Over the Rhine

When the Aladdin Theater welcomes the Cincinnati, Ohio, husband-and-wife duo Over the Rhine Thursday, the audience should be prepared for a mix of soulful folk and Americana.

Linford Detweiler and his skillful piano and guitar melodies will accompany the powerfully elegant vocals of his wife Karin Bergquist.

The musicians met while they were attending what is now Malone University, a liberal arts school in Canton, Ohio. After graduating, separating ways and then regrouping and forming Over the Rhine in their early twenties, the couple eventually decided to get married.

“That musical chemistry evolved into a really deep connection and we became friends and then became romantically involved. We decided to make it official and get married and it’s been about 15 years now that we’ve been married,” Detweiler said.

Being married does bring joy and challenges to the life of a band on the road. “The great thing about touring with your wife is you get to travel together and embark on an adventure together. The really hard thing about touring with your wife is you get to travel together,” he said.

Detweiler said one of the more difficult things most touring musicians face is leaving their families at home.

“It’s a real blessing for Karin and I to be able to do that —tour together. On the other hand, our friends tell us, ‘Wow, if I was with my spouse as much as you two are together we’d kill each other within a week,’ ” he said.

To accommodate the challenges of working with his spouse, Detweiler said the couple tries to find ways to give each other their own space. “We see our music and our marriage as two separate gardens. Each one requires some care and creativity and we try to take care of both,” he said.

Detweiler said his love of music goes back to when he was a child playing piano in the third grade. When his dad figured out he was interested in music, he “opened up the newspaper and circled a bunch of ads. We drove around together and he let me pick out my first upright piano, which we brought home. It was the one I thought sounded the way it should sound. I have no idea as a third-grader what I would have been listening for, but I knew it when I found it,” he said.

Detweiler said he feels music from the piano is closest to who he is when it comes to music and songs, but he came to the guitar when he found an interest in songwriting. Influenced by Bob Dylan and Neil Young, Detweiler made the connection that these songwriters played guitar.

“I found it was a wonderful songwriting tool because I had to simplify everything that I was doing musically because I only knew a few chords on the guitar. I found that to be very helpful to my writing,” he said.

Because of his background with both instruments, Detweiler said that when he writes with the piano, his music tends to be more gospel influenced; when he writes with the guitar his songs tend to be more of a folk style.

When they aren’t on the road, Detweiler enjoys spending time on his Ohio farm. “On a Sunday morning I love to sit quietly with a cup of coffee on my porch, maybe have a little Louis Armstrong playing in the house and just kind of look out over the fields. I find that very special.”

Over the Rhine owns their own record label, Grey Speckled Dog Record, which was named after their Great Dane, Elroy, who passed about a year ago.
Over the Rhine’s most recent album, “The Long Surrender,” was produced by Grammy winning producer Joe Henry, who has also worked with Ani DiFranco, Elvis Costello and Aimee Mann, to name a few. This CD was recorded in Henry’s basement and features the vocals of three-time Grammy Award winner Lucinda Williams on the song “Undamned.”

“She came into the studio, which was in Joe Henry’s house, and it was just after dinner and we had just had a meal. Lucinda and her husband Tom (Overby) arrived and we sort of went downstairs and turned on the microphones and let that time unfold. It was very moving to hear Lucinda and Karin sing together and we’re huge fans of Lucinda’s songwriting, so it was a great moment. I don’t think there was a dry eye in the room,” Detweiler said.

Detweiler also enjoys writing poetry. He said some of his writings don’t connect to music and there is a stack of poems sitting on the edge of his desk that he would love to get out someday but is a little shy about. “Music gives me a safe place to be a writer and when the music goes away I can get a little self conscious,” he said.

A few of his poems are published on the bands website, www.overtherhine.com.

A minimalist duo from Madison, Wisc., The Milk Carton Kids, will open the show.

Tickets for the 21-and-over show are available at www.portmerch.com for $22 (plus service charge). Doors open at 7 p.m.