Over the Rhine to return to home state

T. J. McGarry
Tue, 03 Dec 2013 03:08:25 +0000
Campus, band, Cincinnati, lincoln theatre, over the rhine, preview

Over the Rhine is scheduled to perform Dec. 5 at the Lincoln Theatre.
Credit: Courtesy of Darrin Ballman

There’s no place like home for Ohio natives Linford Detweiler and Karin Bergquist.

The husband-and-wife team of Over the Rhine is slated to return to its home state 8 p.m. Thursday for a show at the Lincoln Theatre.

“If I had to take a guess at how many times we’ve played in Columbus, I’d have to say over two dozen,” said Detweiler, who plays a variety of instruments, including bass guitar and keyboards, while also contributing vocals to the Cincinnati-based band.

Alongside Detweiler, Bergquist, who contributes acoustic guitar, piano and vocals, said the duo will be accompanied by a six-piece band for the show.

While Over the Rhine’s sound bears much in common with folk and country music, Detweiler feels the band’s music defies traditional genres.

“I guess most people would lump us into this new genre, call us an Americana band,” Detweiler said, referring to a style of music defined by the Americana Music Festival’s website as music that draws from country, folk, bluegrass and other traditional American roots music styles. “But we have all these different kinds of music filtered through our story.”

The band’s story began at Malone College in Canton, Ohio, where Detweiler and Bergquist met and began making music together. In 1989, the two formed Over the Rhine as a quartet, eventually releasing its first studio album, “Till We Have Faces” in 1991. The band began touring with other folk acts, including Bob Dylan, soon thereafter.

Bergquist and Detweiler were married in 1996 and continued to make music together. To date, they have released 23 studio albums.

“Each record can kind of be associated with a different chapter of our lives,” Bergquist said.

The band’s namesake comes from Over-the-Rhine, a neighborhood in Cincinnati where Bergquist and Detweiler lived. They were enchanted by the neighborhood’s classical appeal — enough to name their band after it.

“Over-the-Rhine is really an amazing neighborhood,” Detweiler said. “When K (Bergquist) and I discovered this neighborhood, we felt as if we had discovered this lost European city. We were really romanced by it.”

The band’s latest album, “Meet Me at the Edge of the World,” tells the latest story in the duo’s history, as they left the city to live on a small farm outside of Cincinnati.

“All of these songs grew out of the dirt,” Bergquist said. “There’s a lot of Ohio in this album.”

The band’s latest album also marks a new style for the band, as Detweiler and Bergquist are attempting to focus more on singing together in harmony, rather than Bergquist performing the majority of the vocals.

“When we heard the sound of our two voices together, we realized we had something new, which is hard to do after 20 years,” Detweiler said.

Some Ohio State students were excited at the prospect of seeing a band with Over the Rhine’s type of music.

“I really liked the sound of their music,” said Brian Edwards, a fifth-year in criminology and political science. “They remind me a lot of Edward Sharpe.”

Rolanda Copley, publicist for the Columbus Association for the Performing Arts, said the Lincoln Theatre is an ideal venue for this show.

“The Lincoln Theatre is an acoustically superior, incredibly intimate, state-of-the-art venue that offers patrons the opportunity to experience their favorite performers at their very best,” Copley said in an email.

Despite playing in Columbus many times before, Detweiler said the two are excited to return to the Lincoln Theatre.

“The Lincoln Theatre is a great venue which we love,” Detweiler said. “We’re glad to be coming back.”

Tickets are still available for $34.80, including fees, and the Lincoln Theatre is located at 769 E. Long St.