band reviews

Worcester Telegram & Gazette
The Red Riders are ready to rock at Union Blues
by Scott McLennan Thursday December 2, 2004

For a band that has changed it's name once, changed singers three times and changed drummers a bunch of times, The Red Riders has remained consistently good.
"Swing Baby," the latest and third full-length record from Worcester's hip little swing combo, is a fresh chapter in The Red Riders' story which began five years ago. And it's a chapter that looks back to the bands very beginnings.
" 'Is You Is or Is You Ain't My Baby' is on this record and that was our first song," noted Red Riders bass player Gail Hunt. Back then the group was know as Little Red and the Riders, and that first stab at the Louis Jordan classic took place at the now-shuttered blues haunt Gilrein's, where the group was the house band for swing dance lessons.
Since then, original singer Ann "Little Red" McTigue took leave of the group, prompting the moniker adjustment, and her immediate replacement, Lydia Fortune, likewise bowed out in deference to health concerns. Last November, The Red Riders recruited singer Tyra Penn, whose jazz-bent vocals brought a whole new dimension to the combo. Penn joins Hunt, her guitar-whiz husband Dan Hunt, drummer Joe Zupan, sax player Ririka Masuda and trumpet player Hiro Tokushige.
Jazz being the mother of interpretation, Penn applied some crafty changes to swing-blues standards ranging from "Fever" to "Let The Good Times Roll." Imbued with an adventurous spirit, The Red Riders also tackled Tom Waits' song "Temptation," playing up its salsa beat, and cut loose Dan Hunt for a couple of instrumental showpieces, "Sleepwalk" and "Night Train."
"We almost planned the whole record after playing a bunch of gigs," Gail Hunt said. "Then we did a bunch of gigs before going into the studio. We had fun, made sure we knew the songs. So when we went into the studio, we treated that almost like a live gig. You don't want to make a record that sounds too contrived."
The Red Riders headed to Jerry Seeco's studio in Milford, where the band worked with the highly repected horn player on engineering tracks from July to September. The end result is a sizzling batch of performances that balance the Riders' sense of fun and it's musical depth. For sheer fun, the band included a couple songs by the bawdy Candye Kane; for depth, the Riders plunged into the smoky 'That Mellow Saxophone" and "He May Be Your Man."
The Red Riders celebrate the release of "Swing Baby" (a title chosen once the band found out that sax player Masuda is pregnant) tomorrow with a show at Union Blues, located inside Union Station, Washington Square, Worcester. The Red Riders also still keep busy with dance parties and lesson nights at venues such as Two Cousin's restaurant in Grafton and The Leominster Lodge of Elks.
When not swinging with the Riders, The Hunts can be found making music with Gail's father, Norman Schell, in the folk-music band Youth Well Spent. And Gail Hunt elaborated on the differenced between the two projects: "Dan says the Riders play Saturday night music, and Norman's music is for Sunday morning."

The Worcester Pheonix April 13, 2001 Little Red Book By Brian Goslow Swing music is far from dead, especially here in Worcester. "It seems to be pleasing everybody we play for," says Ann "Little Red" McTigue of Little Red and The Riders. "I wasn't comfortable being pigeonholed as a swing band. It has that tone but it's just fun American music. We're expanding those boundaries and putting in some originals as well." After fine tuning their chops at Gilrein's and Vincent's, The Riders are now performing regularly at the Above Club, Sakura Tokyo, and the Sturbridge Host Hotel. Fans appetites were wetted by the release of two CD's in 2000: Jump Swing and Jumping For Joy. "We did it the low budget way," McTigue says . You'd never know Jump Swing wasn't recorded in a packed nightclub. "We also had this opportunity when we were working with Jeff (Giacomelli, the groups former saxophonist whose now with Fatwall Jack) to use Jerry Seeco's studio. He's also a fine trumpeter and singer as well as a Berklee instructor. While Jumping For Joy wasn't "technically perfect for widespread distribution", thanks to the groups website, she says they've received requests for it from swing fans throughout the US and around the world. The Riders line up includes Gail Hunt, who recently moved to the upright bass, guitarist Dan Hunt, drummer Joe Zupan (who can be heard hosting WICN's A Tasteful Blend weekday mornings from 6 to 10am), and saxophonist Ririka Masuda. Baritone saxophonist Neal McNanna is currently in Spain performing with the Drifters. "We're also playing a lot of wedding and private functions for people in happy places who know they want to dance," says McTigue. Little Red and The Riders settle in for two shows Friday and Saturday night at Sakura Tokyo, where they'll be joined by trumpeter Hiro Tokushige.

