Richard Carr

Saturday, March 31, 2007
Article by Eric Pilla
Richard Carr is an award-winning blues guitarist and bandleader based in Montreal, Quebec. His vast experience and talent have kept him at the forefront of the blues scene in Montreal. Carr sees himself as an interpreter of the music that has inspired him and shaped him into the musician he is today. His material comprises a wide variety of songs by renowned Blues & Roots musicians. Whereas most musicians these days tend to play a more modern style, Carr proudly sticks to the basics and performs his own kind of Blues music. "I try to play closer to the original version rather than doing more modern versions of tunes," explains Carr. "I make sure they sound really rootsy and rock 'n' roll." He performs both acoustic and electric sets, alone or with his full band. His full band performance include sets at the 2006 SIMMM (Place des Arts) Maximum Blues Festival (2005), Weekend En Blues, Octobre en Blues, Festival Blues De St-Fortunat and Cancer en Blues (2005). Also, you can catch him on weeknights playing gigs in venues across Montreal. With a great deal of experience under his belt, he continues to succeed in capturing his audiences with his sophistication and flair. He is a captivating entertainer with a powerful tenor voice. His specialties remain old-school blues, west coast swing and Chicago-blues. "I try the best I can to do justice to the material," he explains of the responsibility he has in upholding the quality of these timeless classics. "I try to emulate the famous people I appreciate but through this still develop my own personal style." Without holding any judgment toward other styles of music, he seeks to promote and preserve the old-school musical styles by performing them with the highest level of musicianship and respect. Carr was born in February 19 1963 in Ville-Émard, a small town in the western part of Montreal. Early in his childhood, he moved to Gulf Shores Alabama for a brief period. It was there where he would get his first exposure to roots music and culture. "The nannies that tended to me would listen to a lot of gospel and early rhythm 'n' blues," says Carr. "I would be around mostly black people but this was very natural to me." Though his time spent in Alabama was relatively short, this experience would prove to be marking in more than one way.
Upon returning to Montreal, Carr spent time in an Italian convent called Marie-Clarac. Around him, all he heard was choir music. He later joined and sang in that same choir. While this experience introduced him more concretely into the realms of music and performance, it would not prove to be a major influence on his musical identity. When he was just 7 years old, he received a guitar as a gift from his godfather. He then tried taking lessons at a Baptist Church in St-Henri. Having no particular interest in musical notation and theory, he would only go on to take a few lessons. What marked him most when attending the Baptist Church was the gospel choir that would be rehearsing. Even though he couldn't vividly recall having encountered this music before in Alabama (being that he was still very young when living there), it still sounded familiar to him. Carr became acquainted with some people in the choir and they would tell him about blues and gospel musicians and the venues where this music would be found. He associated himself a lot more with these types of music and it is within these roots-oriented genres where he would find his niche. After quitting guitar lessons, Carr worked hard to teach himself how to play. After a few years, he gradually started to develop a style and his own taste for music. It took him about until he was 14 years old to become a solid guitar player and realize that he had a talent. His orientation was mainly towards blues, rock 'n' roll and swing. He also had access to some really interesting record collections owned by some of his family members. Some of his favorites were the records of Buddy Rich, Louis Jordan, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn. "A lot of jazz standards became a mainstay for me," explains Carr. "Classics that people grew up on in the '40's and '50's were what I had as reference material". Although he was living in Montreal, where the culture was diversified and wide open, the American influence stuck with him all the time. Being that Canada had access to many different forms of U.S culture, Carr found many ways to stimulate his inspiration. Growing up, he would look up to celebrities like Dean Martin and would always tune in for The Ed Sullivan Show. Carr always had a flair for entertaining people. This talent went hand-in-hand with his musical gift and he soon started to become conscious of his potential as a musical entertainer. As he grew older, he developed a strong interest into the history of the music he played. Being raised as an Anglophone, he did not actively participate in the francophone culture of Montreal. When it came to music and culture, Carr always associated himself with the traditions of the United States, especially the South. The folklore of the South had been imprinted on him at a very early age. In fact, Carr's experience as a child is a good example of cultural imprinting. When a person is young, the music they will hear will affect how they play and listen to music. The music one chooses to play and listen to is caused by what one heard in his childhood.
