This is part of our ongoing series on musicians who perform in The Berkshires.
Andy Wrba is a native of Pittsfield and a central figure of the Berkshires’ thriving music community. Andy founded The Berkshire Jazz Collective in 2012 to showcase the talent and diversity of local music artists. He developed and curated a weekly jazz residency at the Mission Restaurant in Pittsfield, which ran from the spring of 2011 through the fall of 2022, when the restaurant closed. Andy was an original member of the band Barefoot Truth, which toured nationally and achieved commercial success as an independent roots-rock band.
Andy is releasing a new single, “Bluie,” this week and will have a Thursday night residency for the month of October at The Lion’s Den at the Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge. I enjoyed catching up over Zoom with Andy to learn more about the new single, the October residency, and his musical journey. Andy’s commitment to The Berkshires, and Pittsfield specifically, and his passion for educating our next generation of musicians shine through in the interview. I hope you’ll see that in our conversation, which has been lightly edited for clarity.
I understand you have several exciting things coming up, including the release of a new single and a month-long residency at the Lion’s Den at the Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge. Can you tell us more about both things?
It all started over a decade ago with the residency that I had at Mission [in Pittsfield], with Monday night jazz. I ran that from 2011 through the fall of 2022. Since Mission closed, I haven’t had much of an active touring or playing schedule. So I’ve been hungry for that. And I love the Lion’s Den – the vibe down there is great. I can’t quite commit to another [permanent] residency, but I wanted to do more than just a one-off gig. I wanted to have something a little bit more creative and something to sink my teeth into a little bit more. It’s largely inspired by the Mission residency, and I’m having a lot of the same musicians who joined me through those Mission years at the Lion’s Den next month.
[Regarding the Single] Let’s also turn the clock back to about a year ago. After 11 years of playing, I decided that I wanted to finally start documenting some of the Mission nights. I had lined up a live audio engineer to record some of the nights in November and December. And then, in mid-October, I found out that I had three nights left at Mission before it closed its doors. I called the recording engineer to see if he could come earlier, and we were able to record two of the nights with no real plan other than posterity and just having something to look back on.
One of the nights featured Kris Allen, Peter McEachern, and George Schuller – those guys just bring it every single time, and I’m constantly chasing them and just trying to keep up. But at the end of the first set, we played an original song of mine called “Bluie.” And they totally captured the spirit of the song. It’s a song that I wrote both in dedication to my dad and my two sons. It randomly happened to be my dad’s birthday that night, which was a coincidence, and he was in the room. It was the first night after Mission announced the closing, so the place was mobbed, and everyone was just trying to soak up everything. And the playing was great. So this is the one track from that night that I wanted to release. And I don’t have too much out there officially in the world – this will be only the second single that I’ve released under my name.
Do you have anything special planned for the Residency?
I’m playing Thursday nights in October at The Lion’s Den under Andy Wrba and Friends – I wanted to feature the names of everybody, but there are too many different folks, so that’s how we’re naming it. The first week, we’ll feature Todd Reynolds on violin, Luke Franco on guitar, and Conor Meehan on drums. That’s a unit that’s worked together quite a bit and has a lot of energy. Todd Reynolds describes himself as a classical violinist gone wrong. It’s essentially a string band, but we go far out, and it’s a lot of fun.
The second week will feature Wanda Houston, Benny Kohn, Conor Meehan, and Don Mikkelsen on trombone – and I’ll round it out for the quintet. We’re following Wanda that night. She takes the reins anytime she’s on the bandstand, and we have a lot of fun. And that will be swinging.
The third week will feature The Trio. I say “The Trio” because it’s my most regular working band and some of my most favorite music to play – it’s with Benny on piano, Conor on drums, and me on bass. That’s a classic lineup for me.
And then the last week will feature the same quartet that I recorded “Bluie” with. That’s Kris Allen, Peter McEachern, George Schuller, and me. We will definitely play “Bluie” that night.
That sounds great – there is a lot to look forward to there!
Yes, there is a lot to look forward to. And with the exception of the last week, Conor is on drums, and I know that we’ve spoken a bit about him in the past, but Conor is one of the best – if not the best – drummers in the Berkshires playing now. He holds up to all the cats that I know. He can do it all – he can play with so many different feels with authenticity. He’s totally down to play the role; he’s totally down to take charge and rip into a drum solo that’s going to blow the room apart. He just knows when to do the right thing at the right time. Conor is the best. And he’s a great guy.
