Morris man writes a new family chapter

Way back in the day — the late ’90s to be exact — there was a young man who wrote about the music scene here in Charlottesville.

We felt pretty lucky to have landed Keith Morris on the staff.

He could turn a pretty mean phrase. But, then again, he had a master’s in literature from Florida State.

He also really had a keen ear for music. But, then again, he was an undergrad at Georgia about the same time R.E.M. was on the rise. He hung out with the boys in the band from Widespread Panic.

After working as an innkeeper and driving taxis in Colorado, Morris headed back down South. Somehow, he ended down in Charlottesville. Or up.

Back then, there was no Paramount, no JPJ, no Gravity Lounge. But the town still rocked, and rolled, and Morris wrote about it with the best of them.

He covered the locals — John McCutcheon, Tim Reynolds, Corey Harris, Kathryn Caine. He let us know when the likes of James Cotton, Cracker, C.J. Chenier and Dar Williams were heading to Trax or the Outback Lodge.

But as the new millennium approached, Morris set off on another adventure — teaching at Longwood.

Oh, he could still turn a pretty mean phrase, and he still liked music.

So, it came as no great surprise when Morris combined his two interests a few years back.

He released his first CD, “Songs from Candyapolis,” that his successor at the Progress said “grabs the listener by the collar and never lets go, drawing him into a world all its own.”

Morris, himself, noted that he “had stumbled onto some odd, new musical territory.”

And he had a lot of help from the music friends in Charlottesville that he once wrote about. Listen carefully to the 11-track disc and you can hear Morwenna Lasko’s violin, Raphael Bell’s cello, Paul Curreri’s guitar and Devon Sproule’s vocals, to name just a few. Morris, who also sings and plays guitar, added the trashcan and chicken shakers.

Since then, Morris and his band have been somewhat of a regular at Gravity Lounge.

Saturday, however, he’s adding yet another new twist to his repertoire.

“We’re doing a kids/family show,” he said.

“The Candyapolis Revue” starts at 3 p.m. Saturday at Gravity. The cost is a mere five bucks.

“Some people have said it’s scary, and I’m gonna frighten children with it,” he wrote in an recent email, “but they’re just nattering nabobs of negativity.”

That’s our Keith.

He said the musical and visual matinee will include “some skits, some characters, and even a visual presentation of my song, ‘Anabel Says’.”

Prunella Killjoy, the self-appointed librarian of silence at Gravity Lounge, will be among the cast of characters that also includes Clarence the Bunny and Lonesome Blinky McGee.

He’s also bringing his full band, so it should be an afternoon of fun for the whole family.

Morris calls it “a show done for kids and families by people who love kids.”

If there’s enough interest for this weekend’s show, he said that he would like to do more.

“If we can do that,” he said, “this will soon be the coolest thing in the world for kids. I promise.”