geyda

geyda

Geyda is Rob Miller, lead guitar; Paul Santagelo, bass guitar; Frank Lowenberg, drums; and Chuck Pitt, rhythm guitar. They have been playing in and around the Detroit area for the past three years. In the past several months their music has assumed another dimension as they have gained new direction. Introduced to the group by Candy Barr (lead singer for the Kaliedescope Assembly), Bob Burwell and Bob Redofski of Joint Productions have taken over management of the group. Burwell has described their music as fresh, but found it difficult if not impossible to categorize their style. Hearing and seeing Geyda at the Canterbury House in Ann Arbor last weekend, I found this statement to be true.

The sound was clean and the music was tight, making the evening vary from a pleasant to an intense high as the Geyda controlled the air. Folk, blues, and hard rock, accomplished with own progressive

styling.

The show evolved smoothly from beginning to end with the constant feeling of coming together of music, mind and body as the Geyda rapped spontaneously on stage with each other and the audience between songs. This togetherness has had a positive effect on the groups upward movement as measured by an increasing amount of both followings and engagements.

Besides two nights at Canterbury House, the Geyda have recently played the Silverbell at Lake Orion, and the Crows Nest in East Detroit. Also, performances at both the Obsidian Arts and Fools Festival (a benefit for Obsidian - local underground press serving Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti) and the Festival of Sound produced by Gravity, ended in ovation,

increasing heavily the demand for their style of talent. Joint

Productions has several local

performances slated, including a return to the Canterbury House on June 7, where they will be recorded live by Head Sound Recording, with sound engineer Dave Heller. Many of the cuts are to be used on their first album, now being planned. In addition to this, future concerts include the Crows Nest East and West, also a stand at the Grande Ballroom in Detroit, sometime in late June or early July.

A bit more of a personal estimation of the group comes from Frank, who adds the following comment: “Music today is so elective that often it becomes too pre-planned and rigid. Our music has the tendency to be ad-libbed except to words and chords. It’s more of an actual happening on stage. It represents the mood we’re feeling at the moment, instead of the mood we’re trying to create. The audience has a lot to do with how we’re feeling at the time. If they’re up tight we become up tight and can sound that way.

With so many groups around, especially in the Detroit area, it’s sometimes hard keeping an organized sound from becoming an area sound. Listening to each other more intensely, and jamming out songs instead of writing for the sake of writing keeps the particular sounds of our originals.

No one in the group has actually been brought up on one kind of music. We all dig blues, rock and folk. It’s more or less the mood that determines the type of song we’re going to play.”

Frank Michels

Obsidian