By WKTV Staff
Anybody who attended the recent Bob Seger concert in Grand Rapids already know that The War and Treaty — which opened the Seger show — are worth the price of a ticket all by themselves.
The rest of us will just have to find out for ourselves at St. Cecilia Music Center in February.
St. Cecilia on Monday announced that the band, featuring Michael and Tanya Trotter, has been added to the Acoustic Café Folk Series, with the performance set for Sunday, Feb. 24, at 7:30 p.m.
“The War and Treaty’s Motown sound with soul and folk roots … are a powerful duo who are on the rise and we are excited to feature them,” Cathy Holbrook, St. Cecilia executive director, said in supplied material.
Tickets for The War and Treaty are now on sale. (Tickets are also still available for this week’s folk series performance by the The Lone Bellow, who will take the St. Cecilia stage Thursday, Nov. 29, at 7:30 p.m.)
The War and Treaty, according to supplied material, “blend roots, folk, gospel, and soul, reaching back through their deep-rooted history to conjure up the strength of their ancestors. Their Down to the River EP (2017) boasts a sound that’s both stirring and sensual, driven by joy, determination, and an unceasing upward gaze.”
Lofty sounding words, but their real life stories provide evidence to the description.
The backstory of the band, and its name apparently, is a story of the separate but now joined musical paths of Michael and Tanya. One found their voice during childhood; the other found it during time of war. And their songs now blend to show life — real life, of real people.
After winning a talent show when she was 13, Tanya knew singing would be her life, her supplied biography states. Growing up in a tight-knit community just outside of Washington, D.C., she had a voice described as “honeyed and bold, guttural but angelic.” She started writing songs young as well, often alone in her room at night.
Michael spent part of his childhood in Cleveland before moving with his mother, brother, and sister to Washington, D.C. The family spent time in and out of homeless shelters – a limbo Michael would experience again as an adult. He was 19 when his first daughter, Michaela, was born, he “joined the Army for her,” he says in his supplied bio. Michael enlisted in the United States Army in 2003.
The musical transformative days, came when he was sent to Iraq, and stationed in one of Saddam Hussein’s ruined palaces. There, he had access to a piano that had emerged miraculously unscathed. An American officer heard him play and sing, and he encouraged Michael to pursue music. When that same officer was killed, Michael sat down to write the first of his many songs, some for other fallen comrades.
When Michael returned home, he was booked on a festival, where he met Tanya Blount. Today, they’re married, with a 6-year-old son, and writing and singing songs that, again, translate life, real life, to the audience.
“You have to have a deep place of love within yourself to be vulnerable,” Tanya said in describing their music. “With The War and Treaty, we allow people to see two people that are not perfect. We get on stage. We sweat. We’re overweight. We yell. We get ugly, we scream! My hair comes loose. We’re vulnerable — naked — in front of people, and it’s a chain reaction. It allows them to be vulnerable, too.”
For more information on The War and Treaty visit their website: thewarandtreaty.com/ .
The remaining concerts in the Acoustic Cafe Folk series, all in 2019, include Béla Fleck & Abigail Washburn on Feb. 9, The Milk Carton Kids on Feb. 28, Asleep at the Wheel on April 11, and guitarist Leo Kottke on April 18.
Tickets for The War and Treaty are $30 and $30. All concert tickets can be purchased by calling St. Cecilia Music Center at 616-459-2224 or visiting the box office at 24 Ransom Ave. NE. A post-concert “Meet-the-artist” party with wine and beer will be offered to all ticket-holders, giving the audience the opportunity to meet the artists and to obtain signed CDs of their releases. For more information or to purchase tickets online visit www.scmc-online.org.
