Music for food: Red Gallagher presents benefit concert for food pantry Oct. 15

CONWAY — Musician Red Gallagher, of Center Conway, has been living and performing in the Mount Washington Valley and Lakes Region for three years now. He decided it was about time to give back.

“I decided to do a benefit for the [Vaughn Community Service] Food Pantry because of the good work they do,” Gallagher said. “I've been doing a similar food pantry benefit concert in Minneapolis for 15 years, every Thanksgiving, and I've wanted to get something going here that would benefit the community and help me become a more contributing member of my new community.”

Gallagher will present a concert to benefit the food pantry and honor long-time volunteer Bob Therrien. The event will take place at The Salyards Center for the Arts at 110 Main Street in Conway Village, Saturday, Oct. 15, from 7 to 9:30 p.m.

“I've been wanting to do something at the Salyard Center,” Gallagher said. “It is very intimate, very small. It would hold 150 people, maybe more, but they'd be really crammed. And I thought it would be perfect for a first-time event like this because if we draw a crowd at all it would be great. But of course the dream is to fill the place, have this become a successful and maybe do it every year.”

Gallagher, a long-time entertainer at the The Balsams Grand Resort, will be performing a mix of humor and straightforward blues and boogie. He will play a mixture of dark, funny songs including original compositions and parodies and covers of songs by people like John Prine, Steve Goodman, Shel Silverstein and Pat Donohue.

“I don't do a lot of slow ballad, sad stuff,” Gallagher said. “I leave that to the people that do it better and one of them is my wife, Lorraine, and she will be, as she often is with me, a special vocal guest and she'll do probably four to six songs in the course of the evening.”

In addition to the Gallaghers, Balsams pianist Greg Goodwin will open the show with a half hour of jazz and popular music at the grand piano. Goodwin is a long-time friend of the Gallaghers and was even in the best man at their wedding.

“He's a virtuoso,” Gallagher said. “His repertoire is jazz-pop crossover, due in large part because of where he plays — the dining room up at the Balsams. You have to play songs people are familiar with, but his love is jazz, so he gives it a real special flavor and texture.” 

Suggested donation for attendance will be $10 per person or $5 and items of non-perishable food.

“We're going to keep it short, we're going to keep it early and we're making it cheap,” Gallagher said. “I want it to be a fun thing for people to have an alternative of something to do on a Saturday night.”

For more information call 986-7736.