.m. Monica Taylor, Rick Reiley
9 p.m. Bob Wiles, Brad James
10 p.m. Gene Collier, Travis Kidd
11 p.m. Steve Rice, Jake Moffat
Stonewall Tavern, 115 S Knoblock
8 p.m. Randy Pease, Don Morris
9 p.m. Mike McClure, Randy Crouch
10 p.m. Susan Herndon, Scott Evans
11 p.m. Joe Baxter, Larry Spears
Eskimo Joe’s, 501 W Elm
8 p.m. Ben Han, Greg Jacobs
9 p.m. Kevin Welch, Dustin Welch
10 p.m. Stoney LaRue, John Cooper
11 p.m. Jimmy LaFave, Chris Bell
Outlaws, 501 S Washington
7:30 p.m. Bo Phillips, Sam Naifeh
8:30 p.m. Bill Erickson, Joe Mack
9:30 p.m. Chuck Dunlap, Don Wood
10:30 p.m. Tom Skinner, Brad Piccolo
11:30 p.m. Cody Canada , John Parker Millsap
-BAM
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