Soulfolk Blog

A hump-day lunch hour to remember!

Fri, 30 Sep 2011 00:40:51 GMT

Thanks to booking agent Natasha Miller and her staff at Entire Productions, Soulfolk performed a free outdoor concert at Oakland's City Center this Wednesday. Hundreds of people enjoyed this magical, musical "lunch-hour enhancement"!

Soulfolk regulars Robert Cassard, Bara Waters and Eli Cassard got the audience moving. Paul Manfrini made the trek from Laguna Beach to sing the high harmonies and add tasty guitar to the mix. Soulfolk's harmony-heavy sounds were also graced with the supreme bass skills and funky bottom end of Marc Levine. Truly amazing.

Not only was the day beautiful and warm and sunny, but we managed to heat up the plaza even more and get the smiles smiling, toes tapping, and lots of people singing along with some groovy retro folk-rock.

Thanks also to Jacob Rosenberg for his superb sonic skills as our mixing engineer, and major kudos to CBRE and Oakland Magazine, who sponsor the series and make every hump-day a lot more enjoyable.

Soulfolk Summer News

Fri, 01 Jul 2011 02:39:59 GMT

Soulfolk's summer is shaping up with some exciting developments, both in NorCal and SoCal. Let's start with the "discovery" of Soulfolk by a wonderful San Francisco booking agency, Entire Productions. This agency, run by Natasha Miller, represents some of the most talented and eclectic live performers in the Bay Area and beyond. We are proud to be the newest addition to their talent roster. We can thank Entire Productions for adding us to the lineup of the Oakland City Center Fall Concert Series, and we look forward to many more exciting gigs as a result of our relationship with Natasha and her team. Also in NorCal news, Soulfolk has been asked to become regular performers at a very special "new" (but wondferfully historic) venue. The 1400 Bar & Grill occupies a vital commercial corner in Alameda, in a gorgeous old building that has housed some of the area's most popular restaurants since 1883. For those of you who haven't yet visited Alameda, it is a very special enclave known as "the Island City"—sitting quite literally in San Francisco Bay between Oakland and SF (near the eastern end of the Bay Bridge). Worth a visit for many reasons, not the least of which is the greatest per-capita concentration of Victorian-era homes anywhere in the USA. And 1400 is one more great reason to make the trip and discover Alameda. Watch the Soulfolk calendar for our upcoming dates at the 1400. And, of course, let's not forget our friends and fans in SoCal! Soulfolk will make the trek south for one very special OC appearanace at Laguna's Lumberyard Restaurant on July 9. The Soulfolk calendar has all the details, and we hope to see you there.

Soulfolk groove it up with Paul Manfrini & Eli Cassard at Karousel gig

Sat, 12 Feb 2011 08:05:00 GMT

The energy was really crackling as the full Soulfolk lineup launched into 3+ hours of favorite tunes on a beautiful Thursday night last week.

The Karousel Boutique is one of Alameda's newest art gallery-gatherings places—in the heart of historic Webster Street. Guitarist/Vocalist Paul Manfrini traveled over 400 miles from Laguna Beach to share the stage with us, while Eli Cassard layed down a deep steady groove on drums. Bara and I reveled in the fun and excitement of playing for a wonderfully appreciative new crowd with the full band. We also debuted Soulfolk's new PA system, and we're happy to report it filled the large space with smooth sound, despite that the gallery was teeming with enthusiastic art and music appreciators.

Susan Grant, who manages the Karousel, made this an extra-special event with wonderful food and great energy. Bill Williford from Rock Wall Wines oured tasty local wines and even joined in on percussion! We've had an amazing welcome into the Bay Area community, and we're happy to be sharing our music with all these soulful folks!

Soulfolk rocks Franklin School's Summer of Love

Sun, 06 Feb 2011 23:00:00 GMT

On Saturday, February 5, Soulfolk contributed music and mood-enhancement to a magical fundraising evening for Alameda's Franklin Elementary School. The event took place at the "O Club"—the historic Officer's club on the Alameda Naval Air Station.

We were very impressed with the event committee's 60's-themed decorations, which included a large My-Generation's-Magical-Mystery-Tour bus, oversized Haight-Ashbury Street signs, massive floating flower-power symbols, and even a Peace Sign ice sculpture! Guests dressed the part in tie-dye, sandals, peasant dresses and lots of hippie-dippy accessories.

Soulfolk revved up a repertoire consisting entirely of music from the 60s and early 70s to match the theme—everything from beatnik Donovan tunes, to the Lovin' Spoonful to Tommy James and one-hit wonder Scott Mackenzie's infamous "San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair)." And Richard from "A Sound Explosion" helped with the sound.

For Bara and Robert, this show marked two major firsts:

1) Soulfolk's Bay Area debut
2) our first show featuring our son, Eli Cassard, on drums.

What a psychedelic night! If you missed it, then you aren't experienced!

From food to folk...

Sat, 22 Jan 2011 21:55:00 GMT

We kick off Soulfolk's blog with a brief tale about being open to change. Bara and I had been living in Southern California since 1991 and Laguna Beach since 1994.... We and our kids were deeply ensconced in the community, and from the outside looking in, we were alive and well and living in paradise. But, for us, there were subtle undercurrents we found unsettling...high cost of living, rapid cookie-cutter development encroaching, artists moving out of town—plus a long series of Kafka-esque personal events. We were never able to relax enough for home to really feel like home. In 2005, we made the difficult decision to sell our house of a dozen years (karmic timing, eh?). Over the next 4 years, we rented our way around Laguna, and circumstances beyond our control caused us to move 3 times in just 4 years. But when we learned that we'd be forced to move a fourth time, we took a moment to read the writing on the wall, and it said: MOVE ON. Northern California has been our long-term dream...the San Francisco Bay Area was our beacon of opportunity, cultural richness, and diversity, not to mention that my oldest son Dylan and his wife were already living there. So last July, we pulled up roots and replanted "up north" on an island off the coast of Oakland called Alameda. We found the perfect situation simply by measuring options against intuition, making decisions quickly, and keeping the faith. Just over 6 months later, we're already settled in and finding a kindred community here...personal, professional, political, spiritual and musical! Our replanting process confirmed that change is good when you follow your gut. The same adage about change goes for our acoustic quartet, newly called "Soulfolk." All our SoCal friends and fans have known us as Soulfood. And t named worked well for us because our goal was to make "music that feeds your soul." But upon moving to the East Bay, where "soulfood" is prevalent, and generally means hominy and grits, we realized the old name required too much explanation and was a potential source of confusion for new fans. Just by changing the last two letters of the name, we were able to give the band a new identity and capture a more descriptive sense of what we do. You know...folk-rock with some soul! We've discovered that the Bay Area is a musical haven...hundreds of great venues and thousands of amazing musicians. Soulfolk is a name that allows our lineup to grow and evolve...it lets us bring in whatever folks can or should be part of this music- and magic-making experience. We hope you like the new name and we appreciate your ongoing connection to us and our music.