Jon Rounds, songwriter and acoustic guitarist. began his musical career in State College in the 1970s as the lead guitarist for the folk/country singer Bob Dear, whose repertoire included songs by Guy Clark, Gordon Lightfoot, Jerry Jeff Walker, and early Bob Dylan that would become part of the Americana canon long before the genre was named. Their music continues to influence Rounds’s own writing.

He went on to play and write songs for State College-based bands, including the Rounds Brothers; Cartoon; Hughes, Kidder& Rounds; and Mathieu, Fox & Rounds. Cartoon played an annual reunion concert of original music at the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts from 1984 through 2012. His last pre-Covid performance was with harmonica virtuoso Richard Sleigh at First Night 2019. He has played several songwriter-in-the-round shows at the Bluebird Café in Nashville, and appeared on the Nashville-based webcast for songwriters, The Weird Turn Pro, on July 30, 2020.

His songs have been performed and/or recorded by dozens of artists with ties to State College, including Richard Sleigh, Tommy Wareham, Jen Hesketh, Jameson Kidder, Whetstone Run, Morningsong, Stacey Tibbets, and Northwest Territory.

Jon will be joined by Bruce Truitt, a multi-talented instrumentalist and singer from Austin, Texas. Bruce has many years of experience in the music business as producer, engineer, designer, instructor, composer, arranger, and performer in many genres. He speaks and sings in Spanish, Portuguese, and Russian.

Jerry Bresee had been a solo performing songwriter for more decades than he’ll admit to, with two released full-length collections on CD and streaming media to his credit. He held the guitar chair with the Loudoun Jazz Ensemble big band for 11 years and been a member of several jazz combos. He has performed on the Kennedy Center’s Millennium Stage, Twins Jazz Club on DC’s U Street jazz corridor, and has been featured at Folk Alliance as a Martin Guitar showcase performer. He continues to perform with the DC-based String Theory Jazz Trio and Mad Dog Jazz Quintet.

Glenn Kidder performed in State College as a solo artist from 1977-1981, and then as a singer/songwriter, guitarist and percussionist with Cartoon and Hughes, Kidder & Rounds. He then formed Glenn Kidder and Sidekicks in Virginia. Having lost the use of his vocal cords for singing, Glenn will be playing percussion.

Between 1966 and 1990, Randy Hughes played music around the State College area, all over Pennsylvania, and up and down the Eastern seaboard, most notably with the bands Cartoon and MorningSong and often as a solo entertainer. It would be hard to prove, but he thinks he may have played more CPFA shows than anyone. Randy moved to North Carolina in 1990 and retired three years ago as an English professor at Sandhills Community College in Pinehurst, NC. Still married to Cindy, they just got a puppy named Toby.

This performance is sponsored by Brown & Associates Inc.

An Arts Festival wristband is required for this performance.

In accordance with local ordinance, masking may be required at this show.