Piedmont Brothers Band

Eden, North Carolina
Varesa, Varese (VA) -Italy
Country-Rock
In the beginning were the sixties and the seventies and the common passion for the Beatles, the Byrds, Bob Dylan, CSN&Y and the Backersfield Californian country sound, from Buck Owens to Herb Pedersen and Chris Hillman, even if Ron Martin comes from Eden , North Carolina, and Marco Zanzi from Varese. Born and grown up in North Carolina, since schooldays Ron plays in different bands: “Kaleidoscope”, “Wampus Cats” and “Shiloh” are the ones thanks to which he reaches a fair popularity. Marco Zanzi follows a similar path, in the beginning he plays and sings in minor local bands, but later he has more significant experiences in “La Signora Stracciona” and “The Steamboat Willie” and with them he plays throughout Italy. In this period he is also conquered forever by the country rock and by groups like Poco, Burrito Brothers, Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and Eagles: through them (and especially through the project ‘Will The Circle Be Unbroken’) he discovers the Bluegrass and soon falls in love with the 5-string banjo (in that period an almost unknown instrument and difficult to find).
But the real meeting place of Ron and Marco has been the Web. The diffusion of the Internet has allowed them to know each other thanks to a Website dedicated to the Byrds (‘My Songbook’, realized in 2000 by Zanzi with the English friend David Reynolds), but above all thanks to the common and active participation at various newsgroups: “Gene Clark List” and “Byrdmaniax”, but mainly “Acousticharmonies”, which is an incredible resource both musical and human. Here Ron and Marco collaborate for the first time on a musical project and they are involved in the making of a CD, which involves musicians from different countries (USA, Canada, Japan, Ireland, Holland…).
Piedmont stands for the Italian pedemontana, because Ron lives at the foot of the Blue Ridge Mountains, in the Appalachians chain and Marco lives on the offshoots of the Prealps. Therefore, here is the “Piedmont Project” that combines both common musical interests and environmental similarities. In Spring 2007 Marco Zanzi goes to Ron in the USA, he knows his companion Suzon, his family, his friends and he finds a landscape that recalls Varese. With his American friend he goes to the “Merlefest”, probably the most important Music festival dedicated to the ‘American’ genre (acoustic, country, bluegrass, folk, blues, Celtic…), and he records three pieces at the Flyin’ Cloud Studio of Doug Rorrer, in Eden, NC. Here arises the idea to create the “Piedmont Brothers Band”, where the two brothers are Marco and Ron and the band is composed of old and new musician friends having in common the same passion. Thanks to the Internet again, the music knocks down the barriers and flies over the Ocean. Ron sends his original pieces (Martin is a composer, too), Marco arranges and reworks them thanks to his competence. He involves his friends, records and sends his pieces to Eden where Ron listens to them, comments on them, goes to the Studio and records his voices with the precious help of the Chief engineer Doug Rorrer. And then he sends them back to Italy for the final mixing.