On Friday, August 6, 8:00pm, Jim Messina will play the Napa Valley Opera House - 1030 Main Street, downtown Napa. Tickets, $40 / $45, are available 707.226.7372 or NVOH.org.
Few musical artists résumés list membership in a band inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame; fewer still can lay claim to being a founding member of the seminal band credited with creating country rock; and only one artist can include all the above in addition to being one half of the most successful duo of the 1970s. When chronicling the current commercial and critical success of artists like Keith Urban, Brooks & Dunn, and the pairing of Alison Krauss & Robert Plant for 2009's Album Of the Year Raising Sand, it is not overstating things to say a direct line can be drawn back to Jim Messina's legacy with Buffalo Springfield, Poco and Loggins & Messina.
A supremely talented guitarist, Jim Messina began working with the legendary band Buffalo Springfield in 1966 as a recording engineer on their second album Buffalo Springfield Again. When Buffalo Springfield disbanded, Messina signed a contract with Epic Records as a producer and a recording artist and along with fellow Buffalo Springfield member Richie Furay joined forces to form Poco. The band's aptly titled 1969 debut Pickin' Up The Pieces is the only debut album ever to receive a perfect rating from Rolling Stone magazine; the landmark album laid the blueprint for the then new musical genre uniting country with rock music and it blazed the pathway for future multi-million selling artists like the Eagles. After producing three albums for the band, Pickin' Up The Pieces, Poco and Deliverin' (recorded live in 1970 and released in 1971) - Messina departed and signed on as an independent producer with Columbia Records.
In November of 1970, Messina opened up his living room to record a number of compositions for a promising young songwriter named Kenny Loggins. Messina suggested to Columbia Records president Clive Davis that he consider letting Messina "sit in" in much the same way that jazz artists had done in the past. Leading the way as producer, arranger, vocalist, and guitarist, and contributing the signature songs, the album Kenny Loggins with Jim Messina Sittin' In was released one year later in November of 1971 and an accidental duo was born. In the next few years, a series of albums would follow in rapid order and when the dust had settled, Loggins & Messina had sold sixteen million albums, become one of rock's biggest live draws, and cemented their legacy as one of the most successful recording duos ever. Following the split, Messina recorded four critically acclaimed solo albums and also reunited with Poco for the 1989 album entitled Legacy.
Now, nearly 45 years after first stepping into the studio, Jim Messina is hitting the road with guitar in hand to tell the stories and sing the songs that made Buffalo Springfield, Poco, and Loggins & Messina iconic American groups.
