Take your valentine out for a little swing

There’s some self-interest in Carolyn Martin’s suggestion that people delay celebrating Valentine’s Day.

The singer-guitarist wants to drum up an audience for her band’s concert on Thursday, Feb. 16, at the South Broadway Cultural Center.

Since Valentine’s Day falls on a Tuesday this year, Martin suggested that some people are more than welcome to celebrate at the concert.

	Carolyn Martin Quartet WHEN: 7 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 16 WHERE: South Broadway Cultural Center, 1025 Broadway SE HOW MUCH: $15. For reservations call 298-5589 or email inquiry@siliconheights.com or at the door

“That way you can stick something in a Valentine’s card – two tickets to the show,” she said in a phone interview from her home in Nashville, Tenn.

Martin’s ensemble, which plays Western swing and swing, will have at least a few romantic songs on the program. One will be the ballad “The Nearness of You” and another is Hoot Hester’s “Only Time Will Tell,” a new song written in the style of the great ballads of the 1940s, she said.

Martin also will perform a couple of new songs that she’s written – “Wild West Texas Wind” and “Swing On.” They’re on a limited-edition CD titled “Preview.”

“The songs on the limited edition will eventually appear on two CDs that I hope to have out in the spring,” she said.

Among other songs on “Preview” are “Change Your Made-Up Mind” and “Tennessee Local.”

“We’re not sure who wrote ‘Tennessee Local,’ but we heard it on (a recording) of an old radio show of Tennessee Ernie Ford from the 1950s,” Martin said. “We fell in love with it. It’s a song about a slow-moving train. The beat, the lyrics, it’s a happy, good-feeling song. Every time we play it, it makes people smile.”

She said “Change Your Made-Up Mind” was composed by Chris Scruggs, the grandson of famous bluegrass banjo player Earl Scruggs.

“Like any song that attracts me, it makes me want to learn it,” Martin said. “The lyrical content is important. Music for me is a very emotional thing. … And the whole thing about Western swing music is that it puts a smile on your face. It’s impossible to be in a bad mood after listening to this music. That’s what it was designed to do.”

Ultimately, swing is dance music, but there’s no requirement that you have to dance to it, she said.

Her CD “Cookin’ with Carolyn” was voted the Western Swing Album of the Year by the Western Music Association last year.

Performing with Martin will be her husband, Dave Martin, on bass, Tommy Wells on drums and Eric Lewis on nonpedal steel guitar.