'Country all the way to the bank...'

In Tune,
E. Kyle Minor

    You don't have to go far to hear what passes for country music these days. In the post-Garth era, when even native Danburians affect Nashville accents, you almost forget what the real McCoy sounded like before the dobro crossed over to mainstream.
    Tomorrow you can refresh your memory, or perhaps hear real country western music for the first time.
    Amy Gallatin and the Stillwaters perform at 7 and 8:15 p.m. at Chase Manhattan Bank, 234 Main St., as part of First Night Danbury celebrations. "I guess my first public singing was around a campfire at Lone Mountain Ranch in Big Sky, Mont.," said the 36-year old Gallatin, "then singing for kids at a sleigh-ride dinner about 10 years ago."
    During this Christmas Eve's storm, Gallatin, who lives in Glastonbury, was one of the estimated 48,000 Connecticut residents left without electricity. That didn't stop her from playing, though. It brought memories of her years in the West.
    "It wasn't until I came up to the Northeast in 1992 that I ever needed to plug in to an amp to play."
    Then, when Gallatin went shopping for amplification, she found more than just equipment. Her eyes fell on a notice for fellow pickers posted by Matt Nozzolio, a dobro player.
    Gallatin called him up.
    "We just hit it off right away," Gallatin said during a phone interview. "Matt came from a bluegrass background while I was more Joan Baez, John Denver. But the two styles worked together."
    Soon mandolin and guitar player Kevin Lynch joined the fold - and the Stillwaters were born.
    Since then the acoustic band has played such notable venues as the Connecticut River Valley Bluegrass Festival in Moodus, the Boston Bluegrass Union, and the Northeast Indoor Bluegrass Festival in Boxborough, Mass.
    They also have a wonderful album titled Northern Girl out on Happy Appy Records. "We are a combination of Bluegrass, country western and folk," Gallatin said. "The songs I play come from my days working on the ranches, mostly little-known songs from writers like Karla Bonoff or Richard Dobson."
    Gallatin is a Muscle Shoals, Ala., native who moved to California as a child. She studied journalism at the University of California at Davis, but chose not to stay with it too long. "I was a roving reporter for KGNR AM in Sacramento, when they switched formats. I was out of a Job, so I decided to travel throughout the Northwest."
    Gallatin's wanderlust took her to White Pass, Wash., Cold Foot, Maska, and eventually back to a ranch in Washington, where she indulged a lifelong fantasy. "I wanted to be a wrangler. I learned to ride as a kid and always loved horses.
    "Hours were tough, getting up at 4:30 in the morning to wrangle the herd in. I taught people to ride," she recalled. And she soon got to indulge a second love, music.
    She moved to Lone Mountain, a hunting ranch in Montana. "I worked as a cook. People would come out to the ranch to hunt. Our job was to bring them out to the mountains and escort them. We'd sit at the campfire, I'd play my guitar and we'd all sing."
    Soon people were telling Gallatin she should present her voice in broader circles than mountaintop campfires, and the camp hired her to sing from a porch for its sleigh-ride dinner. A weekly gig followed. "I learned lots of great songs working out there," she said. "Since we always played acoustic, I naturally played early American and modern western songs." Listening to Northern Girl, it's easy to figure how she's come so far in only two years as a full-time professional.
    Gallatin's voice covers a broad range and is well supported on either end. Her band, which now includes Tara Rickart, has a fullness achieved only with the finest quality recording.
    Rickart's bass is the percussive backbone to Lynch's speedy mandolin and lush guitar leads. Nozzolio's Dobro lends a distinctive flavor, melancholy on one track, buoyant on the next.
    Gallatin's song selection, her band, and her clear voice call to mind vintage Nanci Griffith. Gallatin even includes Griffith's "I Wish It Would Rain" on the record. This is not to say she tries to imitate Lubbock's favorite daughter. Her phrasing is different, and her voice lacks any sign of a West Texas twang.
    It stands proudly in its own right. The album's 12 memorable selections also include Dan Fogelberg's "Sutter's Mill," Bonoff's "Falling Star," the traditional Scottish tune "The Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond," and the title track, Northern Girl, written by Cheryl Wheeler.
    You will surely hear most of them when Amy Gallatin and the Stillwaters' make their Danbury debut tomorrow.
    "We're really looking forward to it. We like the idea of playing for new audiences, especially young people," Gallatin said. "Playing for a roomful of kids and their parents in a bank doesn't sound too different from the old days in a log cabin on a hunting ranch."
    Buttons to admit you to their concerts and the full menu of First Night Danbury events are $8 for adults and $5 for children and seniors in advance. Tomorrow, they cost $10 and $7, respectively.

--The Danbury News -Times
Danbury, CT Friday, December 30, 1994