The power of three: Organ Fairchild returns to WNC
Organ Fairchild will play Asheville Feb. 22. File photo
When it comes to classic band formations, there’s something truly and uniquely special to the power of three — this trio of musicians coming together to create a melodic trinity of sonic exploration.
“The trio is such a freeing format, in that there can be a lot of space, spontaneity and dynamics in the music,” said Dave Ruch. “Each person’s contribution carries such weight and has the ability to dramatically alter the direction of the song simply by playing louder, quieter, taking a musical side road or playing with a new rhythm.”
Guitarist for rising instrumental trio Organ Fairchild, Ruch and his bandmates, keyboardist Joe Bellanti and drummer Corey Kertzie, emerged from the vibrant Buffalo, New York, jam-rock scene to create something all their own — in tone and in vision.
“I have always been a melody and harmony person — the musical aspect of a song is what attracts me to it,” Ruch said. “In fact, I have no idea what some of my all-time favorite songs are actually about since it’s not the lyrics or the story that draw me in.”
Although they formed Organ Fairchild in 2019, the three members of the band first played together as part of their first band in 1983. Honing their musical chops in a six-piece rock band dubbed Wild Knights, that original group specialized in covering Grateful Dead numbers. To note, the Wild Knights still occasionally host reunion gigs.
“The music had a bit of a freight-train-like quality, in that it could be very hard to turn on a dime with that many musicians playing,” Ruch said of Wild Knights. “One person could stop playing completely and the rest of the band might or might not even notice.”
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In later years, Kertzie found himself performing and touring with national acts, while Bellanti bounced around Buffalo music circles in a handful of bands. Ruch himself had a 25-year career as a full-time acoustic folk musician, only to pick up the electric guitar again right when the three friends (with Kertzie recently “giving up the road”) started jamming together by chance in 2019.
“And it all happened by luck,” Ruch said. “We found ourselves on the same gig as three-fifths of the backing band for an old friend here in Buffalo. And when the rest of the band set down their instruments after sound check, the three of us remained on stage and started playing something.”
Ruch can’t remember what song the trio played, but he does vividly recall what he felt, not only within the music, but inside of himself.
“That was the moment when the idea came to my mind: I wonder if the three of us, who are old dear friends, could be a complete band,” Ruch said. “A week later, I called them both and asked if they wanted to give it a shot [at forming a band].”
Thus, Organ Fairchild came to fruition, this trio of lifelong friends circling back to one another, creating new music, and also finding wide recognition as of late by fans and critics alike, especially amid their live performance — this instrumental, improvisational crossroads of rock, jazz and fusion elements.
“It was all about three friends spending some time together again and trying something new,” Ruch said. “So, the fact that this is all happening as we become 60-somethings is absolutely wild.”
Recently crossing over the five-year mark, what matters most to Ruch and his bandmates is the genuine sense of discovery and reaching new depths of their musicality and friendships along the way, whether it be onstage or on the road to the next performance.
“It’s incredible how much deeper and more meaningful the friendship has become,” Ruch said. “Solidified no doubt by all the time on the road together and overcoming all the obstacles that come along with that. As Corey said very recently, ‘The road has turned us from friends into true brothers.’”
Even with finding this rich, vast creative landscape later in life, Ruch looks at the process itself of arriving to this point in his musical aspirations as something that took time to arrive at, where it’s about the journey to finding your true self in the musical realms the members of Organ Fairchild roamed before combining forces.
“The excitement of creating this fresh, new music with my lifelong friends is all the motivation I need to keep going right now,” Ruch said. “The playing field has changed for sure with the digital delivery of music, but the band’s goal is the same as it would have been long before the streaming era — to provide memorable live music experiences for people, and for ourselves.”
So, with the space allowed in the trio formation, whether physically or artistically, what does that lend itself to when it comes to the endless sonic possibilities within Organ Fairchild?
“All three of us have each other’s backs, which creates a huge ‘safety net,’ where we can, and do, go out on a limb musically,” Ruch said. “Confident that the others will be listening and responding and ready to pick up the slack if things go awry, which they certainly can, given the amount of improvisation that’s baked into our shows.”
In the midst of a live show, Ruch feels intricately and intrinsically connected to the music and the audience surrounding the stage, this sacred two-way street of energy and community in a shared experience that resides in the ancient act of performance.
“Music and live performance have an almost unparalleled ability to take us out of our own heads,” Ruch said. “[To] speak to us on emotional levels we barely understand and help us bond with our fellow human beings in a communal setting — that all seems like pretty valuable stuff to me.”
Want to go?
Instrumental funk/soul trio Organ Fairchild will hit the stage at 9 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 22, at One World Brewing in West Asheville.
Doors open at 8 p.m. Admission is $13.32 per person (tax included). For more information and/or to purchase tickets, go to oneworldbrewing.com and visit the “Events” tab. To learn about Organ Fairchild,visit organfairchild.com.
