Calgary musician coming to Strathmore in April
Shannon LeClair
Times Reporter
Blues lovers are in for a treat when musician Steve Pineo comes to Strathmore on April 1for a performance at the Travelodge. The $50 ticket get you dinner, catered by the Station, and the show.
Pineo first learned to play when he was nine-years-old and began performing in the late ‘80s.
“I just always wanted to play music for a living. I took a few years of university and dropped out and went home and started playing,” said Pineo.
In the ‘70s Pineo was into a lot of hard rock, Led Zeppelin and those sorts of bands.
“I just noticed a lot of the guitar playing was influenced by blues so I just kind of got into it. I just found it was a fun kind of way to express yourself because you just, you know, improvise every time. You just make it up,” said Pineo.
“There’s something about it that just felt right and I like the rhythm of it.”
He said he is not just a blues musician, he also plays jazz, country and rock and roll. He said he spent a lot of time learning the blues, which he said may seem simple, but actually takes a long time to hone in.
He said a couple of years ago he worked almost exclusively as an acoustic guitarist. About three years ago his friend Mike, opened up a bar called Mikey’s Juke Joint and Eatery.
“He wanted to get me in there doing something. So finally I said, why don’t I take Monday nights, and we’ll try to make something happen there and we’ll just play blues with a trio,” said Pineo.
He wanted a chance to get back into electric blues and have the same place to play once a week and this was his opportunity to do so.
“It sort of lead to a lot of inspiration, I just kind of went with it. I’ve been writing a lot of songs for that form of band,” said Pineo.
“I’ll be playing with a horn section in Strathmore, so it’ll be my three piece band that I always play with on Monday nights with a horn section.”
Pineo also writes all of the original music for the band. He said some the songs just come out of the blue, or there are some that he had written a long time ago that have come back into his head and he is now able to take the time to work on them and fine tune them. He wrote the song, ‘Too bad for me’ by Prairie Oyster, and had recorded the tune for ‘Canadian Man’ by Paul Brandt.
“Plenty of other people have covered my songs, they are just not name acts,” said Pineo.
Tickets are available at Music Centre Canada, Pro Water Conditioning, Assist Business Centre and PJ’s Appliances. People can also go online to www.strathmorearts.com and purchase tickets through PayPal.