Anything else to add about the residency or the single?
You’ll be able to find the single on Tuesday, October 3, on all the platforms: Spotify, Apple Music, etc. [Here is a link to pre-save the song.]
Tell us about your musical journey – how did you first get started in music?
I came up in a musical family. Nothing too over the top, but my dad played by ear and played a little piano, a little bit of harmonica, and would play squeezebox at Christmas time. He has a great ear and loved to play boogie woogie, the blues, and rock and roll around the house. And my mom could only play with sheet music in front of her, and she played a little folk guitar and some basic piano. And we had a piano in the house and had instruments around. I started on alto saxophone in fourth grade. So we were a musical family. And music was always introduced and offered to me in a lot of different ways. My dad didn’t really intentionally listen to music but liked the blues, R&B, Motown, and things like that – that was his bag. My mom was into Carole King, The Beatles, Joni Mitchell, and that sort of stuff. Carole King’s Tapestry is the deepest record imprinted in my DNA. It’s an amazing album. And I own like three copies of it. And I don’t know why – if I see it, I just pick it up.
I started playing alto saxophone and piano; then in middle school, I started playing some guitar and a little bit of bass. I was a 12-year-old thrasher playing in punk bands and doing what I was supposed to do, I guess. In high school, I didn’t want to be in the marching band, so they kicked me out of the concert band, which I thought was a shame because I like playing saxophone, but you had to do everything if you wanted to do one of them. [Editor’s note: having worked in education, I’ve heard this same sad sentiment many times – it’s a shame school music departments don’t give students more agency in where they play.] So I bailed on that and just played in my rock bands. But then, when I was a junior in high school, the jazz band needed a bass player. And it’s like, “Oh, I can play the jazz band” and not have to do all the other stuff that I didn’t feel like doing and do all the trips and all the concerts and all the fun stuff. So that was my introduction to jazz, playing electric bass in a pretty modest high school jazz band.
That was my start. And then, I wanted to pursue it further, so I applied to a couple of local college programs and ended up going to Westfield State University. I was definitely in over my head because I didn’t really have much formal training at all. But I definitely had some innate skills and approaches that I didn’t realize how much would benefit me. Taking a little bit from both my parents – my dad’s ear and instincts and my mom’s ability to read music. I kind of hit the accelerator in a serious way in college and just dove right in, and spent all the hours in the practice rooms at night and did all the things you’re supposed to do as a music major. It takes a lot of time, practice, and focus, and I was fully committed from the beginning and really took off.
I had great teachers and some really great peers that I learned from, too. That was when I started playing upright bass and was just really, really diving in. I nerded out on music theory, which I just ate up, and somehow I loved music history. And even though teachers may have had other thoughts about my actual abilities as a student, I was really interested in all the material.
Then, when I was a junior in college – in January 2006 – I went to a concert at the Iron Horse Music Hall in Northampton, MA, with some friends. And they introduced me to this acoustic duo that was playing. And I introduced myself after the show, and they were looking for an upright bass player. That was the start of my journey with Barefoot Truth, which I joined full-time and toured with for the next… well, we’re still doing it.
Was that Will [Evans] and Jay [Driscoll]?
Yes, and then they had a harmonica player, Garrett [Duffy], who was just joining for weekends and doing it for fun at that time. But he eventually became a full-time member of the band as well. And then my college buddy Wayno [John “Wayno” Waynelovich], who was a couple of years younger than us, joined a few years later. So January 2006 was the start of my run with Barefoot [Truth], which we still do every once in a while. [Editor’s note: Will Evans is performing at The Stationery Factory in Dalton on November 3.]
Barefoot Truth was your first professional music gig?
Yes, with the exception of one incredible opportunity that gave me the motivation and inspiration to pursue music as a career. When I was 17, I received a call from Matt Cusson, who was looking for a bass player for an upcoming performance at Ozawa Hall at Tanglewood. Even though I was in over my head, I eagerly accepted the offer. And it turned out I was right! I was way out of my league playing in a band full of Matt’s peers from Berklee. But Matt was patient with me, and in the end, I held my own and had an amazing experience on stage. Beyond that dream start, I was playing some really, really modest gigs before that with some jazz and funk stuff.
