Big fish, little fish: Trout Fishing in America headlines music at ArtsCape

For 30 years they've been in the game, delivering a strange brew of sounds to audiences -- both child and adult -- across the country. They float somewhere between notoriety and obscurity -- nominated for two Grammy awards but sustaining for those decades as independent artists on their own label.

Their name is Trout Fishing in America, and if you haven't heard of them yet, you're about to. The little band with the weird name will be in Cape Girardeau on Saturday to headline the musical entertainment at the ArtsCape festival, and they've got something up their sleeve for the entire family.

The Los Angeles Times has called them a "powerhouse instrumental and vocal talent" and the Philadelphia Daily News described their children's songs as "akin to the empowering work of Shel Silverstein and Dr. Seuss."

Keith Grimwood, the 5-foot-6-inch bassist usually accompanied by his 6-foot-5-inch guitarist Ezra Idlet, talks solo about being a Trout.

Matt Sanders: So where did the name come from?

Keith Grimwood: This is really ancient history, because we first started getting together back in 1976. In the early days we were a subset of a five-piece band. The band was called St. Elmo's Fire, out of Houston, Texas.

When Ezra and I would play as just the duo, we wanted a name that was different. We'd go on trips and we'd leave a day or two early and we'd stop along the way so Ezra could fish.

I'm not a fisherman, but I'm a reader. The name is taken from a book written by Richard Brautigan called "Trout Fishing in America." When somebody asked us what the name of our band was, I said it was Trout Fishing in America, and it just sort of stuck.

MS: The band has a very eclectic sound.

Grimwood: If you listen to our music, you'll notice we play of lot of different kinds of music. We started in a melting pot, Houston, Texas.

You have Tejano to the south, the Cajun and the Zydeco, country music; there was a great folk scene there, and I was trained in classical music.

That's one of the things that's kept us going so long -- we don't play one musical style and beat it to death. We come from so many different places, it really is a blend of a lot of different things.

It's just Trout music is what it is.

MS: You've really gained a reputation as a band that can play to kids and adults, right?

Grimwood: In the early days, teachers would ask us to play shows for kids at elementary schools, and now we're playing for a lot of different kinds of audiences.

We never played for a specific age. If you have a pulse, we'll play for you.

MS: Saturday you'll give two performances, one for the kids and one for adults. What's the difference?

Grimwood: The difference between a kids' show and a regular concert is at a kids' show you don't play love songs. They don't need all that sugar.

And for the adults we'll rock a little bit harder, there will be more jamming, more playing. But we don't play down to kids, we play at them.

MS: You have a pretty loyal following -- some people follow you around don't they?

Grimwood: We travel all over the United States, and we've got people all over the place. A lot of the time people will line up their travels with our travels -- they'll see where Trout's going to be, and that's where they'll go.

The Internet has really made this possible, but we were sending out newsletters in 1980.

One of the reasons for the loyalty is that when we played originally, we played for our peers. When you enjoy something, you want to share it with your kids.

Now these people are growing up and having kids themselves, and sometimes I look out at the audience and see three or four generations in the audience.

I look out at the audience and I love those people.

MS: It seems that you've managed to be successful, but not get so big that you have the pressures of a major label. What's that like?

Grimwood: We are Trout Records -- we are independent. We've gotten some recognition. We've won two Indy awards -- awards for independent music -- when those were still around. We got one for pop music and one for kids' music.

We've had two Grammy nominations and a bunch of other nominations.

With those kinds of things, you're still the same person, but when you get a Grammy nomination people are willing to take a closer look at you. That opens doors. Then we go in and we play, and they go, "Wow, that's great."

MS: Do you play a lot of these small-town arts festivals?

Grimwood: We play a lot of arts festivals, and we play big festivals, too. I love it at all levels. One of the cool things about our job is we don't have to do the same thing every day.

We'll go play a small folk club venue, and the next thing you know we're playing for 5,000 people.

MS: Aren't you guys a bit like the Odd Couple, not only in height but in personality?

Grimwood: Ezra has much more of a childlike personality. He's more outgoing, I'm more reserved, more serious.

We play off that a lot, which is another easy thing about the job -- we walk on stage and act like ourselves. If there's an adult role to be taken in a song, that's me. He's childish and outgoing, and I'm grumpy.

MS: What about the height difference?

Grimwood: What is that? You always see that with comedy teams, the big guy and the little guy. I don't know what it is, but it has worked well with us. It just happened that way.

For more information on Trout Fishing in America, log on to www.troutmusic.com.

msanders@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 182