Skirball and GRAMMY Foundation Announce - Celebrating Gregg Allman: Storytelling

The Skirball Cultural Center and the GRAMMY Foundation® announce GRAMMY®-winning legend Gregg Allman, renowned founding member of the Allman Brothers Band, in conversation with GRAMMY-nominated country star Eric Church on Thursday, September 24, 2015, at 8:00 p.m. Moderated by Scott Goldman, Vice President of the GRAMMY Foundation and MusiCares®, the evening will conclude with live acoustic performances by both Allman and Church, which will be recorded and archived as part of the GRAMMY Foundation Living Histories program. The Living Histories program preserves on visual media the life stories of key recording industry professionals and visionaries who helped create the history of recorded sound. To date, the Foundation has completed more than 200 interviews with artists, producers, executives, and technology pioneers.

Gregg Allman and Eric Church come together at the Skirball to pay tribute to the enduring legacy of legendary concert promoter Bill Graham (1931-1991). When the Allman Brothers Band first played the Fillmore East in December of 1969, Graham introduced them to a wide, appreciative audience. Two years later, they returned to that same stage, where they had played many times since, to record their seminal live album, At Fillmore East. These performances at the Fillmore cemented the Allman Brothers Band's reputation for unforgettable live shows and eventually contributed to a young Eric Church's interest in country music. In this special conversation, Allman and Church will discuss Graham's influence on their respective careers and those of a long lineage of musicians.

Before the program, the exhibition Bill Graham and the Rock & Roll Revolution will be open to ticketholders from 5:30 to 8:00 p.m.

About Gregg Allman
A singer, guitarist, keyboardist, and songwriter, Gregg Allman has released over forty live, studio, and compilation albums with the Allman Brothers Band, who were inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995. He has also recorded seven solo albums since 1973. Allman's latest solo album, Low Country Blues, showcases his distinctive voice and soulful interpretation of songs by the blues giants-Muddy Waters, B. B. King, Buddy Guy, and Magic Sam-who informed his career. Rolling Stone hailed the album as "an eerie pleasure with quietly persistent emotional conviction."

About Eric Church
Widely regarded as the new face of country music, Eric Church has been performing since the age of thirteen and released his first album, Sinners Like Me, in 2006. His music, ranging from bottle-raising drinking songs to tender and reflective ballads, has topped the charts and won critical acclaim across genres. Both the Country Music Association and the Academy of Country Music recognized his album Chief as Album of the Year in 2011. Church was the top-selling country artist of 2014, and his latest release, The Outsiders, earned four GRAMMY Award nominations. His "The Outsiders World Tour," which has frequently set new venue attendance records, was ranked No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Tours recap in April 2015.

About Bill Graham and the Rock & Roll Revolution
Gregg Allman and Eric Church: Storytelling and Special Performances is presented in association with the critically acclaimed exhibition Bill Graham and the Rock & Roll Revolution, hailed by the Wall Street Journal as "a moving reminder of how Graham fostered community while presenting rock music as well as anyone ever has." Bill Graham and the Rock & Roll Revolution is the first major museum exhibition about the life and career of Bill Graham. Recognized as one of the most influential concert promoters in history, Graham launched the careers of countless rock & roll legends in the 1960s at his famed Fillmore Auditorium. He conceived of rock & roll as a powerful force for supporting humanitarian causes and was instrumental in the production of milestone benefit concerts such as Live Aid (1985) and Human Rights Now! (1988). As a promoter and manager, he worked with iconic artists including the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Santana, Fleetwood Mac, the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Doors, and the Rolling Stones. Organized by the Skirball, the exhibition runs through October 11, 2015. Through memorabilia, photographs, archival concert footage, historical and new video interviews, ephemera, and psychedelic art, Bill Graham and the Rock & Roll Revolution is both a deeply personal reflection on Graham's life and an exploration of how Graham helped transform rock music into the immersive, multi-dimensional, and highly lucrative phenomenon of rock theater that persists today.