Larry Keel

Original, and from the soul, Larry Keel and Natural Bridge joyfully ride the changing tides of traditional bluegrass, country, jam rock, roots reggae, and even the currently emerging indie-alt scene always honoring the pioneers that introduced Bluegrass and Mountain Music into popular culture. Larry Keel is an award-winning Acoustic Americana flat-picking guitarist, well known for his entirely unique song-writing, gravelly voice and lightning fast licks and is "consistently touted as the hottest, most provocative and most entertaining bluegrass (artist) of this decade." Joining the award-winning Flat-picking legend to make up Natural Bridge are the vastly talented Mark Schimick on mandolin and vocals, Larry’s life-long picker pal (and fishing phenom) Will Lee on soulful, blues-grass style 5-string banjo and penetrating lead vocals, and wife Jenny Keel with her impeccable timing and solid, yet imaginative bass lines as well as tenor vocal harmonies.

Mousike Magazine describes Keels music as "Steeped in the old-timey and with a gravelly voice as deep and rich as moonshine on a riverbank... Larry’s flat-picking style is as seamless as it is gymnastic and he’s a master at simulating banjo rolls, mandolin runs or even parts that you would normally hear played on a fiddle." Larry Keel is an ever-evolving musical force that stands in ongoing defiance to all genre expectations. And his fierce, high-spirited energy also appeals to young rockers, jammers, alt country pickers and fans who are equally drawn to Keel’s deep rumbling voice, his earthy and imaginative song-writing, and his down-home-gritty-good-time charm. Guitar Player Magazine noted, “When bluegrass guitar greats Tony Rice, Norman Blake, and Beppe Gambeta sing your praises, you must be good.”

Larry Keel will be picking with a variety of players swirling around the calendar throughout the year; while Natural Bridge remains the mainstay act, look out for Larry Keel solo, Keels duo, Keller and the Keels, the Keel Brothers, Keel with Danny Barnes and Drew Emmitt, Keel and YMSB's Adam Aijala, an occasional Keel trio, and many other special guests added to the mix. You never know who you will catch him sitting in with... 2011's The Festy even found him sitting in on a spectacular Appalachian African combo of songs with Toubab Krewe along with host band the Infamous Stringdusters. Keel makes his rounds during the festival season with stops at Spring Fest (FL), FloydFest (VA), John Hartford Memorial Festival (IN), Bill Monroe Bluegrass and Uncle Pen Days (IN), Smilefest (NC), Rhythm and Blooms (TN), The Northwest String Summit (OR), New River Fest (VA), The Festy (VA), The Waterfront Music Festival (CO), Bluegrass in Paradise (CO), Appalachian Uprising (OH), Aiken Bluegrass (SC), The Getdown (NC), Mulberry Mountain Harvest Fest (AR) as well as lots of other shows and events.

Keller and the Keels are on tour with each other at select shows throughout the 2011 including the Yonder Mountain's NorthWest String Summit in Oregon, and several more lined up for the season. Keller and the Keels released their second album in May of 2010 and hit #1 on the Billboard Bluegrass charts! These all-covers collection amusingly titled Thief includes songs originally written and recorded by as wildly diverse an assemblage as anyone’s ever likely to dream up, from Amy Winehouse's "Rehab" to Patterson Hood's "Uncle Disney".

Larry Keel and Natural Bridge have also been writing a bunch of new material that is going to be released on a new album due out in early 2012. The Keels will also be heading back in studio to record another BlueBrass Session this winter (if you are not familiar this was a project from about ten years ago that involved pickers and New Orleans funk musicians and included members of Dirty Dozen Brass Band, Rebirth Brass Band, Troy "Trombone Shorty” Andrews, Aaron "Woody" Wood, Jason Krekel, and many others....!)

Throughout his career, Larry Keel has released 13 albums and is featured on 10 others including recording with Keller Williams, Curtis Burch, MaGraw Gap, and Acoustic Syndicate's Steve "Big" Daddy McMurry. Larry Keel's latest release with Natural Bridge was 2008's BACKWOODS in which the approach to the material made "all the difference here, a hybrid of bluegrass with folk, country and jazz that tweaks the arrangements in subtly, shifting ways to grab one's attention... It feels like sunshine peaking through a thick forest or a sunrise with the grass caked by morning dew,” noted John Pattrick Gatta on Jambands.com.

One of Keel's instrumental's entitled "Sound Check" is being featured in a new fly-fishing film directed by the renown Confluence Films which released in the Fall of 2011. Fans will also have a another chance to pick n' fish with the Keels and friends at their fishin and pickin workshop events which occur twice a year, Bass and Grass in Perry, GA and Trout and Tunes in Slatyfork, WV.

"Larry Keel’s website sports the countrified boast 'Guitar Legend & Master Fisherman.' While I’m sure his unruly beard and general country demeanor support the latter (at least on a surface level), there’s no arguing the former. Whether you catch him in a solo setting, showing off his white-lightning acoustic finger picking, or in more fleshed-out musical digs with his Appalachian ensemble Natural Bridge, you’re likely to be transported to a place where moonshine flows aplenty and coal mines loom in the distance. While his rusty, bar-dweller vocals are strictly backwoods beauty, pigeonholing Keel’s versatile guitar playing would be a mistake. He’s capable of dizzying displays of virtuosity and calming, sermon-like reverence," states Leo Weekly.