Peter Breinholt brings signature style to campus Friday
Utah musicians Peter Breinholt and Big Parade will be in concert at Utah State University Friday, sponsored by the LDS Institute Activities Council at USU.
“We’ve just heard so much about him [Breinholt], he’s always been recommended for college-age students. I just think people love him. It gives people the opportunity to have fun,” Scott Mortensen, institute activities vice president, said.
The show is one of the institute’s bi-monthly event series, which will possibly include Voice Male and John Bytheway in the future, he said.
Peter Breinholt and Big Parade enjoy coming to USU and have performed on campus in one way or another at least twice a year for the past six years. The band feels that at USU there is a lot of exposure to acoustic music similar to the music they perform, Breinholt said.
“We love the feel of the campus up there. It feels like there is a large folksy-fan base,” he said.
While many students enjoy the music of Peter Breinholt and Big Parade, their musical style is difficult to define. Breinholt himself could not place the band in one genre.
“If you say folk, people think of Peter, Paul and Mary. If you say pop, people think of the Backstreet Boys. While they’re good, we’re not them. It’s better to name inspirations that define our music,” he said, citing Simon and Garfunkel, the Indigo Girls, Nanci Griffith, Paul Simon, the acoustic era of the Beatles and James Taylor.
More importantly, Breinholt said, is how the music will affect those who are listening.
“I always wanted my songs to be songs that put you in a good mood. I’m aware that music can both uplift and depress. Most people know there are two aspects of music, the lyrics and music. But the third component is emotion. I try to tap into that, and I have [my songs] reflect the things I feel,” he said.
Peter Breinholt and Big Parade have been performing together since 1993, but the band has undergone several changes since then. Initially, the band consisted of Breinholt and his friends Mike Ensign and Rex Griffiths, while they were all attending the University of Utah. Since then, Griffiths – who helped write material for the first album – has stopped performing with the band.
Their name Big Parade came from a line in their song You Wore Flowers and came about when they were under deadline pressure for their first recording. Ironically, at the time there were only three members of the band, but “it grew into this big parade,” Breinholt said.
Most shows now include Ensign on bass, David Tolk on piano, Ryan Shupe on fiddle, guitar and mandolin, Rory Carrera on percussion and Breinholt on lead guitar and vocals.
At times, their stage presence includes more than 12 people and an occasional string quartet.
The band used to practice twice a week, but since many of the members are married and must also hold full-time jobs, or also work with other bands, they are not as close, Breinholt said.
“It’s changed, but we’ve still maintained a sort of balance,” he said.
The band has recorded four CDs including “Songs About the Great Divide” (1993), “Heartland” (1996), “Deep Summer” (1999) and “Live September,” which was officially released Tuesday, according to www.peterbreinholt.com.
Breinholt organizes the band, writes their shows and produces their music full time.
“It is my little livelihood here,” he said.
He compares his creative ability to a train that takes a few miles to get going full speed and a few miles to stop.
“I need to crawl into this space where no one, emotionally, can reach me, and set aside time to get it done, then let it go,” he said. “The big trick for an artist is to maintain a balance.”
Although Breinholt does not get stage fright or nervous about shows anymore, he still compares concerts to finals week in college.
“I always dreaded finals week. I couldn’t wait to graduate so I didn’t have to stay up all night. Now, concert weeks are my finals weeks,” he said.
Peter Breinholt and Big Parade will be performing at the Kent Concert Hall at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $2 with a LDS Institute ID card and $4 without.
Mortensen said,”If you think about it, the U2 concert was $50, and this is only $2; you can take 25 of your friends to this for the same price you went to the U2 concert.”