The harmonious fusion of joy and intensity in Ben Carr’s music is something that will continually strike listeners and audiences alike. He’ll be grinning away as he directs the band through the one measure of the 4 that heralds the shift from 7/8 to 4/4 time in one of his many original compositions. The wild mix of time signatures, instrumentation and feelings always come across as genuine; when asked why he wrote a transition that way, Ben has been known to reply, “That’s the way the music came out and made sense to me.” And a triumphantly innovative and musical sense he has.

Ben grew up in the rolling farmland suburbs of Philadelphia that have since become the paved progress of America. His first instrument was the alto sax but he found his true love in a pair of bongos. From that moment on he’s been on a course of rhythmic exploration that continues to this day. He played around the East Coast with various groups, and in the late 1990’s landed in New Orleans to pursue music full time.