The Hot Club of Cowtown, the world’s greatest little Texan swing band, is a trio consisting of Elana James’s vivacious fiddle solos and vocals, Whit Smith’s cunningly understated guitar phrasing and the delicious thump of Jake Erwin’s slap-bass. A. J. Roach is opening the show and his Dogwood Winter and Revelation are stunning achievements, but nothing compares to hearing A. J. in a live setting. His performances are so powerful that it is common for audience members to be moved to tears. You don’t have to be a cowpoke to love this music — don’t miss it!

The Hot Club of Cowtown story begins with a classic musical travel adventure: an ad in the music section of New York City’s Village Voice. In the mid-’90s Elana James was looking to join a “gigging band” when Whit Smith answered her ad. Though he had no shows on the books, Whit somehow convinced Elana to come down to his East Village apartment and rock out for an evening just to see what would happen. When she arrived, he opened the door in big furry slippers and the rest is history. More than a decade later, the Hot Club of Cowtown has grown to be the most globe-trotting, hard-swinging Western Swing trio on the planet. From early days busking for tips in San Diego’s Balboa Park, the band has grown and developed into a formidable international sensation. The Hot Club’s ever-growing presence on the international festival scene has grown with its relentless touring over the years alongside the release of five critically acclaimed. In August 2008 the Hot Club’s sixth CD, The Best of the Hot Club of Cowtown, a hand-picked, band-picked, twenty-song retrospective, was released by Shout!Factory records.

After a two-year hiatus during 2005-2007 when the band went its separate ways, they reunited in 2008 with a packed tour schedule and a new studio CD of original material slated for release in early 2009. In the meantime, some things haven’t changed. The band still swings harder than ever as it continues to develop its unique, ever-evolving sound. This journey, which began with the roots of the Hot Jazz era, Americana music, vintage pop and folk music, continues to unfold into the new sound of the group’s original songs. In the United States, the Hot Club of Cowtown has been featured on All Things Considered, The Grand Ol’ Opry, $40 Dollars a Day with Rachel Ray, Mountain Stage, A Prairie Home Companion, and numerous other radio and television programs. In the UK they have appeared extensively on BBC Radio with Bob Harris and Andy Kershaw, and on BBC TV’s “Later” with Jools Holland, the “Live from Glastonbury Festival” broadcast, as well as throughout the UK at festivals, theatres, and clubs. Among the youngest members ever to be inducted into the Texas Western Swing Hall of Fame, in 2006 they also toured as musical ambassadors for the US State Department and were honored to be the first American band ever to tour in Azerbaijan. These days, tours with Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, the Mavericks and others keep the Hot Club of Cowtown busy dazzling new audiences both nationally and internationally throughout much of the year.

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A. J. Roach was raised in the deep hollows of mountainous Scott County, Virginia, home of such legendary acts as The Carter Family and the Stanley Brothers. Growing up, A. J. was fed a steady diet of bluegrass and traditional mountain music that strongly flavors his own vivid and haunting, yet contemporary tunes. In August of 2003, Roach released his debut full-length album, Dogwood Winter on his own New Folkstar Records label. The response to Dogwood Winter over the next three years — from hardened critics and music lovers alike — would be overwhelming. The record would prompt eminent songwriter Tom T. Hall to declare A. J. “a true poet,” and to cite one of the songs on Dogwood Winter (“Hard Bein’ Right”) as his “new theme song.” Legendary BBC Radio personality Bob Harris would place Dogwood Winter in regular rotation on his weekend radio show and would later name the record as one of his year-end favorites. A. J.’s sophomore effort, where it debuted on the Euro-Americana chart at #16 and quickly found its way to the #1 spot. With Revelation, Roach has managed to incorporate such diverse instrumentation as banjo, mandolin, trumpet, trombone, Wurlitzer piano, glockenspiel and accordion, while at the same time staying true to the Appalachian roots that defined his first record.

For [the Hot Club of Cowtown] Western swing is a way of life, not a retro style to be ironically picked over (as you might say of Dan Hicks). Now re-formed, there’s probably no finer exponent of this noble genre (with the possible exception of Asleep at the Wheel). It’s a special combination of the music of Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli, of Hot Club de France fame (hence the band’s name), and a belief that no matter who’s in Texas, Bob Wills is still the king. On tracks like ‘I Can’t Believe You’re In Love With Me’ or ‘I Had Someone Else’, Smith’s guitar approaches the kind of lightning jazz chops that Les Paul could pull off in his heyday.

James’ and Smith’s own compositions are every inch the equal of the standards they cover: a sure sign that they take this kind of fun very seriously indeed… . Suddenly this gentle, good time music doesn’t seem quite so quaint or hokey. This is a mighty fine place to start digging the real sound of Austin. Chris Jones, Songlines magazine

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A.J. is a true poet. Tom T. Hall

Roach is a deep woods troubadour with a cunning wit and a southern gothic spiritualism that sounds older than voodoo. His music is parochial and far flung at the same time, witchy and unabashedly romantic . . . He’s a shitkicker poet with voice that crackles, pierces, smokes and then smoothes it all over with a shared shot of hope. Pop Matters

His Americana folk songs unfold beautiful narratives and a gritty sentiment not heard since the late great Townes Van Zandt last broke the hearts of an audience. Listen.com