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With her first solo performance in Chattanooga, Susan Cowsill will bring her folk-rock vibe to tonight’s Nightfall concert at Miller Plaza. Opening act No Big Deal kicks off the event at 7. Cowsill has been a name in the entertainment industry for four decades, and her style transcends traditional music genres.
"I cannot even put a name on it," she said. "It’s an amalgam of all of it."
Blue Corn Music describes Cowsill’s music as rooted in "the organic honesty of rural folk and the catchy melodicism of ’60s pop, while dipping into the fluid R&B grooves of Cowsill’s longtime hometown of New Orleans."
Cowsill began performing at age 8 with her brothers as the youngest member of The Cowsills, model for the television show "The Partridge Family." The group became an icon of 1960s pop with chart-topping singles such as "Hair," "The Rain, the Park and Other Things" and "We Can Fly."
Cowsill’s music has been influenced by years spent working with a variety of artists, including Giant Sand, the Continental Drifters and Hootie and the Blowfish. The Louisiana native recently released her first solo album.
"She’s sort of a rootsy pop artist with a really amazing voice and with an interesting, long history," said Carla Pritchard, executive director of the Chattanooga Downtown Partnership, which produces and funds Nightfall.
"There will be that element of the audience certainly that isn’t familiar with her, yet I think they’re gonna love her." Pritchard expects anywhere from 2,500 to 3,000 in attendance at tonight’s performance.
The show will feature songs from all stages of Cowsill’s life. "Songs from the album, new songs, some (Continental) Drifters songs," she said. "I think you’re gonna get a little bit of everything. We might even do the ‘Chattanooga Choo-Choo.’ "
Her latest CD, "Just Believe It," released in 2005, drew predictions of a crossover into big-time fame from some critics. Cowsill wrote or co-wrote all of the 14 songs on her album, save a cover of Sandy Denny’s "Who Knows Where the Time Goes," and reviews have hailed her talent as a deft and expressive lyricist.
According to "All Music Guide," "Cowsill has stories to tell, and she tells them with a skill and vigor that never lets artifice get in the way of cutting to the emotional truth."
Cowsill’s recent work has a notably personal bent.
"The whole record is kind of a music essay of my journey," Cowsill said.
For example, the song "Crescent City Snow" was inspired by her 2004 experience of the first Christmas Day snowfall in New Orleans in 50 years, and the contrast of that peaceful day with Hurricane Katrina’s subsequent devastation of the city eight months later. Cowsill lost her brother, Barry, in the aftermath of Katrina and has since remained involved in the city’s recovery process.
The musicians accompanying Cowsill on her summer tour include Russ Broussard (Cowsill’s husband and former member of the Continental Drifters ) on drums, guitarist Aaron Stroup and Tad Armstrong on bass guitar and vocals.
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