Andre Thierry is on a mission to coin a new musical genre: alt-Creole. The 35-year-old Grammy-nominated musician describes it simply as a blend of traditional and modern, only not as something he does consciously.
“It’s not thinking about the old, it’s not thinking about the new,” Thierry explains. “It’s thinking about everybody. [Alt-Creole] has always been my blueprint, my trademark.”
Born in Richmond, California, Thierry’s French Creole ancestry has a direct line to Jennings, Louisiana. His grandparents migrated to California to find work and brought music with them.
Thierry recalls hearing zydeco music coming from their church as a kid. He hated it at first. That all changed after seeing a guy play the accordion close-up.
“I wanted to do what he was doing,” he says. “I fell in love with the accordion. I just threw myself into zydeco.”
Thierry learned to sing in original Creole French and perform variations of zydeco on accordion, drums, guitar and bass. He also began writing his own music and picking up awards, including a Creole Preservation Award, a Bay Area Blues Society Award and even a Grammy nod in 2013 for Best Regional Roots Music. Thierry also performed with Los Lobos frontman David Hidalgo and appeared on Sammy Hagar’s Sammy and Friends.
Michael Tisserand, who penned what’s considered to be the definitive book on zydeco, wrote: “[Thierry] combines youthful vigor with a mature appreciation for his inherited tradition.”
But his dream is to bring the accordion, and zydeco, to the mainstream.
“A lot of people look at the accordion like it’s an alien, but it’s just like any other instrument,” he says. He wants to make a record where he plays every genre – from reggae to country – on accordion.
“I don’t want to be known for playing a certain style of music,” he says. “I just want to be appreciated for playing good music, with a Creole twist.”
ANDRE THIERRY 8pm Thursday, Jan. 22. Studio 105 at Sunset Center, San Carlos and Ninth, Carmel. $30; $20/students, military. 620-2048.
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