My name is Black Francis (sometimes known as Frank Black). While performing solo or with a band I will play selections from most of these releases. Of course, some releases are better known than others, and in true show biz fashion I will usually perform several selections from my "A" list, but I will not perform medleys. And I generally do not perform so called encores, because I have always found this show biz mechanism (now it is a mechanism) to be overused and as a result lacking in the drama that perhaps occurred in the encores of yesteryear; plus, shouldn't an encore be a repeat performance of some selection that has already taken place earlier in the concert? I think some people would be confused if I repeated a song for an encore.

For some artists the live performance is the chicken before the egg of writing or recording of repertoire. For other artists the writing or recording of repertoire is the chicken before the egg of live performance. For other artists still there is the feeling that the live performance or the writing or recording of repertoire is that EGG which comes first. I am one of those artists who cannot remember which came first: the chicken or the egg? I can remember back as far as age 8 performing with the Boston Folk Song Society. It was a Woody Guthrie song.

why oh why oh why oh why?
why oh why oh why?
because because because because because because because

But what came before that? I cannot remember. I have always been a singer, a writer, and a musician, not as a prodigy or as in a trade handed to me by my parents, but because of an inner voice or maybe a command from beyond reality as it is usually defined. Some have called we rock and roll performers who never retire troubadours. I enjoy this misnomer immensely. While there are many differences between me and my distant predecessors in L'Occitane I do believe there is a lineage that connects us of the last 70 years with those romantic singers of the HIgh Middle Ages.

AUGUST DATES: