DAVE ISAACS
Musical Cameleon.
by John Haring
Dave Isaacs is the ultimate musical chameleon. One night this Nashville-based singer /
songwriter / guitarist will be playing solo in an acoustic setting at a local
Nashville writers’ night, offering his jazzy, blues-tinged, rootsy originals
that’s the standard fare of many of his solo albums. Another night, he’ll be out with his band,
Good Souls, playing an infectious brand of commercial contemporary country and
accessible covers. Another he might be
out with the DI Trio showcasing his more bluesy, rootsy side as front man for the
band. And still another night, he might
be out with his experimental jazz outfit, Chupacabra, playing set-long streams
of consciousness. All of these musical
adventures have one thing in common, though.
You want to keep listening.
“I would say most career artists don’t fall narrowly
into one category, and I would say the artists I admire most have had a history
of exploring different kinds of music,” Dave says, “and that’s what comes out
of me when I write.”
Although only in town for three years after moving to
Nashville from Long Island, New York in 2005, Isaacs has developed a loyal
following of fans, guitar students and fellow musicians who frequently ask him
to sit in with them as well as join them on their recording sessions. Over the past twenty years he has earned a
reputation as a world-class musician, a talented composer and songwriter, and
an inventive and engaging teacher. He has released six albums, including his latest,
“Good Souls,” and has logged countless road miles, performing in hundreds of
venues from dive bars to concert halls across the eastern and central US.
Isaacs first made his mark nationally as the front man
and driving force of NYC-based country-rock band Jackalope Junction, but has
developed a soulful jazz-inflected roots-rock sound over his subsequent solo
releases. He is a classically-trained
musician, a 1993 graduate of the Manhattan School of Music with an advanced
degree in classical guitar, but performs folk and blues with foot-stomping
authority and a rocker's electric energy.
But it’s playing solo on the writers’ night stages
across Nashville that Dave really shines.
In the past, I’ve called him the best “interpretive” guitar player in
town. Let me explain. Playing in writers’ night rounds with
songwriters that he’s never played with before, Dave has an uncanny  knack for
picking up a melody and offering guitar fills and leads to songs that he’s only
hearing for the first time and be flawless in the execution, like he’s played
it for ten years. That is an extremely difficult thing to do. Not to take anything away from all of the
great guitar players in Nashville, and we have more than probably any other
city in the world, but there aren’t many that can do that without seeing the
charts ahead of time. In that regard,
Dave Isaacs stands in very small company.
Dave maintains private
teaching studios at his Hermitage home and at Grand Staff Music in Franklin, specializing in building musical and
performance skills for songwriters and developing artists, and he offers
regular music workshops both in Nashville and
on the road for the Nashville Songwriters Association (NSAI), the
Songwriters Guild, ProMusicU and other regional organizations. He joined the faculty of NSAI's annual
Songposium seminar in 2006, and recently took a position teaching music theory
in the recording program at the Art Institute of Tennessee / Nashville.
For more on Dave Isaacs, go to www.daveisaacs.com
Dave Issacs’ Upcoming Shows:
Thursday November 13 – 7:00 at Sambuca
Thursday November 20 – 9:00 at Windows Off The Cumberland with Chupacabra
Saturday November 22 – 6:00 at Ri'chard's Louisiana Cafe with Shannon Cain & Robert K. Wolf
Thursday December 11 - 7:00 at Sambuca
John Haring is the president of Random Music Group, Inc., a
Nashville-based artist management and publishing company and executive director
of ProMusicU, a provider of on-site music business and performance seminars. He can be reached at
jharing@randommusicgroup.com.
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