Richard and Mickey About Their Musical Journeys

Richard Vidmer: I was born in France, father was in the air force. Moved to West Texas at age 6. Mother was a piano teacher so took up music at a young age. Got my first guitar in Ojinaga, Mexico at age 12, learned by listening to Johnny Cash, Eric Clapton, Crosby, Still and Nash, Neil Young, Eric Clapton and greatly influenced by the arrangments of Led Zepplin. I played in a few bands as a teen and into my 20's , Cotton Belt Blues Band, Friends Trio, R&L Express Duo, and Gemini Duo. I have lived in the Hill country of Texas between Austin and San Antonio for almost 30 years and have had the honor of playing with such greats as B W Stevenson, Towns Van Zandt, Steve Fromholtz, Monty Montgomery, and Butch Hancock. I moved to Ruidoso in the fall of 2005 where I've met some wonderful musicians, one of which is my partner Mickey Cochran in our duo Acoustic Wheel. We started out this past January playing at Ski Apache and have played gigs at least twice a month since then. We are both songwriters and have several new tunes we've writen in this past 6 months. Our goal is to write original music eventually putting out a CD. Also entertaining people of all ages in the local establishments......

Mickey Cochran: I was born in France (just like Richard) ... my father was serving in the Army at the time ... I was fortunate to travel the world due to my dad's military orders.

I took up the guitar at the age of 15 ... and have been forever addicted to music in all forms ... I've always been intrigued by acoustic rock music from Zeppelin to Moody Blues ... along with many other styles of music including: ragtime, jazz, and bluegrass. Through my musical wanderings, I've taken up other instruments along the way including: banjo, mandolin, dobro, fiddle and dulcimer. My main venue for playing, as I worked my way through college, was at the world-famous Cattleman's Steakhouse in Fabens, Texas ... where I performed a relentless 12 years, 6-nights-a-week until I graduated from UTEP in '89.

Since my move to Ruidoso (1996) ... I've spent most of my time focused on eking out a living through graphic design and web development. Fortunately, I found my way back to performing music and have had a phenomenal time working with Richard and Acoustic Wheel. Anything can happen at an Acoustic Wheel performance. We're susceptible to playing songs we've never played together before (depending on requests) and have had many local musicians sit in with us. Two of our mainstay sit-ins are Brad and Ruth Barnum on bass and flute.

I especially am enjoying the process of writing songs with Rich. We're reaching a new pinnacle of textured sounds unique to Acoustic Wheel's orchestral approach to composition. Our original songs have a depth of melody, lyricism and rhythm that I feel is allowing us to transcend the common ground of tonality ... almost surrealistic where timing melts into a stream of melodic textures recreating a sense of new origins in sound.

Richard and I have one more thing to say: Thanks for listening!

Acoustic Wheel is available for private parties, weddings and other events.

E-Mail Us: E-Mail at:
richmick@acousticwheel.com
for further information.

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