Billy Price Band & Bill Toms & Hard Rain

2016 Blues Music Award (BMA) Winner and frequent BMA nominee Billy Price first attracted national attention during his three-year association with guitarist Roy Buchanan. Price is the vocalist on two of Buchanan's LPs, That's What I'm Here For and Live Stock. Since then, with the Keystone Rhythm Band, the Billy Price Band, and solo projects, Billy Price has recorded and released a total of 20 albums, CDs, and DVDs.

Price’s album This Time for Real, with the late Chicago soul singer Otis Clay, received a 2016 Blues Music Award in the category of Best Soul Blues Album of 2015. His 2018 album Reckoning, produced by Kid Andersen at Greaseland Studios for Vizztone, was nominated for a 2019 Blues Music Award in the category of Best Soul Blues Album of 2018. His 2019 album Dog Eat Dog, also produced by Andersen, was nominated for a 2020 BMA for Best Soul Blues Album of 2019. He also received BMA nominations for Best Male Soul Blues Artist in 2020 and 2022. In 2022, he released a 3-CD compilation retrospective of his career on GetHip Recordings titled 50+ Years of Soul.

The Billy Price Band, based in Billy’s hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, consists of Dave Dodd (drums), Tom Valentine (bass), Lenny Smith (guitar), Jim Britton (keyboards), Eric Spaulding (sax), and Joe Herndon (trumpet). They won the Pittsburgh City Paper Reader’s Poll in 2021 and 2022 as the top blues band in the city.

While it’s hard to put a finger on any one sound that defines “American music,” the compositions of Bill Toms are as close a template as any. The Pittsburgh native, along with his band Hard Rain, delivers a sound that takes the greatest of America’s most beloved genres and melds them into a poetic representation of the best the country has to offer. Bill Toms captures the American conscious with thoughtfulness, honesty, and a groove that keeps the tail feathers moving.

Toms launched his musical career in 1987 as lead guitarist of Pittsburgh’s legendary band Joe Grushecky and The Houserockers, during that period, he opened for and played with such legendary names as The Band, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Little Feat, and Stevie Ray Vaughn. While playing guitar, co-writing, and adding backup vocals for the Houserockers, Toms and the band recorded six studio albums and one live concert album. In 1995, The Houserockers released American Babylon, which was recorded and produced by Springsteen himself.

As a solo artist, Toms has opened for the likes of Buddy Guy, Levon Helm, Marshall Crenshaw, Steve Forbert, and Dan Baird.

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