Kent Rose w/ John Ballantyne's Crazy Heart

 If you wondered if the snappy-dressing country singer on that U.S. Cellular TV ad a few years back was for real, rest assured that Kent Rose is all that and more. He’s a throwback to the guitar-toting country troubadours of yesteryear and at the same time a product of the rock and roll era, certainly the only performer of his kind in the greater Chicagoland area.  For the last decade, he’s sub-billed himself as The Voice That Remembers. It’s an apropos title, for Rose remembers plenty. “I wanted to convey the fact that I was not a kid, and that I was familiar with all the stuff that had happened before, and had kind of a historical approach without being an archivist, because I don’t want to be one of these folk guys who has a lecture before every song,” says Kent. “So I thought, ‘The Voice That Remembers!’”Rose’s musical odyssey has twisted and turned through the folk era, Chicago’s late ‘60s/early ‘70s rock scene, a short stint in teenaged country star Tanya Tucker’s road band, a spot playing saxophone in a vintage soul combo, and a lengthy tenure crooning pop standards with a society orchestra. But he’s best suited for where he’s at right now: singing his own wonderfully crafted material as only he can, usually in a solo setting. “All of a sudden, it seemed to me that I had real-life experiences that were universal, and that other people had gone through as well,” he says. “And that maybe I could write a song that would connect with somebody that I didn’t know. So I just kept at it.”  

• http://kentrose.com/