Fri 7/28 @ 8PM
Singer/songwriter/guitarist Ryan Humbert has been known as a catalyst in the Akron-area music scene since the 1990s. He’s produced shows and albums, encouraged other artists, held benefits and of course recorded, released and performed his own music.
It was while revving us his solo career and working at Akron community radio station The Summit FM 20 years ago that he met vocalist Emily Bates who was also working at the radio station as an intern while attending college. Soon she was popping up at venues where Humbert was performing, adding her voice to his tunes.
Somehow that never stopped. Bates became a fixture onstage with the Ryan Humbert Band. In 2015, he formed a traditional honky-tonk country project called Shooter Sharp & the Shootouts in 2015 to channel his love of artists such as Johnny Cash, Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Patsy Cline, Hank Williams and Roy Orbison. That soon became simply the Shootouts and Bates came along for the ride as that project became the main focus of Humbert’s music.
And it’s now really taken them places. This year they released their third album Stampede, which spent three months on the national Americana radio top ten, toured nationally and performed twice at Nashville’s legendary Grand Ole Opry.
The duo will celebrate with an acoustic evening at the Akron Civic Theatre’s Knight Stage where they’ll be joined by “surprise special guests.”
Go here for tickets.