Worcester Telegram & Gazette Thursday Oct.19, 2000 Band jumpin' for the joy of swing blues Scott McLennan Little Red and The Riders is a Worcester bred staple of small combo swing .The band has a new compact disc, "Jumping For Joy", and returns Wednesday to Gilreins, 802 Main Street Worcester. Interviewing Ann McTigue, she expressed a love of the "exuberance" built into traditional swing blues. Their project rooted in the tradition of Louis Jordan. The long running Little Red and The Riders, a band that played Gilrein's every Wednesday night for 19 months before ending their engagement earlier this year, is both exuberant and polished. McTigues vocals exhibit an easy touch with this music. "It's supposed to be fun music," she said. "Everyone up there loves the music." Hotshot guitarist Dan Hunt and his bass playing wife Gail anchor the band alongside McTigue. For the recording of "Jumping For Joy", the Hunts and McTigue were joined by tenor sax player Jeff Giacomelli, baritone sax player Neal McNanna and drummer Frank Inangelo. The eight song disc kicks with such standards as "Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens", "Flying Home" and "Is You Is Or Is You Ain't My Baby". There's also a rollicking side trip into the jazzy "Booty Green", and the groups original composition, "You've Done Everything You Can" which shows the diversity within the group. The players chops are on the money throughout, transporting the listener into a freewheeling, high-living frame of mind.

Worcester Magazine June 2, 1999 Lost Classics Little Red and The Riders hark back to when jump blues ruled by Noah Schaffer Some bands play for listeners. Others play for dancers. So it's always nice to find a band that plays for both. One such act is Little Red and The Riders, who follow the swing dance lessons each Wednesday night at Gilrein's. "It's a thrill to perform for the swing dance crowd, because they're really excited about the music," says lead singer Ann McTigue. The swing revival has resulted in an explosions of cookie cutter swing bands churning out covers, but Little Red and The Riders stay ahead of the pack by reaching back for lost classics of the jump blues sound that ruled the early 50's. "We wanted to be really danceable, but we also wanted to try to find some songs that folks might not have heard before," explains McTigue. "We're sort of paying homage to artist like Louis Jordan, Nellie Lutcher and Tiny Bradshaw. They were real musicians' musicians, who didn't get the notoriety they deserved because they were black." The members of The Riders could also be called musicians' musicians. Drummer Dan Bunge and guitarist Dan Hunt are area heroes who have been seen with numerous local bands. Bassist Gail Hunt, Dan's wife, just picked up the instrument last December, but has already come into her own holding down the bottom. The icing on the cake comes from frequent guest appearances by "Sax" Gordon Beadle, perhaps the most in demand blues saxophonist in the Northeast. Beadle sits in with the band when he's not touring internationally. For McTigue fronting a band at Gilrein's is like coming home again. In the early 80's she worked at the club as a waitress and could frequently be found singing at the Sunday jam session. Raising two young daughters kept her out of the nightlife, but the kids are grown up and McTigue is back. "I didn't go out of the house for about 7 years," she laughs, "and then I found myself living again in Main South. So I went back to Gilrein's and started jamming again, reconnecting with the musicians. Then the swing thing came about and here we are!"