George Carver
Steel Guitar Player
George Carver plays with strings, fingers and a steel bar, but that’s where any similarities with the type of “steel guitar†coming out of Nashville end. Carver’s seldom-heard style is Western Swing with heavy emphasis on swing – the type of hillbilly jazz once performed by greats like Herb Remington, Bob Dunn and Joaquin Murphy. In a 30-year career Carver has worn many hats (multi-instrumentalist; producer of artists as diverse as African percussion icon Babatunde Olatunji and country/jazz guitar wiz Dave Biller; a singer/songwriter compared to Tom Waits or “Lyle Lovett on Quaaludes,†whose humorous downer persona can make Richard Thompson seem like Jim Carey), but his steel guitar endeavor is no mere flirtation. His chops on the 8-string lap steel were honed after years of listening to and learning from heroes like Jimmy Day, Junior Brown and John Ely where he lives in Austin, Texas. When not leading his band The Modern Agriculture, Mr. Carver’s non-pedal steel can be heard adding just the right flavor to bands Mark Rubin & his Ridgetop Syncopators, Shorty Long, and The Swingsters.
"Carver does what the best of Austin songwriters do, tell tales with sadness, humor and mood galore."
-CMJ
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George Carver
