Photo: Frankie Cavone
Organ Fairchild has been one of the most exciting bands to come out of the New York State music scene in recent years bringing nothing but joy to their live performances and rewarding their fans with top-shelf jams. Hailing from Buffalo, NY, the group comprised of Joe Bellanti, Corey Kertzie and Dave Ruch have known each other for nearly 40 years first becoming friends while playing in the Grateful Dead cover band Wild Knights.
Don’t get them confused with the Wild Stallions, they are most excellent as the three members share a life long bond and after all these years decided to write original tunes together. Bass player? No need for one as the group relies on the smooth low tones from Joe Bellanti giving a jazzy feel to the whole sound. It has been some time since we have seen the guys in Organ Fairchild and wanted to catch up with them about their plans for 2023. Read our full interview the band below:
What was it like ending the new year on stage with Andy Frasco? How did that all come about?
We love those guys so much. We had opened a show for them over the summer at Lincoln Hill Farms in Canandaigua, and just kept in touch and sent funny videos back and forth from there. So they played Buffalo – our hometown – on NYE and the three of us in Organ Fairchild just went to the show as audience members with our wives and friends. We happened to run into Andy as we were walking in, and in his excitable way, he said “hell yeah you guys are sitting in tonight!” So they called us up about halfway through the set and it was just a five or ten minute whirlwind of fun from there. Great way to cap off an amazing year!
2022 was a big year for you guys, touring all across the state and beyond. How humbling does it feel to have a significant crowd response so soon?
It’s been an amazing experience so far. We never know what to expect when we play an area for the first time, and it can be a real uphill battle getting people to come out and take a chance on a band they’re not very familiar with. In fact, that seems to be especially true now as we’re coming out of COVID and all of us have developed new habits and patterns involving comfy sweatpants, couches and Netflix. So to have someone come out and invest their time and energy with us…and then come out of it with joy and appreciation…that’s about as good as it gets for us.
We all know the story of the band name but tell us the story of the direction you guys have chosen to go with regarding your music. It is really cool to see the approach and is comparable to what bands like Vulfpeck are doing.
The three of us have played in lots of bands – together and separately – over the years (since 1983 to be exact!), but never before did we choose to consciously restrict what we do in the way that Organ Fairchild has. What I mean by that is Organ Fairchild’s M.O. from the get go has been to play instrumental music in an organ trio format (organ/keys, guitar and drums), so we intentionally do not sing in this band, and we intentionally don’t have a bass player. (That said, bass player and singer sit-ins are among our favorite things!). As far as the direction of the music itself, that’s kind of been evolving since Day 1, with two out of three of us writing original tunes for the first time in our lives. (Drummer Corey Kertzie has been writing tunes for decades.) I think fun, funky, danceable and highly improvisational have always been key components, but things like musical dynamics and interplay have also become much more important the more we play together in this format. Bringing things down to a whisper and then letting the whole thing roar for a while can be big fun. And I guess another dynamic is the fact that while organ trios are usually associated with soul jazz music, our intention right from the start has been to see how hard we can rock in this format.
What are some bands that you’ve had the privilege of sharing the stage with and what are some upcoming acts from Western, NY that are on the come up?
Since starting the group in 2020, we’ve done shows with Melvin Seals and JGB, Andy Frasco and the U.N., Anders Osborne and Jackie Greene, Sophistafunk, NYS Dead Coalition, The Outcrops, Albany’s own Glass Pony and many more, with lots more collaborations coming in 2023. As far as bands to watch out for from our area, there are so many – Grosh, Loaded and Gorgeous, Grub, Johnny Hart and the Mess, Folkfaces, Painted Birds, eberwine….the list goes on.
2023 kicks off with a sold out two night run at The 9th Ward in Buffalo where you fellas will be playing Grateful Dead tunes. What other shows are you looking forward to in 2023? Are there any new cities/states you would like to play in this year?
Those “Organ Fairchild plays Grateful Dead” shows are going to be really interesting, and fun as hell. We all have fairly extensive experience playing Grateful Dead material in various cover bands, but working up two nights (no repeats!) of instrumental Dead tunes in our trio format has been a really rewarding experience for us all. We’ve purposely steered clear of doing more than an occasional Dead cover in our normal sets, this will be four sets of nothing but GD. After that, there’s a lot of really cool stuff happening – we’re making our Canadian debut in Feb at the legendary Horseshoe Tavern in Toronto along with two excellent TO jam bands (Must Stash Hat and Shapes feat. members of The Lizards), then in early March we head to DC for the first time for a two night run of “Post Tedeschi Trucks Band” shows at the Hamilton Loft. Later in March we’re recording our second album in the Hudson Valley with engineer and producer Justin Guip (Hot Tuna drummer, Levon Helm, etc). We’re in talks with lots of festivals for the summer, and then we have something BIG coming in fall/winter that we can’t quite mention yet but we’ll keep you posted for sure. As far as new cities/states we’d LIKE to play, New England, the Southern states and the Midwest are all on our radar, as is that holy mecca of jam music, the great state of Colorado.
What’s next for Organ Fairchild?
We just want to keep growing the music, connecting with cool bands out there on the scene, and playing for happy people.
Is there anything you would like to plug?
We have an SMS (text) list people can join by just texting the word ORGAN to 866-499-1121. We send notices when we’ll be doing a show in your area code (if your area code is not reflective of where you live, just let us know and we’ll make sure you get the appropriate content). People can also sign up by clicking here or the QR code below:
