HOME | MUSIC BIO | MUSIC | 'LIVE' CALENDAR | GUITAR HEROES BLOGPURCHASE CD'S |  CONTACT

THE MUSIC
Watch  YouTube videos of Kevin's Performances   HERE 



The Play List


01 Change Comes Slowly

02 Mind and Heart

03 Lightning on the Earth

04 Going Home Alone

05 Fly Me Away

06 What Can I say

07 One Kind Favor (traditional)

08 The Real World 
       (ACIM, Lesson 188)

09 Hear Her Drawing Near

10 So Many Roads To Chose

11 Lightening Strikes Twice

12 Hillside Vision

13 When Dreams Are Here (ACIM, Chapter 23)

14 Now Is the Time

Audio CD  price :  @ $12.00   includes shipping and handling

To order contact us



sample
mp3's
















Lightning on the Earth CD

Esoteric Folk Songs

Kevin Johnson-acoustic and electric guitars, tenor ukulele, harmonica and vocals
Heather Feierabend-vocals
Joel & Sam Whitten-bass, keyboards,drums
Betsy Braud-flute, saxophone
Alan Morton-mandolin
Steven "Scratch" Smith-electric lead guitar,harmonica
Donna Johnson-baritone ukulele
Robert "Doc" Chaney-Grandpa Coglizer's fiddle

(from the Blues and Bread Blog)

The newly released music CD entitled, “Lightning on the Earth” is a unique blend of country blues and contemporary folk songs. Clinton resident, Kevin Johnson has self produced a collection of original tunes and lyrics that sometime seem to border on the mystical. Perhaps this is due to the fact that Johnson has spent the last 20 years researching ancient culture, philosophy, natural health, sourdough bread baking and meditation. Recently, he’s taken to the art of writing songs about the advantages of living the simple life.

“Lightning on the Earth – Esoteric Folk Songs” was recorded and produced by Joel Whitten at the Metal Shed Studio in Baton Rouge. (It’s available at www.bluesandbread.newlibertyvillage.com.) The project began in early May after Johnson arranged a set of new material he’d written over the winter of 2011. Most of the songs are biographical in that they depict emotional challenges and hardships that have shaped and led he and his wife, Donna, to choose a lifestyle of voluntary simplicity.

“I wanted to write songs that poetically express issues that matter to me, rather than just telling stories.” he said. “A lot of the lyrics are ambiguous because they actually contain a couple of different meanings. The words can be interpreted in a number of ways.”

Several talented musicians assisted in the project, including Adrian Percy, “Fiddlin’ Doc” Chaney, Heather Feierabend and Alan Morton, all members of the local Americana Folk group, the Fugitive Poets. Also featured are Donna Johnson on baritone ukulele, Joel Whitten (bass & keyboard), his son Sam on drums, Steven Smith (lead guitar and harmonica), and Betsy Braud, an extremely gifted jazz flutist.
The title track, “Lightning on the Earth” is really a song about man loving woman with purity and integrity. Though it’s not a love song per se, the song is sort of a testimony to the spiritual love between a committed couple. The cover art was painted by Kevin’s daughter and depicts lightning striking a tree, the re-energizing connection between heaven and earth – male and female. On his blues and bread blog, Johnson writes, “I knew that song needed a female vocalist and that Heather had the perfect voice for it. She’s got that sweet country quality that makes the song credible.”

While in the process of working on the recording, Johnson said he kept thinking about the past, about all the incredible musicians who developed their skills watching and listening to other musicians, before radio and records. “What I really wished,” he said, “was that I could have heard my Grandfather, William Zurich Coglizer, play the fiddle. Since he died when I was very young, I never knew him. But he had an old German violin that was made sometime around 1870. After grandpa died the fiddle sat in the closet at my aunt’s house for 43 years, wrapped up in woolen cloth and duct tape. No one on that side of my family was interested in it, so one day I called my aunt and asked her if I could have it. Surprisingly, she packaged it up and mailed it to me last summer. I was absolutely stunned to see it for the first time and hold it in my hands. I wanted that fiddle featured on my new CD, so I asked “Doc” Chaney to play it on several of the tunes. When Doc played on the song “Hear Her Drawing Near” I just knew it was going to be one of the sweetest songs I’d ever recorded because of that fiddle.”

