IND L!VE

Johnny Nicholas rocks the garden

The Jungle Gardens at Avery Island is hosting a special Music Under the Oaks performance this Thursday featuring the Johnny Nicholas Trio with special guest David Greely.

The Jungle Gardens at Avery Island is hosting a special Music Under the Oaks performance this Thursday featuring the Johnny Nicholas Trio with special guest David Greely.

To see Johnny Nicholas perform is to hear a passionate singer with a rich warm baritone, singing a song he wrote that expresses feelings you know very well. His guitar shimmers and purrs with skills absorbed firsthand from masters of the Golden Age of the blues that he also pours into his harmonica, piano, and mandolin.

Johnny’s history and pedigree are enormous. His years with Asleep at the Wheel earned him a Grammy Award. Big Walter Horton, Johnny Shines, Lazy Lester, Mississippi Fred McDowell, and Robert Lockwood Jr. were friends of his. He made pilgrimages to South Louisiana to visit and play with Nathan Abshire and Dewey Balfa and all their friends.

He pulls it all together into his spell so that the music of real Texas cowboys and oil workers, Mississippi expatriates in Chicago, and South Louisiana dance hall heroes are all channeled into his sound.

Johnny Nicholas, a performer’s performer, will be at the Jungle Gardens "Music Under the Oaks" concert series at Avery Island on Thursday, March 16. He’ll be joined by his band of elite Austin sidemen and David Greely on fiddle.

The show opens at 4 p.m. with open lawn-style seating at the Jungle Gardens. Tickets are $20 and can be purchased by calling 337-369-6243 or emailing [email protected].