John Sebastian and Jimmy Vivino will be sharing the stage at The Kent Stage August 4th.
Over four decades the contributions of John Sebastian have become a permanent part of our American musical fabric.
His group The Lovin’ Spoonful played a major role in the mid-’60s rock revolution, but what leader, singer and songwriter Sebastian had in mind was actually a counter-revolution. “We were grateful to the Beatles for reminding us our rock & roll roots,” John explains, “but we wanted to cut out the English middlemen, so to speak, and get down to making this new music as an ‘American’ band.”
You know the songs by heart: “Do You Believe In Magic?” “You Didn’t Have To Be So Nice.” “Daydream.” “Younger Girl.” “Did You Ever Have To Make Up Your Mind?” “Summer In The City.” “Rain On The Roof.” “Nashville Cats.” “Six O’Clock.” “Darling Be Home Soon.” “Younger Generation.” These songs did more than simply answer the British invasion, they carried the musical tradition into the future.
Jimmy Vivino served as the Music Director on the TBS late night show “CONAN.” Vivino has been a consistent element in O’Brien’s late night career, starting with the first episode of “Late Night with Conan O’Brien” in September 1993. In June of 2008 Vivino moved from New York to Los Angeles and worked as Music Director/guitarist/arranger on “The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien,” “The Legally Prohibited from Being on Television Tour” and currently leads “Jimmy Vivino and The Basic Cable Band” on “CONAN.”
Vivino divides his time between recording sessions and live gigs throughout the country. In addition to his solo work, Vivino plays with The Prisoners of 2nd Avenue, Rumble & Twang with Lee Rocker, The Barn Burners, The Rekooperators, and the successful Beatles tribute band The Fab Faux. Vivino has also recorded and played live with such legends as Johnnie Johnson, Hubert Sumlin, Levon Helm and Al Kooper. Earlier in his career Jimmy got his start producing playing and arranging for such artists as Phoebe Snow, Laura Nyro, John Sebastian and Donald Fagen. Summer 2014, Jimmy headlined the King Biscuit Festival with his other band, Jimmy Vivino & the Black Italians.
Tickets will go on sale April 12th at www.kentstage.org
