Hardworking Singer Songwriter Martin Sexton Wins Over Lewisburg, West Virginia Audience
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| Journeyman Musician Martin Sexton on his Mixtape of the Open Road Tour |
When incredibly gifted musician Martin Sexton walked out
from behind the thick red velvet curtains of the Carnegie Library Auditorium in
Lewisburg, WV recently, he faced a very different room than he was used to
playing.
Sexton is not a superstar and does not play the big venues.
He is a hard working journeyman singer songwriter who does, however, regularly
sell out big city medium-sized music venues like LA’s House of Blues and New
York’s Nokia Theater with devoted followers who know his tunes, sing along with
complex choruses, and thoroughly enjoy every note the unique Sexton issues.
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| Carnegie Hall, Lewisburg, WV |
Things were different in Lewisburg, the clean artsy little
West Virginia place that won designation as “coolest town in America” a few
years back. Carnegie Hall, namesake of the steel baron who financed its
construction in 1902, seats about 200 people. It is a sturdy distinguished red
brick facility with high white columns out front. A luscious green lawn welcomes
visitors and a very old cemetery sits spookily across the street.
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| Cozy Carnegie Hall Auditorium |
Carnegie Hall’s auditorium seats and isles are wide and
comfortable and the back row, at most, is only about 20 yards away from the
stage. You could call it an intimate room.
The people who attend concerts at the venerable old library
are justifiably proud of their town, their venue and their long history of
attracting and supporting quality concerts. They go to every performance
season’s worth of shows whether they know the musician or not. Past concerts over
the years have featured artists like Judy Collins, Wynton Marsalis, Doc Watson,
the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Arlo Guthrie, Isaac Stern, Asleep at the
Wheel, Harry Belafonte and many more.
The audience for Sexton’s Lewisburg concert had a few
die-hard fans—one man said he had traveled all the way from Atlanta—but by and large
it was a polite older audience of men and women who came out to see the nice
young man give his concert because it was the right thing to do. At about $30 a
ticket, the right thing was certainly doable.
“I don’t know Martin Sexton,” remarked one older lady who
used a cane and ambled slowly to her seat about 10 rows back. “What type of
music does he play?”
The first two songs in his opening set featured sweet
melodic yodeling in a distinctive falsetto before he smoothly shifted into a
deep baritone. His versatility, touching lyrics and showmanship were on full
display. Uniquely, Sexton can duplicate the sound of a muted trumpet, penny
whistle, or even a trombone and did so often to accentuate the melodies of many
of his songs. The audience took notice.
As the show went on, Sexton, whose songs were heard on TV
shows like “Scrubs” and “Parenthood,” struggled to get his audience involved as
he attempted to teach them lines to sing along. They just couldn’t get the hang
of it. When it was the audience’s turn to sing a chorus on a Sexton song that
most of his other audiences embraced and belted out with enthusiasm, all they
could muster was a shy, whispery, uncertain attempt that made the room feel
awkward.
Sexton is such a talented singer and guitarist blending so
many genres of music like soul, gospel, country, rock, blues and R&B that
he seemed adrift in a sea of music. A Boston
Globe reviewer once wrote that “Martin Sexton is ripe with raw, expansive
talent. His voice comes in a hundred impossible shades. His songs are sweet and
spirited and soulful. His repertoire is like a cross-country tour of the
American musical vernacular.” That was all on display that night in Lewisburg.
He knew so many songs that you never knew where he was
headed. He floated from song to song—some he had written and some were covers
of other artists. He gave the impression that with the exception of the songs
from his new album that he needed to promote—Mixtape of the Open Road—he
didn’t know for sure what his show would include or in what order he would play
them.
He was in the middle of one of his own songs when he joked
with the audience that he thought it sounded like the theme from the old TV
show “I Dream of Jennie” and he smoothly worked in a few measures of the TV
tune in the middle of the song just to prove it. Another time, he drifted into
a chorus of a well-known U2 song and then noted, “that’s the first time on this
tour that I sang that part and the audience didn’t sing along with me.”
A Sexton loyalist in the audience responded with a shout: “Aww…Sorry
man!”
Later, he picked at his guitar and struggled to
recall the opening lines of one of his own songs. “What the heck,” he finally
said with a shrug of his shoulders. “I’ll just play a Prince song.” Then he
launched into an attention-grabbing version of “Rapsberry Beret,”
Another time, he told the sound man to “give me some West
Virginia reverb” and the country-like song he sang sounded like something you would
have heard on an AM country music radio station in 1962. He played Texas
be-bop, belted out Kansas City Blues, crooned love ballads and sang rock and
roll with equal precision occasionally employing the “beatboxing” and “scat singing”
he is known for.
His artistry on the guitar was equally impressive. He made
his guitar—a Godin model A6—rumble, whine, and sing, and played bass lines with
the thumb of his left hand at the same time that he manipulated cords with his
other fingers. At other times, by tapping, rubbing and pounding on his electric
guitar at different places with different intensities, he duplicated the sounds
of bass and snare drums and vocally added symbol sounds with his lips up against
the microphone.
Between songs, he bantered with his audience and offered
insights about what it was like to spend so much time on the road. He talked
about being the tenth child of Irish-American working class parents, and the
strain of leaving his young son at home when it was time to hit the road. He
talked about the value of failure—like the time he attempted to pursue a real
estate career in his hometown of Syracuse, New York. He expressed gratitude for
the “home made dinner” he had back stage just before the show.
It was certain that his hard work was winning over the
audience slowly but surely just like he did when he started his career busking
as a street performer in Harvard Square 30 years ago. They didn’t know what to
make of him but they were headed his direction. The older lady with the cane
applauded loudly after every song overcoming her hesitant early reaction.
Another unique feature of a concert at Lewisburg’s Carnegie
Hall is a reception that the Library holds in conjunction with every show in a
little room off to one side of the auditorium they call “The Mainstage Lounge.”
For $5, you can mingle with the locals, graze at a finger food table and have a
beer or a glass of wine. That’s where you can also overhear what the audience
is saying about the show. The intermission crowd had nice things to say about
Sexton. But, they also wanted to talk about the weather, politics, and how nice
the Indian tee pee displays were outside on the Library lawn.
At the end of the evening, they gave Sexton a nice warm
round of appreciative applause and were enthusiastic about his encore
reappearance that included a patriotic touch with his version of “America.”
It might not have been the most energetic,
adrenalin-pumping, artist-fueling audience that Martin Sexton will ever see, but
it was a sincere and polite Lewisburg crowd that sent him off into the chilly
West Virginia spring night for one more show somewhere far away.
