Boston has a music legacy that needs no introduction. Think of Aerosmith, the J. Geils Band, Morphine, and Willie Alexander for starters. At the heart of the scene, though, is an artist like Dennis Brennan. He's a cagey veteran who hasn't won similar fame but can electrify audiences with his ability to cross brilliantly from rock to soul, blues, country, and jazz, while breathing fresh life into each. On several nights a week, Brennan bops around New England clubs with a passion that is all too rare in today's homogenized music climate.

DENNIS BRENNAN

The White Owls. What more can I say. Take some of the top long term musicians in Boston, put them on stage together add a little alcohol and what you get is Blues that will knock you out. As a special bonus Maggie Gearan will be opening with a few songs. This young dynamo will leave you speechless and wanting more. This will be Dennis Brennan’s second appearance at The Backyard, Tim Gearan and Andy Plaisted’s third. Steve Sadler and Jim Haggerty are new to the Yard but Jim will be thumping away for Ramona Silver later next month.

TIM GEARAN

Anyone from out of town who happens to stumble into a Boston bar—be it Atwoods or Toad—when the Tim Gearan Band is playing would immediately think this is the greatest city on earth.  Tim has assembled a band of musical heroes, at least to me and to many other local music people.  Every Monday night for years, his band (Andy Plaisted on drums, Lou Ulrich on bass, Sean Staples on mandolin, the Cottonmouth Horns—aka Paul Ahlstrand and Scott Aruda on sax and trumpet respectively, and Chris Anzalone on percussion) would play at Toad and there was no better place to be in the city.  Some seriously good music was being made, a lot of feel-good songs, or dark ones, good laughs, and some serious chances being taken right on stage – week after entertaining week.  A few years back, the band moved to Atwoods Tavern on Friday nights, and Russell Chudnofsky was added as a second guitarist.  Playing in open G-tuning, he can fill the musical spectrum in a way that a Hammond B-3 player often does, but he also lets the guitar rip as a guitar should rip from time to time, and the musical journey has continued.