ITHACA, N.Y. -- A musician whose career blossomed in Ithaca and who is a favorite of area audiences will be the featured performer for this year's Lauren Pickard '90 Emerging Artist Series at Cornell University.

David Linhart, a Cornell alumnus (B.S. '99 in agricultural and biological engineering) and the guitarist and lead vocalist with the well-known roots reggae band the Uplifters, will bring his acoustic-guitar driven music to Willard Straight Hall's Memorial Room on Monday, April 15, at 7:30 p.m. The show is free and open to the public.

Linhart's music, which he describes as sounding like "Nick Drake meets Nat King Cole in 1960s Brazil," was featured recently on the 13-song LP "Etc. (The Lounge)." "Linhart's grainy, soulful voice, accompanied solely by his acoustic, jazz-inspired compositions, rings with a sincerity often absent in popular music," wrote one reviewer.

First introduced to Ithaca and Cornell audiences through performances at the Just About Music program house on campus and with the seven-piece ska band Dominant Seven (all Cornell students), Linhart has moved from Ithaca to New York City to Holyoke, Mass., with the Uplifters, while performing and recording independently.

Still a popular and frequent visitor to the area for solo performances, his most recent stop was in March of this year to record a new full-length album with the Uplifters, "Burning Bush," at Electric Wilburland Studios in Newfield.

The Lauren Pickard '90 Emerging Artist Series was created in memory of a 1990 Cornell graduate who died suddenly after suffering a seizure a few years ago while living and working in Paris. At Cornell, Pickard had been an active student employee and volunteer at Willard Straight Hall, who loved the student union's weekly coffeehouse series and was a poet and an activist. The series was created through an endowment established by Pickard's mother and it sponsors one or two programs each academic semester at Cornell featuring bright young artists.

For more information about Linhart's concert, or about the Lauren Pickard Emerging Artist Series at Willard Straight Hall, contact Catherine Holmes at (607) 255-4169 or cah4@cornell.edu .

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