“To me, familiar songs bring back good feelings of a simpler time, but new songs give us hope for a brighter future.” Whatever economic conditions are unfolding in these challenging times, it will be those who come together in a sense of community and spirit of helpfulness that are going to get through it. This CD is filled with hope and vision for the dawn of a new and brighter world.




The Play List


Gilead Valley

Saddle Up My Pony

Tree of Life

Delia's Gone (traditional P.D.)

Biscuit Roller Blues

Essene Cakewalk

It's All The Same

Angels Are Calling

Have A Good One

Muddy River Blues

Been Going Nowhere

** Recorded at Joel Whitten’s Metal Shed Studio, 
Baton Rouge, Louisiana (May 2010)

Engineered by Joel Whitten, All songs written by Kevin Johnson, except where noted

Audio CD  price :  @ $12.00   includes shipping and handling

To order contact us

 

sample
mp3's

 

 

 

 

 


 




Gilead Valley CD
Original Country Blues
 

Kevin Johnson - acoustic guitars, ukulele, percussion & vocals
Steve 'Scratch' Smith -
acoustic lead guitar & harmonica
Robert 'Doc' Chaney -
fiddle
Joel Whitten
- Bass, Keyboards

The songs I write here came out of my own soul search for reason, and the passion I feel about embracing the old traditions.  The songs are presented in the form of country blues because I really like the directness and honesty of the blues, continuing the folk process by writing lyrics that apply today.

 

                                          
The Play List

Blood Red River 

(Brownie McGhee) **


Death Don’t Have No Mercy 
(Rev. Gary Davis) *

Vestapol 
(traditional) **

I Am A Pilgrim 
(Merle Travis) *

Whinin’ Boy Blues 
(Jelly Roll Morton) **

Lift Me Gentle, Lord 
(Deborah Haines) *  

My Lord, What a Morning 
(traditional spiritual – Matthew 24:29) *

Death Letter Blues 
(Son House) **  

Hard Time Killing Floor 
(Skip James) **
 
All I Ask of You
 (Gregory Norbert O.S.B.) *

Sportin’ Life Blues 
(Brownie McGhee) **
 
Be Thou My Vision 
(traditional Irish tune, 
lyrics by Eleanor Hull) *
~~~~~~~
* Recorded at Jeff Shoji’s home studio, 
Baton Rouge, Louisiana (1-26-2008)

** Recorded at Joel Whitten’s Metal Shed Studio, 
Baton Rouge, Louisiana (5-17-2009)

sample
mp3's

















 

 











Sold Out
Blues & Bread CD

Kevin Johnson – acoustic guitars, 
harmonica and vocals

Bill Tidwell – harmonica on 
Blood Red River & Death Letter Blues

 “Blues and Spirituals are like the inside
and outside of the same loaf of bread.  
Each one nourishes you in its’ own way. 
Here are some of my favorite songs to play.”


 

 
The Play List

Moth to Flame 
(by Tim Bordelon)
/ Fire of Life
(by Kevin Johnson)

Another Me

Oak Leaf Wine 

Cherishing A Moment 
(written on a mountain in N.M.)

Such A Long Time

The Primal Heart 
(written in the studio 
by Kevin & Donna Johnson)

Timeless Wanderer

Litterbuggin’ People Blues

Song From the Other Side

Don’t Want Your Microchip, Mister

Patience 
(recorded live at the 
Unitarian Church, BR, LA)

Waiting Blues
(Recorded at Joel Whitten’s
Metal Shed Studio,
Baton Rouge, Louisiana 5-17-2009)

 







 

 

 



Sold Out
Songs from the Bakery CD

All songs written in the bakery by 
Kevin Johnson 
except where noted…

Kevin Johnson – acoustic guitars, harmonica, 
dulcimer, percussion and vocals

Timothy Bordelon – electric lead guitars

Randy Walsh – violin, cello

Bill Tidwell – harmonica on 
Litterbuggin’ People Blues

Bob Hutchinson – percussion, shakers, spoons, bells

Joel Whitten – Keyboards, conga drums on 
The Primal Heart

Donna Johnson – recorder flute


 Photos by John Baute
To order CD's, please visit our
EarthStar Store

      HOME  | MUSIC BIO  | MUSIC 'LIVE' CALENDAR  |  GUITAR HEROES  |  BLOG  |  PURCHASE CD'S  | EARTHSTAR  |  CONTACT 

blogspot visitor
Website by  New Liberty Village Press