With a wide smile and twinkle in his eye, lanky, gray-haired Tim Pfaff will be releasing his debut album, Promises, in Athens this weekend with a CD release show at Donkey Coffee and Espresso, 17 ½ W. Washington St.
But don't let his quick guitar picks and sweetly raspy singing fool you; Pfaff has only been playing music for three years.
I used to write songs and play with my brother when I was in college 25 years ago
and then I didn't do much for a really long time Pfaff said. About three years ago I started to teach myself to play the guitar and something sort of clicked
and over the last two years I've written well over 100 songs.
A professional writer and museum exhibition developer, Pfaff travels all over the country working in museums and spends a lot of time on the road or in the air. This contributes to the themes of many of his songs.
I played piano
but you can't take that on the plane with you
Pfaff said. So I picked up a guitar and I thought
'Well
I could do that.' And I took a few lessons from Frank (McDermott) over at Blue Eagle.
This inspired a tune by Pfaff called Blue Eagle Music
where he warbles, Yeah
and all the local musicians / Come to buy their strings from Frank / They stand around and joke there in the store / You'll see the wild college students with dreams of wailing out on tour / And the geyser guys who dreamed that dream before.
A yearning for change inspires Pfaff to write songs such as The Monks of Myanmar
about Burmese monks who held protests against the government in 2007.
A combination of politics and local licks hold together Pfaff's debut, along with multiple collaborations with other Athens musicians such as Clay Flaherty, Michelle Bartos and Dustin McKee.