Barefoot was just getting up and going – Will and Jay had been doing it for a year or two before that. We had some amazing gigs, like the Iron Horse, but plenty of bars, playing in the corner, or maybe playing next to the soda machine at high school or college events or something like that. But pretty quickly, the band took off, and after we graduated in 2007, we all committed to it full-time. And that’s what we did through 2012 – that’s when we hit the pause button and stopped doing it full-time. We had six years of really dedicated playing. I think in 2009 – 2010, we were playing over 250 shows a year.
What were some of the highlights of that period of time?
In 2009, we recorded and toured with Pete Francis, who played in a band called Dispatch before that. We were all fans of the band independently, and certainly, their music inspired the music of Barefoot Truth.
Barefoot recorded the first few albums with the same engineer and producer of the early Dispatch stuff, Jack Gauthier. That’s how we got connected to Pete – it was through Jack. And that tour was amazing. And that recording experience – Pete came to it with such a wealth of experience. We were kind of fanboys about it because we just loved him so much. But we became peers of his and that opened so many doors for us, too, because we played so many festivals around the country – Barefoot didn’t quite have the name at that point. So we were playing everything from the 10,000 Lakes Festival in Minnesota to the FloydFest Festival in Roanoke, Virginia – that was a big one that was amazing. Then we’d go to Cape Cod, then we’d fly to Colorado, then we’d go to BAM Fest in Chicago.
We were all over the country – we didn’t do the West Coast quite at that point – and at 23 or 24 years old, having that experience was amazing. That whole year was definitely a highlight. We did it so organically and so naturally. We really worked the market from the ground up, we earned every single fan we had, and we had some reasonable success with Pandora and early music streaming platforms that got our music out there a bit. But it was truly an independent effort, and we saw the fan base grow incrementally – obviously, we wish it was more exponential. But it was a process and a reasonable career in the music business for a few years that we can stand by and be proud of.
You have been a huge supporter of music in Berkshire County. You founded the Berkshire Jazz Collective; you are a Board Member with Berkshire Jazz, and you’ve organized many jazz and other community events here in the Berkshires. What makes the Berkshires a special place for live music?
It’s interesting, we don’t have so many venues, especially indoor venues, on a year-round basis that can compare with a big city. But the magic that comes with the [Egremont] Barn, or some of the most amazing feelings you get when you go up to MASS MoCA throughout the year, it’s … magic. It’s really hard to put my finger on it.
And then, more importantly, the outdoor venues we have rival anywhere in the country and beyond. Obviously, the top-tier places like Tanglewood are just stunning. But then you go to Bousquet or you go to a show at some park in some town and it’s just … there’s just magic in the Berkshires. And it’s really hard for me to describe – it’s an ineffable feeling. But I do feel it. And it’s a pretty interesting combination, too, because it’s such a small area, in terms of the people that live here full time – there’s definitely that community feeling. I’m sure you’ve already experienced this in a short time, Mark, where you’re seeing a lot of familiar faces, and you’re like, “Oh, there’s that couple,” or, “There’s that guy.” [I’m nodding my head in violent agreement!] But then you combine that with the fact that the Berkshires is truly a global destination for a lot of different reasons – outdoor recreation, the arts, and everything else. So it’s this weird micro mixing bowl that you obviously get in big cities, but when you have it in a “rural” place like this, it hits in a different way.
That’s great. And looking forward, what are your hopes for the future of live music in the Berkshires? Where do you hope it goes?
I love Pittsfield, and I want to see Pittsfield, the county seat, as the city that holds down this area. I would love to see it thrive, with a pulse, with a scene that offers clubs and venues that can be sustained throughout the year, and also build a natural connection with young musicians and students, tying them into different performance opportunities. So there’s that whole cyclical angle to it, but then there’s that scene that I think Pittsfield is set for.
I definitely want to see more here, and I will be leaning into all the things that I’m starting to plant the seeds for. I think Bousquet is an amazing venue. I want to see more happening there. We are coming off the fourth annual Lenox Jazz Stroll – and it just felt so great in town. There were so many happy people and just really amazing musicians coming through. So, continuing to shine a light on the amazing musicians that live and work in the area. But it’s important to bring in outside folks, too. And keeping that all in balance is important as well.
You’re playing a lot of jazz this coming month, but I’ve also seen you play with rock and folk musicians – I’ve seen you play with The Whiskey Treaty Roadshow and with Billy Keane up at Dream Away Lodge. Is one genre of music your favorite, or is that like asking which of your children is your favorite?
I love them all equally, Mark [Andy laughs]. It’s an interesting question.
