"If living
the blues is a prerequisite for playing the blues, Laurie
Morvan has more than enough fuel to inspire her sizzling
guitar licks and emphatic vocal delivery."
Morvan will be brandishing her deft touch
on the guitar for the next installment of the InCONCERT
series at 7 p.m. Friday, Aug. 1, at the 4th Floor Blues
Club. The opening act for the InCONCERT show will be Lift.
Morvan has been battling conventional wisdom that a woman
can't front a blues band and, in particular, can't hold
her own as a viable lead guitarist. Featured in "Guitar
Player" and "Vintage Guitar" magazines,
as well as making the finals of the International Blues
Challenge in Memphis, Tenn., Morvan has made a career
of proving people wrong.
Growing up in New Lennox, Ill., with a "womanizing,
alcoholic" father who left Morvan and her mother
when she was only 5 years old, life has been a series
of challenges for Morvan. Her mother worked hard to scrape
by. Starting with a new, stable family when her mother
remarried eight years later, Morvan turned a tough start
to life into the motivation to make the most of everything
she did. First it was sports in high school, earning a
spot as a walk-on volleyball player at the University
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and earning her electrical
engineering degree. Later, she earned private, commercial
and multi-engine pilot's license before finding what really
intrigued her - the guitar.
The influence of blues guitar legend Stevie Ray Vaughan
is apparent throughout Morvan's music and her guitar phrasing
in particular. Despite a career liittered with skepticism
of what a female guitarist is capable of, when Morvan
lets loose she is said to shred with the best.
Her latest record is "Cures What Ails Ya," and
is available at her Web site at www.lauriemorvan.com.
Morvan's appearance is part of the InCONCERT series, which
benefits 12 non-profit organizations including: Starr-Gennett
Foundation, Boys & Girls Clubs of Wayne County, Richmond
Family YMCA, Hub Etchison Youth Football League, YWCA
of Richmond, Richmond Football Parents Club, Centerville
Youth League, Conflict Resolution Center, Townsend Community
Center, Sunrise, Wayne County Vision and Noah's Ark. All
ticket and food sales go directly to the non-profits.
