Date: November 3rd 2010

The Nuts'n'Bolts Version... read on for the official press release... and an Oak Park houseconcert this weekend

Who-- Kevin Montgomery
What-- Houseconcert to support the Orange Duffel Bag Foundation
Where-- This Old Houseconcert, Berwyn IL..... RSVP will getcha the address, if you dont know it!
When-- Saturday, November 13th 7:30pm... doors at 7
Suggested Donation-- $15, proceeds to the Orange Duffel Bag Foundation


Singer/songwriter Kevin Montgomery announced his 50 States in 50 Days Tour kicking off on October 29, 2010, in Alaska and ending on December 17, 2010, in Hawaii. In partnership with Every Child USA, an awareness and fundraising campaign focusing on education and healthcare for children in poverty, and the Orange Duffel Bag Foundation, a nonprofit offering leadership and life skills training and community connections for at-risk youth, Montgomery’s mission is to play a show in a different state every night for 50 nights in a row and bring light to the epidemic of teens aging out of foster care and becoming the “invisible homeless.” Along the way, Montgomery will blog and videologue stories of those who have aged out of foster care, been homeless as teens or overcame that background. He plans to create a documentary based on the question: “Who was the one person who influenced your life in a positive way?”

Montgomery, who has 15,000 followers on Twitter, 5,000 Facebook friends and 3,500 fans on Facebook, is booking the entire tour using those two social networks. He has also set up a special blog for the tour and its mission as well as a Facebook Group called I Support Kevin Montgomery’s 50 States in 50 Days Tour. Montgomery will be live streaming concerts throughout the tour at certain locations via his channel on Ustream.tv (http://www.ustream.tv/channel/kevin-montgomery-s-50-states-in-50-days). Followers of the tour can track his journey via GPS in real time. The indie artist has built a highly interactive relationship with his loyal fan base by utilizing all the latest tools social media offers.

Montgomery’s father sang and wrote songs with Buddy Holly. His mom sang on Elvis’ “Suspicious Minds” and Bob Dylan’s “Nashville Skyline.”
At 23 Montgomery landed a recording contract in Los Angeles with A&M Records and toured with Sheryl Crow, David Crosby and Peter Himmelman. He eventually moved back to Nashville. He sang on Lee Ann Womack’s I Hope You Dance CD. He also wrote “I Won’t Close My Eyes” featured on Martina McBride’s triple platinum Evolution CD. In April 2000, he packed his bags. He now tours the UK, Europe and Australia extensively. He still hasn’t unpacked those bags, and this marks his third annual 50 States in 50 Days Tour.

Reviewers describe his music as Americana in the Jackson Browne tradition. His most recent album “True,” featured a remake of his father Bob Montgomery’s Patsy Cline classic “Back in Baby’s Arms.” He is recording a new album prior to the tour.

Montgomery’s sister Echo Garrett (www.echogarrett.com) is president and co-founder of Orange Duffel Bag Foundation, which provides training based on a book she co-authored called My Orange Duffel Bag with Sam Bracken, who grew up in Las Vegas surrounded by mobsters and motorcycle gang members. His mom abandoned him at age 15, and he kept his homelessness secret from his high school. When he flew from Las Vegas to Atlanta after winning a full-ride football scholarship at the Georgia Institute of Technology, everything he owned fit in an orange duffel bag. The graphic mini-memoir/self help book has an unusual format intended to appeal to all learning styles. It features more than 60 original images by internationally award-winning photographer Kevin Garrett (www.kevingarrett.com) and a free DVD with audio book, the book trailer and 7 videos of Bracken, now a successful executive with FranklinCovey, discussing how he transformed his life. Bracken’s story and efforts through the
Foundation have recently been featured on CNN in a segment called Mission Possible, on NBC-affiliate 11 Alive and in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Bracken and Garrett will be joining Montgomery on some tour dates.

My Orange Duffel Bag has been named the November 2010 Book Selection by the Pulpwood Queens, the largest book club in the world with more than 3,000 members and 325 chapters across the U.S. and in 10 countries. The Pulpwood Queens/Timber Guys are actively supporting Montgomery’s tour and his mission, and Pulpwood Queen founder Kathy Louise Patrick calls it the “must-read book of the year – The Blind Side-meets-Same Kind of Different as Me.” Patrick, who owns the only beauty salon and bookstore in the nation and runs two popular book blogs, pledged to her social network that she would dye her hair to match the book’s orange cover if 1,000 books sold in the month of June. Patrick, the authors and several other supporters, now all sport orange hair as a result of making that goal.

“We’re starting a movement,” says Mike Daly, chairman of the Orange Duffel Bag Foundation. “We want the orange duffel bag to become a symbol of hope for at-risk youth everywhere.”



To learn more about Kevin Montgomery’s 50 States in 50 Days Tour, visit http://the50statesin50daystour.com/
To hear Kevin Montgomery’s music and view videos, go to http://www.kevinmontgomery.com/
I Support Kevin Montgomery’s 50 States in 50 Days Tour on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/#!/group.php?gid=124130884288402&ref=ts
The Orange Duffel Bag Foundation http://www.OrangeDuffelBagFoundation.org/
My Orange Duffel Bag http://www.MyOrangeDuffelBag.com/


Also... This weekend, in Oak Park....At The Clarks houseconcert...
Mad Agnes and an opening set by Brian Cutean (www.qtnrg.org/)From simple a cappella to breathtaking instrumentation (guitars, bass, mandolin, keyboard), the genre-bending Mad Agnes delights, incites, and heals. This trio--made up of Margo Hennebach, Adrienne Jones, and Mark Saunders--"brims with funny showmanship, the most agile, rambunctious harmonies and intense beauty."--Boston Herald
Sunday Nov 7, 2010
Doors open 2:30PM, concert at 3PM
Suggested donation to the artists $18
Contact Nancy.. nancylclark@yahoo.com