A night of hip-swaying, heart-beating, honky-tonk warmed with a campfires worth of folk tunes is coming to Finnriver Farm & Cider next week.
Guitarist and singer Royce Leon will by joined Jody …
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A night of hip-swaying, heart-beating, honky-tonk warmed with a campfires worth of folk tunes is coming to Finnriver Farm & Cider next week.
Guitarist and singer Royce Leon will by joined Jody Boyle on mandolin to carry listeners through the cold nights of winter with the incandescence of their soulful harmonies from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Friday, Jan. 13.
It will be a return performance for Leon, who came to Finnriver earlier in the year to tour his new album “For Freedom,” released in October of 2021.
“I’m still playing stuff from the album, and then I recorded and have four singles that I’m slowly releasing over the next couple of months,” he said.
Leon began recording the album on Marrowstone Island and finished it at Rainshadow Recording.
“I had no idea what I was getting into,” Leon said. “I just showed up and from there rode the wave that was created having musicians come in and play.”
“It was really just reaching out and getting into the community of musicians here to see who could sit in and play.”
A full range of human emotion makes its way through the album with lively swingers like “Harvesting Roots,” to the soft, sweet succor of “Lady in White.”
The down-home sound at the heart of it all sparkles with an array of inspirations.
“I say I kind of fall in the lines of folk, country outlaw-inspired,” Leon said. “I grew up listening to a lot of different music so it’s hard to kind of pin down where all my sounds come from.”
He notes a childhood of listening to the blues and early years growing up playing classical music on the piano as places where his road has run.
“I retired those instruments for now. I’d like to eventually start playing the piano more,” he added.
Originally from a small town in Pensilvania, Leon made his way to the West Coast years ago, spending time in Eugene, Oregon which inspired the song “One Good,” though the lyrics about sound healing and herbal remedies fit here in Port Townsend, too.
A quest to find the right feel for his family brought him here.
“I’ve got a couple of kids and I also saw a lot of growth that was happening in Eugene and wanted to find a place closer to water, smaller community,” Leon said.
In the years since arriving, he’s worked to build that community through musical collaboration, releasing his album under the name Royce Leon and the Milky Way Pirates, a group that includes Boyle as a crew member.
“I talked him off of the porch and into the studio,” Leon said.
Matching the toned-down time of year, however, the duo will not be joined by any of the other scallawags.
“The show at Finnriver is going to be a little bit more stripped down,” Leon said.
No matter the size, the live experience always varies, though.
“There’s way more open form and playing inside of it, letting everybody take the melodies for a walk, so to speak,” Leon said.
“Who comes together to play has been different almost every time that I’ve played out live,” he added.