The Foundry Theater and Stuart’s Opera House present:

LIVE! ON STAGE: JONATHAN RICHMAN featuring TOMMY LARKINS on the drums!

“Richman is one of America’s most unique and dynamic songwriters…” – Nashville Scene

The Foundry is proud to partner with our friends at Stuart’s Opera House to bring this show to Yellow Springs. Born in Boston and raised in Natick, Massachusetts, inimitable singer, songwriter and guitarist Jonathan Richman founded the Modern Lovers, a hugely influential proto-punk band, in 1970 at age 19. The original group included keyboardist Jerry Harrison (who later joined Talking Heads) and drummer David Robinson (who later joined the Cars) and the band recorded nine studio and four live albums, developing a die-hard cult following while receiving widespread critical acclaim. The group’s 1976 debut album, The Modern Lovers, is widely regarded as a rock-and-roll classic, recognized across the globe as a positively ground-breaking, seminal release.

Since the late 1980s, when the second incarnation of the Modern Lovers disbanded, Richman has released 18 solo albums, each featuring his unmatched blend of laid-back songs with minimal instrumentation, both acoustic and electric (although these days he plays only acoustic). He is renowned for his wholly unpretentious approach to his art, the consistent optimism and evocative romanticism of his lyrics, his endearingly childlike perspective and delivery style, and for songs that are firmly rooted in rock and roll yet deeply influenced by music from around the world. Richman’s playing and songwriting style has been described as “whimsical” and “innocent,” and in a 2015 interview he was quoted as saying, “I don’t write, really. I just make up songs.”

“The music we’re doing now works well in quiet places like theaters and performing art centers. We still don’t use a program or a set list so we don’t know what we’ll do until we do it. Please do not expect old songs. Many singers my age do a retrospective; this show is not like that. It’s mostly stuff made up in the last 3 and 4 years. Some of the songs presented might be in different languages; this is not to be esoteric or clever, it’s because the different languages help me express different feelings sometimes. One last thing, my idea of a good show has nothing to do with applause. It’s about if all the songs I sang that night were ones that I felt.” – Jonathan