Historically, blues music arose from the oppressive social and economic environment African-Americans living in the South. There was definitely still a significant degree of oppression when Carr was living in Alabama. However, Carr had never really seen himself as being part of a more privileged race. Having developed positive interactions with people of the black community at such an early age, he soon became 'colorblind', so to speak. Issues of race never really affected how he saw people. Back in Montreal, Carr grew up in a dysfunctional family living in a poor working class neighborhood. Early exposure to the culture of the South and a working-class background were two of the main elements that contributed to his natural inclination towards the blues and roots music. Add to that his musical connection to the gospel choir of the Baptist church and, slowly by slowly, Carr was discovering the foundations of his musical personality. Later in his teenage years, Carr started making himself available to different bands. In 1978, he joined a southern rock band called The Phoenix Brothers Band. Carr credits Mike Phoenix, lead guitarist of the band, as being a big musical influence on him. By the age of sixteen, he had already begun working in clubs for a couple of local blues bands. Being in a band and playing shows gave Carr an integral role in the musical community of Montreal. Becoming more involved in the music scene, he met many musicians, some of whom have left a lasting impression. Jazz artists based in Montreal who were important influences include Nelson Symons and Sonny Greenwich. For an avid advocator of traditional blues, Carr has quite a passion for jazz, more specifically swing. He attributes this to the brilliant records he had the opportunity to discover when he was growing up. Listening to these records helped refine his taste in music and help shape his playing style. While he does not claim to be a jazz guitarist, he incorporates a lot of a swing and big band influences into his live show. He also performs material from the likes of Louis Jordan, Ray Charles, Duke Ellington and Mose Allison. After watching Bob Harrison play at the very first Montreal International Jazz Festival, he set himself a goal to one day take part in the festival as a performer. The Montreal International Jazz Festival is the largest jazz festival in the world and also includes many different genres other than jazz.
In the mid-80's, different circumstances in Carr's life led him to take a break from music for a long period. Several years later, while at a club, Carr was had a chance to join his friend Richard Petit's band onstage. After this experience, he regained the exhilarating feeling of playing live music. Soon thereafter, he decided to fully dedicate himself to music and once again made himself available to play in a band. In 1995, after a ten-year absence from the music scene, he founded The Blue Ketchup Band. This was a five-piece traditional blues outfit consisting of Carr on lead guitar, drummer Christian Lajoie, Gabriel Lajoie on bass, Lévi "Bourbon" Bourbonnais on harmonica and Didas Grondin on rhythm guitar. Having fully regained the confidence playing live, Carr later moved to Boston to try to explore the blues scene in the United States. Playing venues on the East Coast, Carr was enthused to see that the crowds really appreciated a live blues band. In the late '90's, he would go on tour with Weeping Willy, Blues Boy Henry and Little Joe Cook, who were all famous blues icons from the 1970's. With them he would get to experience playing renowned blues venues in the United States. The tour turned out to be a very enriching experience for Carr: "It was kind of like going to blues school, if you will." The privilege to tour with A-List blues musicians was the turning point in his career. He was now on a mission to fulfill his calling to the blues.
In September of 2006, he won a Lys Blues award for the "Cabaret" category. The Cabaret category was for year-round players like Carr who do not have a published recording but have been around long enough to get worthy recognition for years of playing clubs and venues. In 2004, Carr was featured in a European blues magazine from France called Blues & Co. He's been invited to attend the Blues Music Awards in Memphis on May 10, 2007. In the past five years, Carr has been receiving more and more recognition. "If the people appreciate what you do, then to me it's all worthwhile," explains Carr. "Whether I'm playing small or big shows, you're always going to get a very good show out of me." As the last of the early blues artists fade from the scene, they leave the younger generations the music that continues to be renewed and adapted into new sounds. The expressive power of the blues stretches across generations, races, cultures and musical trends. Carr continues to authentically reproduce the music of a different era, music that influenced the vast array of contemporary music we hear today. "Nowadays, music is so open, so varied that eventually younger generations are going to want to taste everything that's has come before them," explains Carr. "They will realize that all modern music originated from blues, jazz, country, the roots music. This will humble them and make them realize that all popular music was initiated in that era."