As part of the summer series of outdoor concerts at Eagle Square in Concord, Marc Berger and RIDE will perform Thursday at 6:30 p.m.
Berger’s life has been about pursuing twin passions: creating and recording his American roots songs, and exploring remote areas of the desert and mountain West. After signing his first publishing contract while in law school, he fronted rock bands and performed regularly in New York City clubs like CBGB, Wetlands, and The Knitting Factory. All through this period, he’d find ways to get into the West, picking up details from fellow wilderness junkies about off-the-beaten path locales and filing them away for future reference. On one of these trips, he became intrigued by the cover of The Big It, a book of short stories by A.B. Guthrie he found on a revolving paperback rack in a Navajo reservation trading post. It got him thinking about using his travels to create a set of songs in the cultural tradition of writers like Guthrie and visual artists like John Ford and Frederick Remington. Berger and co-producer Mike Ricciardi recently released RIDE, an album of ten cinematic recordings reflecting his romantic connection to the American West and exploring the value of its myths to contemporary culture.
Thursday concerts in Eagle Square are brought to the community by the Walker Lecture Fund and the Concord Parks and Recreation Department.