Local favorites to perform at this week's ParkFest

Monday, July 16, 2012
The Mongrel Dogs

This week's edition of ParkFest will include performers Chris Wolf, The Mongrel Dogs and FREE featuring Tad Robinson. ParkFest will take place Tuesday evening at 7:30 p.m. at Robe-Ann Park.

Performer Chris Wolf, is a fingerpickin' guitarist and songwriter. He originally hailed from Indianapolis, but is currently living in Mooresville.

His writing ranges from the absurdly funny to the dark corners of real life. He has performed with The Asylum Street Spankers!!, Steve Poltz, Billy Harvey, Amy LaVere, Victoria Vox and Rachel Davis.

Two DePauw University professors, Istvan Csicsery-Ronay and Ron Dye, make up Mongrel Dogs. The two have been playing together since 2007. They cover a range of music including folk blues, country, and soul music and also write and perform original music.

"While in the past we collected a large repertoire of songs to cover, ranging from obscure folk blues, country and soul music that we retrofitted to our front-porch aesthetic, for the past year we have concentrated on writing and performing our own original music," Csicsery-Ronay said.

Tad Robinson

Alex Puga, who is a professor of Spanish at DePauw, will also join the Mongrel Dogs. Puga has been playing harmonica in Southern and Central Indiana, and in the Louisville area, for the past 12 years. He has accompanied more local acts than he can count, and he has recorded with Snake Drive, Hambone, Blues Side Up, and Eric Brown.

His playing and songwriting will soon be featured in the independent film, "Suck It Up Buttercup."

They fondly describe their music as "mongrel" music because they enjoy blending stylistic elements from different kinds of music and make no attempts to present traditionally derived music in an "authentic" way.

"We try all kinds of things, but no matter what the material was originally supposed to sound like, it all ends up sounding like us, but we're OK with that," Dye said.

Tad Robinson will perform with FREE including Bobbie Lancaster, Sandy Williams, Kevin Anker, Heather Sloan, Mary Michael and others.

Robinson has been a Greencastle favorite for many years. He has been nominated for a total of seven Blues Music Awards since 2005, including a nomination for: Male Blues Artist of the Year.

Williams is a member of the faculty at DePauw University, teaching, among other things, jazz guitar. He's worked along side greats, including John Mellencamp and Steve Earle.

Rick Provine is Greencastle's only Rock & Roll Librarian. Currently drumming with the Hauskatz, Rick is also the Director of Libraries for DePauw.

Bill Hamm is a the bass player for the Hauskatz.

Lancaster is a folk singer/songwriter, mandolin player and recording artist. Upon entering the folk music world, she's taken her original music to stages from Kerrville to Chicago. She's new to Greencastle, and is the Co-chair & emcee of Greencastle Civic League's ParkFest series.

Lisa McCoy is the wife of Mike, Dean of DePauw University's School of music. She will be lending her vocals to the group for Tuesday's ParkFest.

FREE is donating their debut performance to the Greencastle community, and while many members are songwriters, they'll be playing all their favorites from artists such as Paul McCartney and Johnny Cash.

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