Don Felder: Former Eagles guitarist is soaring solo at The Music Hall

Don Felder, the former guitarist of The Eagles is embarking on his solo tour and one of his stops will be Tarrytown Music Hall on September 15.

I spoke to him earlier this month about the tour, current projects, his time with The Eagles, and other plans on the horizon.

Currently, he has no plans to tour with his former band mates from The Eagles.

“No, as of now we made no contact I haven’t been invited so the decision lies in their court so I have no plans to join them,” said Felder by phone. “I have not been to the Music Hall previously all the guys in my band are very highly pedigree players; different artists they played with. My drummer just got off The Who tour, another drummer I have worked for Crosby, Stills and Nash and Kenny Loggins, my bass player worked with Michael McDonald and also Kenny Loggins, my guitar player was the musical director on The Who Quadrophenia tour, I just have an amazing group of people in my band.”

The current line-up is Don Felder, (guitar, vocals), Frank Simes (guitar) who’s been with Felder’s band for eight years, Timothy Drury keyboards/ vocals Shem Schroeck bass/ Scott Deavours  (drums/ vocals). 

Felder does anywhere between 50-60 shows a year. This particular tour is to promote his latest solo effort, “The Road to Forever.”

“The last single that was out became number 4 on the media charts so we’ve been delighted with the response and songs have been doing really well live,” he said.

He toured with Peter Frampton in June during the Guitar Circus tour.

“Peter is such a delightful guy and an amazing player. I’ve respected his playing ability and musicianship since “Frampton Comes Alive” came out and I remember Joe Walsh and I sitting in a hotel room listening to it—I’m really just in awe of Peter’s ability to play and that was really the first time we played together on the same stage and we just had a ball and we did “Hotel California” “Pride and Joy” “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” and really enjoyed jamming together it was fun! 

Don penned an autobiography entitled, “Heaven and Hell: My Life in the Eagles” about his time with The Eagles, the recording sessions and life on the road.

“The book took me about a year and a half to write it and it actually wound up much to my surprise on the New York Times Best Seller List,” explained Felder. He continued, “It’s basically about the early days when I grew up and started playing guitar and the people I’ve had bands with—Stephen Stills, Tom Petty, Bernie Leadon, Duane Allman taught me how to play slide guitar; how I got from the little dirt road in Gainesville, FL into the Eagles and what happened to me while I was in the band; so it’s a very interesting read and was a very cathartic process for me to go through to write that book and really look at exact detail back at my life and put it out in print," he admits.  He adds, "At the same time I was writing that autobiography I always had a studio in my house so I would go into my studio when I came upon certain areas of my life like my separation and eventual divorce from my wife and I wrote a song about it called, “Fall From the Grace of Love” it’s one of the songs from the new CD many of the experience I had known and experienced in life I wrote songs about so writing the book and second writing the songs and recording this new album. It has Crosby, Stills and Nash singing background on it with me, Steve Lukather from Toto came in and played on the CD with me, Tommy Shaw from Styx wrote a couple of songs from me and sang background just a lot of great musicians turned out for my album.”

When he’s not on the road, he’s not necessarily off work. He writes music in his home studio.

“When I get home, I spend a lot of time in my studio writing and recording new songs for a new solo venture and hopefully I’ll be able to finish it in the next year and a half or so and put out the new record,” Felder stated.

Don will be part of the Wine, Dine and Music Cruise November 9-16. Music cruises are becoming increasingly popular these days.

“This will be my first time to actually play on a cruise ship although I did a private show for a company in Alaska where they rented the entire cruise ship for the party and they had an amazing theater on board with 2,500 seats it was a nice as any performing arts center that I’ve ever been at and an amazing PA system and you never know that you’re actually down in the hall of a cruise ship. It turns out Kenny Loggins is on that same tour with me Kenny and I have been friends for 30 years—we wrote songs together, he sang on my first solo record and I thought it would be fun to go hang out with people that I know and like and playing a couple of sets and enjoying the cruise.”

He’s looking forward to his debut live at the Music Hall.

“I’ve heard from Kenny Loggins and a lot of other people that have played there that it’s a spectacular place to play—it’s got a great sound it’s not so huge that you get lost in the room—larger rooms don’t particularly have a great sound you get a lot of people in there but the experience is not as nice as playing at smaller venues. Stadiums and large arenas are not a place to hear music but the sound, the intimacy how close you are to the actual performers it’s a very distant echoing large experience it’s not necessarily a place to hear live music for a great show.”