Trooper show suits birthday celebration

Ann McDermott is giving herself a birthday present, and sharing it with other local
music lovers.
McDermott will celebrate her 53rd birthday Sunday with a concert by singer-songwriter
Greg Trooper at 7 p.m. at Grounds for Thought, 174 S. Main St, Bowling Green.

McDermott got the idea for the concert a year ago when she attended a show by Trooper
presented in a private home in the Cleveland area.
Trooper sang before bout 40 people on a little stage decorated with Christmas lights.

McDermott decided she’d like to host Trooper in a similar setting, but her North Main
Street home didn’t quite have the space. She approached Kelly Wicks, of Grounds
for Thought, about putting on the show there. So it’ll be a coffeehouse concert
instead of house concert. Still, she said, Grounds offers an intimate setting
for music.
McDermott said she and her husband, Tom, are ardent music fans. Her husband, she
said, is "the point man" who discovers new artists online.
He found Trooper, and suggested he was someone she’d enjoy. They now own all his CDs.

She said she identifies with his songs. As she listens through his album "he
goes through life changes I can identify with."
Given they are of a similar age – Trooper is 56 – "he talks about things I
understand."
"I just always had a desire to play music," Trooper said recently in a
telephone interview from his home in Queens, New York.
The New Jersey native bounced around after high school playing music and attending
college in Kansas. He started playing in a band while attending college in
Kansas. It was a cover band, playing rock, blues and Van Morrison tunes. He
started as a music major, but was stymied by music theory, so he left the Music
Department and majored in English.
"I was much more suited for it," he said. Soon enough he decided he wanted
to write his own songs. "I was too determined," Trooper said,
"too antsy." So in 1980, he headed back to New York . "I wanted
to make records."
His music is an amalgamation of the styles he’s listened to and loved over the years.
As a kid the Beatles and soul music dominated the airwaves. Along the line he
became conscious of singer-songwriters working in the folk idiom. Those singers
led him to country. "At the end of the day," he said, "it’s
always been a kind of America music, American blues-based music."
He’s written, performed and recorded at a steady pace.
"I think my music has always reflected my life, and I think it always has"
he said.
He stockpiles ideas along the way. "I have boxes of notebooks with terrible
lyrics," he said, wondering why he hadn’t thrown them out. He’ll also
record snippets, the device he uses reflecting the technology of the time. At
one point it was a Walkman, now it’s his iPhone.
While he stores up ideas as he travels, usually he bears down when he’s at home and
has a deadline looming.
Often Trooper will be playing an instrument and he’ll come up with a sequence of
chords, or a bit of a melody. "That dredges up a mood, a idea floating
round in my head."
In earlier years, he work up songs pretty quickly. He had a "fervent
arrogance" about writing. "I was hell-bent on getting songs out. So I
convinced myself they were ready ad they were good."
Now, the more mature Trooper is willing to wait, to get it right.
He’s looking to head back into the studio in fall, so he expects a few new songs to
be in the setlist on Sunday. One old song that fans have come to expect is
"Ireland"
His songs have been covered by artists including Vince Gill, Steve Earle and Billy
Bragg.
As much as he loves playing with a band, doing solo shows is more practical. With a
band "so much more can happen," he said. But when playing solo he has
a more direct relationship with the audience. It’s just him, the listeners and
his songs.