Nearly two years ago Louisville and an entire music community lost a very special man named Tim Krekel, a man who left behind a lovely group of family and friends and managed to touch thousands of lives through his unique ability to write beautiful songs. It seemed as if an entire community joined together in unison to create an every lasting memory Saturday night of a man so talented that his special gift led him around the world. The celebration, which was kick started by the release of Krekel’s posthumous release of Sings Up the Sun, brought people together from all over the United States, and if you weren’t at the Rudyard Kipling Saturday night, you missed one unforgettable party.
The band on stage, headed by Tim Krekel’s son Jason and recent album producer Michael Webb, featured a potpourri of friends, fellow musicians, and family members shuffling in and out throughout the night singing crowd favorites such as All Night Radio, a song wrote for Kentucky bluegrass musician Sam Bush. Everywhere you look you see people aligned elbow to elbow around the room, singing while standing on chairs, peering at the stage through the large windows in the exposed brick room just to get a glimpse. And outside in the quaint courtyard at the Rudyard Kipling, people are reminiscing about the man who wrote songs for artists such as Patty Loveless, Kim Richey, Alan Jackson and Crystal Gayle.
Tributes were also given throughout the night by local artists like Leigh Ann Yost, who sang Everything’s Gonna Be Alright, a song written and recorded by Tim Krekel on his band The Groovebillly’s Underground album. The event even included a great on stage story by Louisville mayor Greg Fischer, who laughed about hiring Krekel to play a party back when he was in college. Everyone in the room could feel the presence of an amazing man and the legacy that he left behind. When son Jason Krekel, who was joined on stage by his fellow family members, said “there’s a lot of love in this room,” he couldn’t have described it better.
photos courtesy of Stef Perri
