Uncle Leo Is Back To Visit

Thu., July 18, 1996

Don Adair Correspondent

If guitarist Leo Kottke continues to visit these parts at his current pace, he may want to relocate.

Following a show at The Met in February, Kottke comes through again Monday night for a gig at Sandpoint’s Panida Theater.

The old room’s funky charm will be perfect for Kottke’s comfortable-as-old-slippers persona. It’ll be like having your favorite uncle stop by to tell a few stories, sing a song or two and knock your socks off with his guitar.

After getting his career off to a dazzling start on John Fahey’s lamented Takoma Records, Kottke survived the tendonitis that threatened his career but left him a better, more sensitive guitar player.

He can still dazzle you with the kind of technique that makes you swear there must be three of him. But, like his old mentor Fahey, he’s just as likely to put you away with a song of such tender beauty you can hardly stand it. (He’s a player who believes in songs, by the way, as opposed to the kind of noodling that too often passes as guitar playing these days.)

Kottke’s a wonderful humorist and storyteller to boot, and though his singing won’t make you forget Sinatra, he gets the most out of an instrument that he once described with a phrase that can’t be printed here.

If you want to know what he said, go to Sandpoint - he might tell you.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: CONCERT Leo Kottke will perform Monday at the Panida Theater in Sandpoint. Tickets are $14, available at Eichardti Pub, Eklektos Gallery and Pend Oreille Brewing in Sandpoint; The Long Ear in Coeur d’Alene, and Street Music in Spokane.

This sidebar appeared with the story: CONCERT Leo Kottke will perform Monday at the Panida Theater in Sandpoint. Tickets are $14, available at Eichardti Pub, Eklektos Gallery and Pend Oreille Brewing in Sandpoint; The Long Ear in Coeur d’Alene, and Street Music in Spokane.

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