Travel has always been a favorite musical subject. Hitting the road or the sea has always
been an exciting human adventure and a natural subject for music.
Travelling music comes in many varieties, from opera to country, and it takes a special kind of musician
to present convincing performances in a wide variety of styles. Our audiences know that the members of The Bijou are up to
this task; we revel in combining musical forms and styles in unexpected and entertaining ways, and there isn't a single musical
style that we aren't willing to learn if we haven't played it already. Finding soloists who can join us in that endeavor,
however, isn't easy.
We know we have
found one in singer Randall Williams. Even his bio tells us he is the perfect Bijou collaborator: Two hours after informing
his voice teacher that he was leaving the world of classical music, Randall Williams graduated from the Royal Conservatory
of Mons, Belgium at the head of his class. He felt that classical music lacked the inclusiveness of folk music, and that
the inevitable division between performer and audience was unbearable. And so Randall turned to the world of traveling
with his guitar, writing songs in train stations and sleeping on couches, then singing and playing on street corners,
cafés, and pubs. For a time he lived aboard a 20' sailboat that he bought for $800, teaching himself how to
sail by single-handing through the Baltic and North Seas with his guitar sleeping in the berth beside him at night. He
wrote a book about the trip, which begins with the story of almost getting squashed by a tanker before dawn one morning
in the North Sea. Our kind of guy...you're going to love him.
