Live at La Fonda...
“The Music Man of the West” just took Best Country CD and Best Song of the Year at the New Mexico Music Industry Awards for his seventh CD,
Always a Cowboy in My Dreams. Now he’s waiting to see how the release fares with the national judges at the Western Music Association and Academy of Country Music.
Meanwhile,
Syd Masters and his Swing Riders—with lead guitarist Lonnie Ohta-Mayer and bassist Gary Roller—will play La Fonda on Nov. 5 & 6 and Dec. 5 & 6, where they will road-test tunes from their upcoming album of hunting and fishing songs, due out in 2015. An avid outdoorsman, Masters believes he’s tapped an unsung opportunity serenading in such modern-day saddles as the Ford F-150 and Chevy Silverado. Masters pens originals in the style of the music he loves, and wrote the official Cowboy Song of the state, “Under the New Mexico Skies.”
Humorous and good-humored, Masters explains that Western music is the part of the Country and Western category that’s people love. “I call my music ‘vintage Western cowboy swing,’” he says. “I’m a cowboy song historian.”
Later this month, you can dance to the Latin Beats of the world music-inflected, socially conscious L.A. band
La Santa Cecilia (Nov 21).
