Roots Raconteur Ray Bonneville returns to historic Silver City Schoolhouse

Roots Raconteur Ray Bonneville returns to Silver City for one exclusive show at the historic Silver City Schoolhouse, 385 High Street, on Saturday, Jan. 19 at 7 p.m.

Donations of $15-$25 are requested. Reservations highly recommended.

Email: SilverCityLive@gmail.com

Accompanying Bonneville will be acclaimed instrumentalist Richie Lawrence on keyboard and accordion.

Lake Tahoe singer-songwriter Darren Senn will open the show. View his video for "Mile Marker 41" on YouTube.

Listen to Bonneville's tracks on Soundcloud.

There's also more on Ray at raybonneville.com.

"On his ninth album, Bonneville displays the discernment that some artists never attain, namely that he realizes the strength of his songs lies not in what he puts into the recording, but rather, what he leaves out... another example of storytelling that once again proves we are in the presence of a master," said Joe McSpadden of No Depression.

Acclaimed raconteur Ray Bonneville strips his bluesy Americana down to its essentials and steeps it in the humid grooves of the South, creating a compelling poetry of hard living and deep feeling.

His ninth release, At King Electric, delivers more than his trademark grit and groove. Songs such as “The Next Card to Fall” and “Codeine” gleam with intimate narratives of characters reaching for hope and wrestling with despair.

Rich guitar and harmonica lines resonate over spare but spunky rhythms, while Bonneville’s deep, evocative voice confesses life’s harsh realities.

Jim Withers of the Montreal Gazette describes his sound as “folk-roots gumbo... a languid Mississippi Delta groove, seasoned with smooth, weathered vocals and a propulsive harmonica wheeze.”

Whether performing solo or fronting a band, playing electric or acoustic guitar, Bonneville allows space between notes that adds potency to every chord, lick, and lyric.

Thom Jurek of Allmusic.com remarks, “With darkness and light fighting for dominance... he’s stripped away every musical excess to let the songs speak for themselves.”

Often called a “song and groove man,” Bonneville has lived the life of the itinerant artist.

From his native Quebec, he moved to Boston at age twelve, where he learned English and picked up piano and guitar.

Later, he served in Vietnam and earned a pilot’s license in Colorado before living in Alaska, Seattle, and Paris.

Six years in New Orleans infused his musical sensibilities with the region's culture and rhythms.

And then, a close call while piloting a seaplane proved pivotal: After two decades working as a studio musician, playing rowdy rooms with blues bands, and living hard, Bonneville’s lifetime of hard-won experience coalesced into an urge to write his own music.

Ray recorded his first album, On the Main, in 1992. He’s since released nine albums, earned wide critical and popular acclaim, and won an enthusiastic following in the U.S., Canada, and Europe.

His awards include a prestigious Juno, the Canadian equivalent of a Grammy, for his 1999 album, Gust of Wind. In 2012, Ray won the solo/duet category in the Blues Foundation’s International Blues Challenge.

His post-Katrina ode, “I Am the Big Easy,” earned the International Folk Alliance’s 2009 Song of the Year Award, placed No. 1 on Folk Radio’s list of most-played songs of 2008, and was recently covered by Jennifer Warnes for the BMG label.

Other notable artists who have recorded his songs include Ronnie Hawkins (“Foolish”) and Slaid Cleaves (“Run Jolee Run”).

Ray has shared the bill with blues heavyweights Muddy Waters, B.B. King, Dr. John, J.J. Cale, and Robert Cray, and has guested on albums by Mary Gauthier, Gurf Morlix, Eliza Gilkyson, Ray Wylie Hubbard, and other prominent musicians.

He has performed at renowned venues around the world, including South by Southwest, Folk Alliance, and Montreal International Jazz Festival, and plays over 100 shows per year across the U.S., Canada, and Europe. When not on the road, he resides in Austin, Texas.

"There is something perennially cosmic in Ray Bonneville's songs... He wraps his sound around a potent gris-gris of genuine grooves, and then layers on a soft-shell delivery that is seductively impossible to resist... At his core this man is a song catcher, someone who waits for the ether to send something his way, where he then snags it from the air and puts it inside his musical satchel. From there, things can go a thousand different ways until songs like 'Next Card to Fall' and 'The Day They Let Me Out' spring to life," said Bill Bentley of Bentley's Bandstand.

"The oughta-be a hit in this is 'South Of The Blues,' a journeyman musician's credo if there is one. Or the spectral sounding 'The Day They Let Me Out,' or maybe 'Codeine.' Bonneville's cautionary tale that brings to mind Cale's 'Cocaine.' ...If he comes anywhere near you, and you like musicians who can hold a stage by themselves, do catch him live," said Bill Wasserzieher of Blues Music Magazine.

"Ray Bonneville may have one of the sexiest guitar styles around. Poetic. Infectious. Bad Man's Blood emerges as Bonneville's magnum opus," said All Music Guide.

"A weathered voice, a pule of a beat, fuzzy electric guitar, growling harmonica, late-night vibe, blues-cool ... it's Ray Bonneville at his best," said Music Matters Review.

"Moods and feelings that go beyond the bare facts of his tales ... funny and quirky one minute, and cerebral and reflective the next," said PopMatters.

"The appealing gumbo of his weathered voice, percussive guitar playing, amplified footboard and hook-rich songs (all originals) results in a rootsy folk-blues sound that tugs at the ear with its grainy groove and less-is-more production," said Sing Out!

"Like Gunpowder and Opium," said Ray Wylie Hubbard.

"Raw, gutsy music," said the New Times.