Ben Connor
Soul-driven blues, folk, rock singer songwriter Ben Connor has been described as the musical lovechild of Leonard Cohen, Nick Cave and David Gray.
His debut album, Stone Fields, was released on 2nd February 2023.
Dark, with splashes of light, layered with instrumental palates and propelled by his special brand of husky baritone vocals, Stone Fields’s finely crafted songs journey through love, fatherhood, contemplations on mortality, majestic and mythical landscapes and more. And through it all Ben’s formidable guitar playing features, giving texture and tone and lilting and roller-coaster melodies as it croons, coos, screeches and screams to the accompaniment of a flawless rhythm section.
Stone Fields received positive reviews from publications such as popular online music and culture magazine Happy Mag and was syndicated across the country on the Blues, Roots N Boots show with John De Laurence. Australian music industry legend Stuart Coupe also premiered the song Sailor from Stone Fields on his show Dirt Music while other tracks from the album featured on community radio stations in the Central Coast, Byron Bay and South Australia's Limestone Coast.
Active in the inner-west of Sydney in the early naughties, Ben took a hiatus from performing in the mid-naughties, continuing to work on his song writing craft and doing the occasional gig while travelling the world as an arts/travel writer. In 2017, however, Ben returned to the stage and has been writing songs and performing regularly, at festivals and venues in his home town of Katoomba and beyond, ever since.
Ben performs solo, with a full band and with his duo, Ben Connor & The Butterman,
Ben Connor & Band
Ben's band consists of Davor Opacak on bass, Frankie Symes on drums and Stuart Christie (The Butterman) on 2nd Guitar, Djembe and Midi Keyboard.
Ben Connor & The Butterman (Duo)
Ben's cohort, multi-instrumentalist Stuart Christie (‘The Butterman’), has entertained audiences around the nation and across the seas as a musician and physical theatre and circus performer with companies such as Circus Oz, Strut and Fret, Dislocate and Kage. True to his circus training, The Butterman entertains both musically and physically, generating sounds that range from the subtle to immersive as he pats, taps, whacks and even wields a chain over his less than conventional drum kit, often while simultaneously picking, strumming, and occasionally even drumming, his guitars or making his clarinet sound like a cooing baby predator.
Together, this dynamic duo combine the evocative lyrics, compelling melodies and warm well-worn vocal cords of a seasoned singer-songwriter with the style and theatrics of a professional circus performer.
If interested, you can access Ben's arts/travel writing here: https://benjaminconnor.com/