By: Al Black
I met Tom Coolidge four or five years ago at Utopia playing some of his own music and accompanying other musician at the Open Mic Thursdays; later, I saw him on stage with the Plowboys. He finally agreed to play at Mind Gravy, but said he had formed a duo with Steve Bennett who had been picking around the Midlands for 40 years with different bands and currently played with a local blue grass Americana band, Blue Iguana. I ask the name of their duo and he replied just call us, Bennett and Coolidge. The Mind Gray partisans loved them.
I asked them for a bio and here is their reply:
"Steve Bennett and Tom Coolidge play folk music, sort of, or maybe they play Americana music… if anyone can really figure out what that is. They both write songs, some are funny, some are serious and some are both. But they also play other people’s songs too … some you may have heard some you may not have heard. Basically Steve and Tom play music they like, but also think other people like too, and might find entertaining. Steve plays guitar and mandolin and Tom plays guitar and harmonica… they both sing… in harmony sometimes. Both of these guys have been at this for a while having played, individually, in a number of acoustic bands over the years. They met several years ago at Bill’s Picking Parlor and found common ground in the music they were playing. The main thing is that they enjoy making music, really enjoy playing together and really, really enjoy playing for folks who like music that is not run-of-the-mill, music that may be familiar, but you may not have heard in a while, music that other folks don’t play, but some they do."
This Thursday, 01/15/2015, they will be playing for the Jasper Release Reception at the Historic Siebels House and Gardens, 1601 Richland St, Columbia. Come enjoy the release of the 21st edition of South Carolina's premier arts magazine, the announcement of Jasper's 2015 Masters of Art; the announcement of the city of Columbia's new and first ever Poet Laureate by OneColumbia; the announcement of Columbia's 2015 One Book, One Columbia by Richland Library; Historic Columbia's presentation of the Burning of Columbia sesquicentennial commemoration schedule and hear some great music from Bennett & Coolidge.