A contemporary blend of folk rock that smoothly transitions among strong yet soothing melodies with engaging lyrics reminiscent of Dave Matthews and Martin Sexton.

12 MP3 Songs
FOLK: Modern Folk, ROCK: Folk Rock



Details:
Self-titled musician and songwriter Jonathan Coleman has been performing his solo acoustic act around
Central New York for the past five years. Inspired by his father, another Central New York Musician, it was natural for Jonathan to pick up a guitar and follow in his footsteps. Many of Jonathan's songs bear witness to the influence of Dave Matthews Band with other songs reflecting the impact of Syracuse native Martin Sexton.

Jonathan's performances started at open mic nights in local bars and coffee houses. It didn't take long before he developed a following of loyal listeners and a list of local businesses that wanted to hire him for entertainment. After one year of playing at open mic nights and performances for local business owners his summers were booked in the Central New York region.

His audience began asking when and where he would be performing and if he had a CD. In 2001 encouraged by these requests, Jonathan produced a CD collection of his songs he had written over the previous 2 years, which he named after his most requested song at the time "Castle Walls". He distributed copies to family and friends who in turn passed them on to their family and friends. Eventually a copy passed into the hands of local musician and recording studio owner, Jay McCarty. McCarty was impressed with what he heard and asked for permission to add a background band to Jonathan's acoustic sound. Jonathan agreed and with the help of some local musicians the CD "Originals" was born in the spring of 2003.

Joe Basi of Mohawk Valley community College and music critic of the College Crier said in a review of
"Originals", "[Jonathan's] music is not a sound that one would expect from a local artist". Mark Bialczak a music critic for the Syracuse Post Standard wrote "The singer-songwriter from Rome [New York] has a soothing, happy folk-pop touch that at times is wonderfully reminiscent of the catchy, melodic work of Cat Stevens in the early 1970s". Excited by these reviews Jonathan is working once again on compiling a group of new songs for another CD. His focus for this next piece of work is an all-acoustic sound, just himself and Destiny (the name he affectionately calls his guitar). The songs on this new CD have stories of Jonathan's own life as well as from people and events he has encountered through his music over the last 3 years.