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Phil Keaggy & Friends
August 24, 2007
Point of Praise Family Life Centre
Kingston, NY


It is a rare event these days when Phil Keaggy plays with a band rather than doing a solo concert. So when the word went out that he would be appearing in Kingston, NY with a band it was definitely worth a road trip. The concert was billed as "Phil Keaggy & Friends". Taking into consideration that those friends were Tony Levin and Jerry Marotta that just sweetened the pot. Sweetened the pot nothing, this was going to be the concert of the year without a doubt.

The show started out with Phil doing a forty five minute solo acoustic set consisting of fairly recent material. Now, since Phil currently has three releases out there was an abundance of tunes to choose from. Phil Keaggy has a career that spans more than thirty years and he just seems to get better and better the older he gets. This is an artist the never disappoints during a live performance, his passion for his art is still fully evident.

After a brief intermission the maestro took to the stage again with Tony Levin and Jerry Marotta on bass and drums respectively. These two guys are not just back up players, the are the best in their field having graced the stage with artists such as Peter Gabriel, King Crimson, Hall & Oates and literally dozens of other world class acts. The trio supplemented by a sax player on one tune played an amazing set of Phil's material including songs from an upcoming album that they had begun recording that week. Unfortunately the evening ended much too soon for this old DJ's taste, I could have listened to them jam all night long.

I mentioned at the beginning of this review that this was a show worthy, yes indeed worthy of a road trip. Audience members came from as far away as Iceland, Ireland, France, Korea and Thailand for this dream gig. It was one of those concerts that people will talking about twenty years from now with fond remembrances.

Chris MacIntosh aka Grandfather Rock