Buffalo Blurb

Greetings,

Wow! What a year 2004 was! With intense political battles here at home, War and suffering from revolutions, disease and natural disasters such as the recent earthquake and tsunami which brought suffering and destruction in such an unfathomable and epic proportions … so much else happening all over the globe that inundates us via the media each day.
In the midst of so much suffering we must stand up to let our voices be heard loud and clear.
It is so important that we do whatever we can do as individuals from all nations, to participate in our governments as much as we can so that all of us are represented and change can happen.
We must reach out our hands with assistance and love to those in need.
We must continue in our our daily lives, our prayers and indeed the hard work that it will take to transform our planet.
We must strive to do what it takes, that in some future generation, we will indeed be recognized as one people and that it is our solemn duty to care for each other and that above all else we must learn to be good caretakers of our Mother Earth.
I remain so ever thankful for the blessings of health, family, love and goodness that I am surrounded by day to day. My prayers, thoughts and condolences go out to all those who are affected by any and all of these sad events .

2004 was a year filled with lots of performances, world travel and big stuff on the home front. It began with a wonderful tour to Brazil in January, where I performed 4 concerts around Rio, Rio Das Ostras Festival and in Sao Paulo. In these concerts I was backed up by The Jefferson Gonçalves Band. Jefferson is a great harmonica player in his own right and helped to make this whole tour happen. I had a ball! His band was wonderful!! His band mates Kleber Dias,Guitar, Luis Guilherme, Sax,Guitar & Mandolin, Fábio Mesquita, Bass and Beto Werther Drums, had whooped up some great arrangements for my tunes. We rocked the house in all of our performances together. These cats were not only great players, but as well, were wonderful people … I had a ball hanging out with them. (Although I have a long way to go before I master Brazilian Portugese). I relied on Kleber translating my Spanish. While there, my hosts helped turn me on to a great collection of Brazilian music (one of my all time favorites musical styles) As well I connected with some other Brazilian musicians including A phenomenal young master of the Seven string guitar, Yamandu Costa, with whom I had a joyous and inspiring jam around the hotel pool. I also met and jammed with a few other Brazilian harpsters including the great Flavio Guilmĺres. We had some wonderful jam sessions and some great food … I am looking forward to going back to perform there again soon!!

In February 2004, I went to New Zealand for the 2004 World Blues Revue tour. Backed by a great S.F.Bay Area rhythm section including Danny Caron, David Mathews, Duane Pate & Deszon Claiborne and a great New Zealand Horn section fronted by the tour’s promoter, Trombonist Roger Fox. This tour featured me along with Duke Robillard, Chris Cain and New Zealand blues artist Bullfrog Ratta. I got to travel New Zealand pretty extensively as we performed seven concerts in different cities around the country. What a beautiful place … so green and lush … I met some great folks as we traveled around… I enjoyed myself and had a gas touring around with Duke, Chris, Bullfrog, Roger and the gang … what a hoot!!! This year was a busy year for my duet with guitarist Roy Rogers.We did more performances than usual, traveling around the country. We have been including a lot of tunes from our most recent CD, Roots of Our Nature. It is so much fun performing with Roy as we spar back and forth musically taking each other to fun and fine musical heights, telling lots of tales along the way.

September was marked by two major events.The first and very sad one was the passing of Tony Flores, my darling Lisa’s father. Born in 1914 in San Vito Lo Capo, Sicily, Tony came to America when he was seven years old. Growing up in San Francisco, California, Tony took up the mandolin and played it for the rest of his life. He became one of the better known players to come out of San Francisco’s Italian music scene and had several releases of this music that he loved so much ... Tony was loved by a huge and diverse world of fans including many Italian and Hispanic families who came to love his music as well. For the past 25 years he performed each weekend at "Jardines" a mexican restaurant in San Juan Bautista, California. Backed by some of Santa Cruz’ best acoustic guitarists, he kept the music of his hometown in Sicily along with many other Italian, latin and other ethnic styles alive with a style and a passion all his own. Tony will be sorely missed not only in our home and by our family and his fans, but in the musical community as well.
I am blessed and thankful that my father, Now 88 years of age is still healthy and in the groove ... as the one that first taught me the harmonica, I owe him a huge debt of love and gratitude for that gift. Please keep him in your thoughts and prayers that he may continue to "Live Long and Prosper!"

