The Unity College Center for the Performing Arts will host a concert with Cedric Rogers, a singer-songwriter-guitarist, on Friday, March 25. He was reached recently at his New York home, where he chatted about his music, his career choice and a bit of his history. I began by asking him where he hailed from.
Rogers: I’m actually from Unity. I went to Mount View High School and I also taught math at Mount View High School. I love that area: Benton, Unity, Troy. That whole area’s great.
Q: And you’re now living in New York?
Rogers: Yeah, I’m living in Marble Hill. I’d say it’s like the Twilight Zone of New York City. It’s Manhattan with a Bronx ZIP code. It’s a little complicated when you’re doing official paperwork.
Q: How long have you been playing music?
Rogers: I kind of got a late start. I started playing seriously when I was maybe 26, I would say; and I’m 34 now, so that was about eight years ago.
Q: I’ve been listening to the four-song “Home” EP online. How many albums do you have out now?
Rogers: Actually, just the one. I have a lot of original material, but I just haven’t really gotten around to recording it all. I do, though, have everything I need to record the material myself, but it’s quite an undertaking getting it the way that you want to get it and having it be top quality. I plan, actually, to release another one fairly soon. I have the desire to do it but I just don’t have the free time to do it.
Q: Do you do a lot of touring nowadays?
Rogers: A fair amount, actually, in the recent months. I did a mini-tour at the end of January in Vermont, New Hampshire and Massachusetts — that worked out pretty good. I’m on my way out to Ohio in April and I was in Pennsylvania a few days ago, and as soon as I got back, I had to go to the Finger Lakes region in New York last night — yesterday afternoon, actually. It’s so beautiful there, and that’s one of the things I like most about it. I get to travel around and see a lot of cool new places.
Q: How about the songwriting end of things? Is it something that comes easily to you, or do you have to labor over it?
Rogers: For me, some songs just flow out and come very easily, and then others take some time.
Q: Does the touring you do impact on the songs you write?
Rogers: Yeah, I think actually more in the past. A lot of my songs are rooted in Maine and New England, and when I moved to New York years ago, that was very inspiring and that definitely became the source of a lot of my material.
Q: For your performance at the UCCPA, will it be a mix of originals and covers?
Rogers: No, it’ll be all my work, yeah.
Q: Well, I enjoyed the title track, “Home,” a lot. I hit replay every time I sit down at my computer.
Rogers: Well, thank you. I’ve been playing with this one guy for quite a long time here in New York. I think we started playing together about four years ago, and he’s the drummer that plays on that track. He’s an incredible drummer and he just found the right thing to play on that track. It was really nice. I like that one, too.
Q: Seeing you brought up that drummer, the next logical question is this: Will this be a solo performance at the UCCPA, or will there be backing musicians included?
Rogers: It’s going to be a solo show for the most part. I’m hoping to pull on a few friends throughout the evening. I’m not sure who’s committed yet. I might have a friend coming with me from New York to play, and then I might have a friend of mine from the Unity area to play with me, as well; actually, he lives out in Benton, but he might play a track with me, too.
Q: Well, talk about your basic homecoming concert.
Rogers: Yeah, I’m really excited about it because I don’t get home nearly as much as I’d like to, and even when I do get home it’s just for a day or two, so this will be a good opportunity. I’m going to try to stay for a couple of days. It’ll be an opportunity to catch up with some old friends and have everybody in one room.
Q: Is there anything, Cedric, that you’d like to have passed on to the folks reading this article?
Rogers: Well, this concert is a fundraiser for an instrument borrowing program that I’m developing at Mount View High School. It’s something that I’m working on with the staff at Mount View and then also with Wendi (Richards) at the performing arts center. We’re hoping to have five guitars available for eligible students to borrow in 2016. I’m waiting for a call from a possible sponsor, a guitar manufacturer, who might help out with the whole thing, actually, so I’ve got my fingers crossed on that.
Lucky Clark has spent more than 45 years writing about good music and the people who make it. He can be reached at luckyc@myfairpoint.net if you have any questions, comments or suggestions.
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