PRESS RELEASE
For Immediate Release
The Arts Council
Contact: Kevin Ledgewood
205-758-5195, x6
MARK HUGHES COBB AND ABBY JONES FEATURED AT THE BAMA’S ACOUSTIC NIGHT
(Tuscaloosa) Acoustic Night will feature a performance by Mark Hughes Cobb and Abby Jones on Wednesday, August 31, 2011 at 7:30 p.m. at the Bama Theatre’s Greensboro Room. Presented by The Arts Council, Acoustic Night features new and upcoming singer/songwriters from around the country throughout the calendar year in the intimate setting of the Greensboro Room.
The Bama Theatre is located at 600 Greensboro Avenue in downtown Tuscaloosa. Cover charge for the evening is $5, and a full-service bar will be available. For more information about the theatre, visit bamatheatre.org or follow the group on Facebook at “The Arts Council – Bama Theatre – Cultural Arts Center” and also on Twitter. Call 205-758-5195 for further information.
Mark Hughes Cobb
Mark Hughes Cobb writes songs about Krispy Kreme waitresses, circus geeks circling the country driven apart by forbidden love, the combustible nature of certain cocktail mixtures, the failure of cool and bad love gone good. At any moment he might spontaneously compose whale song, to the chagrin of his co-workers, neighbors and innocent passers-by, but to the delight of migrating marine mammals who think, “A whale driving a car. Cool.” Turns out whales mostly sing about water, and how deep it might be.
In his spare time MHC, or Markhughescobb (all one word) as the kids call him, tries to wrestle his novel to the ground (it’s about sex, death, magic, Elvis and football); plays Shakespeare in the park (Shakespeare wins); performs the odd wedding; reads Pooh, Poe, “Gatsby,” Chandler and Pratchett; eats a lot of blueberries and (although knowing that tramps like us were born to run) swims (because his knees were not).
He has written a handful of 10-minute plays, performed at the Kentuck Festival of the Arts and elsewhere, and is ever-so-slowly writing a rock musical called “Big Wheels,” about the bootlegger/dirt-track foundation of NASCAR. He’s sung, written and played guitar for bands including The Corvairs, The Crying Jags, The Damn Dirty Apes and The Simpletones. He and Mr. Shakespeare collaborate on songs, but Mr. Cobb collects all the royalties.
During the day he is an arts writer and critic for The Tuscaloosa News, and editor of Tusk magazine. That much is true.
Abby Jones
Abby Jones was born in Austin, Texas to ex-hippies with an extensive vinyl collection and lots of art on the walls. Growing up, she produced plays in her best friend’s yard, taught her mom to color and told herself stories on the school bus.
She wrote her first 16 bars of a song in a music theory class she took during her undergraduate studies at Wellesley College. Sixteen bars turned into a whole song, which turned into two songs, which turned into a CD, The Will to Turn (2005). After graduating from Wellesley in 2002 with a BA in Art History, Abby had every intention to move to New York City to work in film production. That didn’t happen. Instead, she moved back to Austin, bought a 1991 Volvo named Happy McCloud, and got a job writing expository essays about Ancient Persia for an 8th grade social science book. A. Jones Freelancing was born, serving educational publishers across the country.
Also while in Austin, Abby helped Heartsong Music, a music school for toddlers, hang its shingle. When she left Austin to move to Tuscaloosa, she was teaching 12 classes at Heartsong and running the music program at a local preschool.
Jones is currently pursuing her MFA in Acting at The University of Alabama. You can learn more about her and listen to her music at www.enterabbyjones.com.