"Artist of the Week" Wayne Givens

BMS had the good pleasure many years ago to be introduced to Wayne through a mutual friend and musician, Kevin Simon. In those early days you could sense there were a few among us who shined a bit brighter than their peers.  It became quite obvious why Kevin was so excited to team up with this extraordinary musician. What great joy to choose Wayne Givens as the "Artisit of the Week."

"Heavily influenced by The Beatles and the classic rock era of the early 1970's, Wayne began his musical career in 1976 playing cover tunes in the St. Louis, MO area. As his performing progressed, Wayne began throwing the original tunes he had written into the mix at his shows. His group, Ambush, was selected to have a song on the K-SHE 95 compilation called "Seeds," which featured songs from the top ten groups in the area. Later, KWK put out a similar album called "Moonshine," and Ambush was selected out of hundreds of groups to have a song there also. It was soon clear that there was definitely an audience for Wayne's songs. During the 80's, Wayne was fortunate enough to work with Danny Liston from Mama's Pride and Ken Hensley of Uriah Heep fame, on Danny's project "Every Beat Of My Heart." During the 90's, Wayne continued writing songs and eventually worked with Gary S. Paxton in Nashville TN for a brief period, learning much about the songwriting craft from one of the great songwriters and producers. In 2006, Wayne had a number one song on the charts at IAC, a site that features over 30,000 songs that can be streamed online. That song, "Who's Gonna Save The Day?" was written the day John Lennon was murdered, and is featured on Forces Of Nature, released in February 2009. All songs on the album are written and produced by Wayne, who plays all the instruments as well as providing all lead and harmony vocals. "http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/waynegivens

TICKET TO THE BEATLES came together in the summer of 1997 with the express purpose of performing the music of The Beatles. Great attention to detail is taken to reproduce
faithfully, the sounds that The Beatles forever etched into our memories. Our band decided early on, that it was the music, rather than the image, that we wanted to reproduce.
Classic, is the term used to describe great music, and as with any endeavor to capture the classics, a high degree of skill is involved....

"The timeless classics of the Fab Four live on in the authentic sounds produced by TICKET TO THE BEATLES. The band was formed in 1997 when Baker Symes (keyboards, guitar, vocals) and Dave Bohannan (guitar, vocals) got together to "play some Beatle tunes." Wayne Givens (bass, vocals) joined them a short time later to add his vocals and to begin recreating the incredible vocal harmonies of John, Paul and George. With the addition of Jim Laverty (drums), the band was complete. In 2005, the TICKET TO THE BEATLES welcomed a new "George" into the band. After a death-defying and harrowing escape from the Blue Meanies of Pepperland, George Smith arrived on a flaming bundt cake and passed the audition.

"http://web.mac.com/lavertypro/iWeb/Ticket%20To%20The%20Beatles/Welcome.html