The other extremely major event, was that last September 18th, Lisa Flores and I were married in the Chapel at the old Mission San Francisco Solano. (The Last of the California Missions) I am so honored to be in such a wonderful relationship. It took me 50 years to find this wondeful angel and we are having such a splendid time writing and playing music together and living a happy life. I thank Lisa for all that she has brought into my life … (including a very large, very close and very wonderful Sicilian family!)

I will be in the studio later this spring to continue working on a new Knockouts CD … We have already recorded a great collection of my original R&B and blues tunes, many which have been favorites of our live show for many years … along with those we will be cutting some great new tracks. The band is still going strong … (although at times it is challenging coordinating the bookings between all of my musical ventures) With John Vernazza, David Brown and Tyler Eng holding down the grooves … Keyboardist Austin Delone, who had played quite a bit with me back in the 80s has been doing most of our shows and fits the band like a glove, he brings some great experience with him including stints with The Moonlighters, Commander Cody, Elvis Costello, Nick Lowe and most recently Howard Tate. I am looking forward to finishing the Knockouts CD and getting it out to our fans who have been grooving to these tunes for so long;

Probably my most exciting project has been Norton & Friends. For many years I have been doing acoustic performances, gathering different players from duets to at one time a 7 piece acoustic group, to perform the huge collection of tunes that I have written that don’t fit in with the Knockouts or with Roy … The pile has gotten so immense! Nearly four years ago I started in earnest trying to put something more permanent together with which I could both record and perform that music in an ongoing basis. Norton & Friends took on a few transformations before it got to it’s present lineup … and many of the musicians that participated along the way made big contributions to some of the material. Narrowed down to a trio “Friends” now has close to thirty songs in it’s treasure chest and has been so fun to play with as we get tighter and better and discover new tunes and so much fun music. The lineup happens to include my wife, Lisa Flores on guitar and vocals (we were wed last September) and an old friend and neighbor from the Sonoma Valley, David Aguilar on guitar and vocals. I have added the bongos to my list of onstage instruments … we are having such a good time playing together … truly friends … but David and Lisa are excellent musicians and there is a true soul that comes out in this music. It covers so many styles of music … and will be a bit reminiscent to fans of my early Capitol LPs. Norton & Friends went into the studio in late December and mid January and cut 25 new tracks, on which we will now be putting the finishing touches so that it as well should be ready for a release later this year.

Since last year I have begun doing some performances dubbed “An Evening With Norton Buffalo” which includes both “Friends” and “The Knockouts” Starting out acoustically the first part builds up and then Friends are joined by the Knockouts rhythm section … then The Knockouts take over and Lisa and Dave step up to the mikes and ad some great vocal harmonies to the Knockouts set. These shows have been so much fun and cover such a broad spectrum of my music that they are truly a joy for me. In 2005 I am hoping to do more and more of these shows.Keep an eye out for them in our schedule and be sure to catch them when they come to your area. I am certain that you will enjoy these shows.

There is also some great late breaking news regarding my older music, in that it looks like we have finally negotiated an agreement with Capitol Records that paves the way for me to re-release my first two LPs, Lovin’ In The Valley Of The Moon and Desert Horizon. I am hoping that this will as well be ready to get to my fans sometime this year. So far we have been talking about re-releasing them through a label called "Fuel 2000" ... So keep your eyes out for that. We will keep updates regarding that here on the website.

Steve Miller is gearing up for some touring this year … and as the ol’ veteran having played with Steve since 1975, I will make some room in my calendar to fit his shows into my schedule. (This fall will mark 30 years since the Gangster and the Buffalo first hooked up) We are still having a great time playing and singing together. I am honored to be up there rocking out with him and such a great band!!

So 2005 is indeed starting out to be an exciting year as you can probably tell. I have temporarily taken charge of the web site and am presently going through a re-design that should give it an entirely new look. … meanwhile I will keep the performance dates and other news as up to date as possible.

Thanks for your continued support … and thanks to all the fans from around the world, along with the musicians, agents, promoters, radio and press that contunue to support my music. I cannot do this alone .. and thanks to all of you, It seems that I don’t have to!

A special thanks must go out to Chris Harris for his years of devoted and often tireless work in designing and maintaining this website. Chris was also married last October … I congratulate him on his marriage and wish him many happy years. As he also holds down a full time day job, it has gotten to the place where he just didn’t have the time to spend keeping up this site. For now I am the Interim Webmaster” I wish to extend my gracious thanks for all the work done by Chris that allowed me to become connected to my fans all over the world. I will forever be indebted to him for his great work and dedication … staring out as the host of an “unofficial” Steve Miller website … he did magic in creating this site. Thanks Chris!!!!

Harmonically,
Norton