Harbortown Music presents Guitar Heroes streaming show!

Two exceptional solo guitarists, Happy Traum and Toby Walker, will be participating in a live streaming show called “Guitar Heroes” presented by Harbortown Music on February 24 at 7:30 EST. Happy learned from one of the best blues pickers, Brownie McGhee, and was a mainstay in the Greenwich Village folk scene in the 1960s and 1970s. He gigged with Bob Dylan often and was part of a group called The New World Singers who released the first version of “Blowin’ in the Wind” in 1962. Internationally and nationally acclaimed Toby Walker is an award-winning fingerstyle guitar virtuoso who is a member of the New York Blues Hall of Fame. Traum and Walker have taught and played together and are great friends, so this evening of music promised to be entertaining.

A first-rate fingerstyle guitarist and singer, Happy has performed throughout the U.S., Canada, Europe, Australia, and Japan, both as a solo artist and as a member of various groups, including a duo with his equally talented brother, Artie. In addition to Happy’s impressive recording and touring history from the 1960s to the present, he is well known for his contribution to music education through Homespun Music Instruction. Happy and his wife, Jane, created a DIY music instruction program that has grown to include specific lessons taught by Happy and many roots musicians such as Richie Havens, Tony Rice, Dr. John, and Keb Mo. There are legions of musicians who have benefited from these informative lessons and have enabled them to gain confidence and further their knowledge of their instruments. Happy calls Woodstock, New York home and has a rich history with musicians from that area like John Sebastian, Levon Helm, and Jay Ungar and Molly Mason. A most happy new addition to the Traum family is the Signature Santa Cruz HT/13 Guitar.

Here's a video of Happy playing "Monday Morning Blues" by Mississippi John Hurt.

Toby Walker has merged many genres into his unique playing—blues, ragtime, country, bluegrass, old-time jazz and even rock. When Walker discovered his intense passion for music, he set out on the road to learn from the masters themselves and scouted out the best pickers from the Mississippi Delta, Virginia, and the Carolinas. He absorbed the lessons from Etta Baker, R.L. Burnside and Eugene Powell, among others. Walker is now known as a well-respected instructor himself. He’s a winner of the International Blues Challenge Award and a New York Music Award for best instrumental album. Noted WFUV DJ, John Platt has said of Toby: “If he doesn’t them with his phenomenal guitar playing or catchy songs, he gets them with his wonderful stories. True entertainers have an engaging spirit that puts a smile on your face. Arlo Guthrie has it. David Bromberg has it. And so does Toby.”

Here's a video of Toby playing "Hideaway" by Freddie King.

Harbortown Music’s streaming show will be live on Facebook and YouTube. A suggested $20 donation is recommended. This series is curated by Kathy Sands-Boehmer (formerly of the me&thee) and engineered by Stephen Bach of The Digital Docs.