The projects that I am currently playing with – and that’s everything from Barefoot Truth to Billy Keane, The Whiskey Treaty Roadshow, to all of my jazz projects – have an underlying thread: they’re all improvisatory music. Yes, if I play a tune with Benny and Conor, that range is much wider, and the ability to just blow the tune up and maybe we come back around to the melody or maybe we don’t. There’s a lot of exploration there. But if you balance that with a Barefoot Truth song, or especially with Billy Keane’s new material, there’s a structure in place, but how we navigate that structure and how we get from A to B, there’s a lot of flexibility, and that’s where my heart is. If I just have to play this formulaic stuff, even if the music is beautiful – I can find beauty in that and enjoy it – but to have the freedom to add my voice to the journey of the piece of music, that’s where I want to be.
I find that same approach when I am on the bandstand with any of those groups. I feel there’s the trust, and there’s the ability, and the allowance for everybody to approach these things however we were feeling in that moment; however the room feels, however it all sounds because all those things matter. If I’m playing with – let’s use Billy Keane as an example since you mentioned him – if I’m playing with him at the Dream Away [Lodge] in a super intimate, pretty quiet room, I have the ability, like I did that night, to have everyone stop and take a truly bass solo, where there was nothing but finger snaps and the bass. And that happened. And that probably won’t happen like that ever again, or if it does, it’s definitely going to be different. But then, if we play up at MASS MoCA, and we get some real loud sounds going, we’re going to approach that same tune in a much different way. So, it’s always different; the music is alive. And it’s in a trusted environment with all the musicians I work with.
What keeps you busy when you’re not performing, rehearsing, wIn addition to your music career, you are the Program Manager at Mill Town Foundation. To what degree does that role intersect with your musical interests?
It puts me in the seat of organizer, convener, and curator of different events such as the Lenox Jazz Stroll, the Bousquet Summer Concert Series, and various community events in Pittsfield, Tanglewood in the City, and others. You can get to explore dance – we started a Wandering Dance Society, a community dance initiative, this year. It’s pretty amazing because I don’t do any of it by myself. I have the joy to work with different nonprofits, different folks in the social sector, and different artists.
And that all goes into this product where, ultimately, it’s just about people coming together and sharing art and community. So I think it’s a really unique position for me to be in with Mill Town. And with my background in education and music, I think it’s a pretty cool lens to approach a lot of this work.
After the residency at the Lion’s Den, what’s next for you musically? Do you have any other shows in the works or songs planned to be released? Where do you go from here?
I have some projects in my head that I’m trying to put into focus. I’m hearing stuff with a string quartet. I’m hearing stuff with some of the groups that I’m playing with at The Lion’s Den. Wanda [Houston] and I have a bass-voice duo gig next month, where we’re just playing one song at an event in the Colonial [Theatre] – that idea is interesting to me. So, I don’t have much on the performance side of things, but I am pretty interested in getting some more recording projects going. Or these mini-residencies, at least, that lead into something a little bit more concrete.
There’s some really cool stuff happening up at Studio 9 in North Adams. Billy [Keane] did a pretty cool project back early this summer – that’s a space with a group of people that are doing some really interesting stuff that I’d really be up for exploring together. I always like to get back down to the [Egremont] Barn – I seem to have an annual March show down there – I’m not sure if that’s happening, but it seems to be the pattern, so maybe that will work out. With winter on the horizon – not to get too scary about the seasons – that’s always a time of practicing and writing for me, kind of going inward a little bit. So we’ll see what happens this year.
Is there anything else that I did not ask that you’d like to share with our readers?
I was a music director at The Darrow School for nine years, and before that, I led some programs and ensembles for the Berkshire Music School, and I’ve always taught lessons throughout the years. So education and music education are extremely important to me. I’m always trying to figure out ways to create opportunities for young artists (we just had a jazz duo from Williams College perform at the Lenox Jazz Stroll) to learn what it means to be an artist, playing with people that are better than them, have the exposure to seeing and hearing art and live music. So, music education is extremely important to me, and even though I’m out of the classroom, it’s still a commitment for me to pursue that path forward in the next chapter.
You can learn more about Andy at andywrba.com. On October 3rd, you can find his new single, “Bluie” on Spotify, Apple Music, and other streaming platforms, and you can pre-save it now using this link. You can follow him on Instagram and Facebook.
Andy Wrba playing with Billy Keane and Tim Morrison at Dream Away Lodge, May 2023