Sad Daddy

Sad Daddy is the union of four Arkansas-based musicians: Brian Martin on guitar, Melissa Carper on bass, Joe Sundell on banjo, and Rebecca Patek on fiddle. Since 2010, the band has traveled down many a road, together and separately, at times focusing on solo projects before reuniting. All four members sing lead and write original tunes, and the convergence of their influences and interpretations creates a stylistic blend of American roots music that draws from early blues, jazz, jug bands, old-time, country, folk, bluegrass, soul, and funk. Their latest album, Ozark Shine, builds on the foundation laid by 2021’s Way Up in the Hills, which was recorded live and in a circle at Brian Martin’s cabin on Greers Ferry Lake during the stillness of 2020. The new record was shaped in the Ozarks along the Little Buffalo River, and comes with a stack of auspicious signs: a bald eagle overhead, a catfish on the fridge, and a message from John Prine’s wife that John would’ve loved the music. At the Arkansas Folklife Festival, Sad Daddy brings that same cabin-porch energy to the stage: original songs, tight harmonies, and a genre nobody’s figured out how to name yet.