If you are interested in having SloGrass entertain at your coffeehouse, club, wedding or private party, outdoor concert venue, please call (or text) Mark at 774-364-4021. Or email us. We will respond as quickly as possible.
The seeds of SloGrass were sewn in the summer of 1989 when Dave, Mark and Fran started getting together once a week to play fiddle tunes for fun and a musical challenge. In the summer of 1993, Bob officially joined the band as its heartbeat on the standup bass.
SloGrass plays a mix of vocal and instrumental songs, drawing on various traditions including Bluegrass, Blues, Jazz, Folk, American Songbook, Americana, World Music and a few originals. While the name implies a strong connection to Bluegrass music, we love all kinds. Roughly three quarters of our repertoire comes from outside of Bluegrass.
Over the past 20 years, SloGrass has performed at the Old Vienna Coffeehouse, John Henry's Hammer Coffeehouse, the Vanilla Bean Coffeehouse, the Grassroots Coffeehouse, Rotman's Club Fantastique, Hezekiah Stone's Coffeehouse, First Night Worcester, weddings, professional events, and many New England summer town gazebo concerts.
The SLO was initially inspired by our need to slow the tempos of fiddle tunes, in order to learn to play them. Now the SLO inspires us to think of new meanings. Part of the fun is reaching beyond comfort zones into breakdown tempos. Pushing the envelope sometimes results in spinning out of control on a curve. So, we aspire to transform fear of crash-burn-and-die, into love of opportunity-for-miraculous-recovery. On a good day, when it all comes together, time seems to SLO down, reminding us of the proverbial "candle-in-a-windless-place".
Coincidentally, SLO is an acronym for Sustainable - Local - Organic.
Mark Whiting Davis plays guitar and sings both lead and harmony vocals. He lives in Holden.
Fran McConville plays mandolin and sings both lead and harmony vocals. He lives in Worcester.
Bob Dick plays bass and sings both lead and harmony vocals. He lives in Northbridge.
David DiBiasio plays banjo, dobro and nylon-string guitar and sings harmony vocals. He lives in Fairhaven.
Photography by Pebbles and Polkadots Photography
(for print-quality images, click on photos)
Stage size represented here is a preferred size. We can adapt to most spaces.
We have our own PA to provide quality sound for nearly any indoor or outdoor performance space, complete with stage lighting. We've been the primary provider of our sound reinforcement since we started in the early 90's, always receiving high praise for quality of sound, as well as volume - never too loud; just right to please everyone in the audience.
If your venue provides sound reinforcement, we prefers to use our own vocal mics (2 EV NDYM 257 and 2 Beyerdynamic M69N), our own instrument mics (various condenser and dynamic mics), and our own mic stands.
Instrument mic (in front of Bob) is used by banjo and bass for soloing; it should be kept at banjo level.
Upright bass has microphone attached to instrument; needs XLR cable only.
Monitor mix is same mix as front-of-the-house mix, kept at a low level.
Please provide one chair for David (banjo) who sometimes plays nylon string guitar.
