Interview: Cornmeal’s Chris Gangi

HT: Have you guys reached a point with Cornmeal where you don’t need, well, day jobs?

CG: We still work whenever we can. It’s not regular work, but I’ve been teaching music for years and still continue to do so when I’m home and have time. I teach at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago and also do private lessons. It’s just such a great organization and I’ve been doing it for about 10 years.

HT: Is it safe to say that Cornmeal is more productive right now than it’s ever been?

CG: Well, nine years later, yeah [laughs]. The last two years, for whatever reason, we’ve all been completely humbled and taken aback by the kind of response we’re getting nationwide. There’s lots of new territory — the East Coast is still very new to us and the West Coast is even newer — but it’s just amazing that we can go as far as New York and have people there who know about the band without having necessarily seen us before. It takes plenty of motivation and a lot of good strategic moves — opening up for the right show, getting on the right bill, understanding how the Internet can help you tremendously, as well as not help you.

Cornmeal – Naive Melody

HT: You guys have been savvy about landing opening slots to help burrow into certain scenes. You were opening for Yonder Mountain String Band — with whom you’re going out with again this summer — a while back, and many folks got their first look at you opening for moe., for example. Is there strategy at work here?

CG: I think so. Often when bands get to our level where they’re getting a little national attention they bypass searching out those opening slots. They’d rather go out on their own and use that little buzz to start headlining as soon as possible. But these are also bands we’ve known for years, and we’re humble enough to know that there’s still a lot of audience out there to find — 99.99 percent of the world’s population still doesn’t know about Cornmeal!

HT: So there are definitely still gains to be made, then, with opening for Yonder again?

CG: Definitely. When we started out nine years ago, we did a lot of opening slots for Yonder when they first started to come through the midwest. It was a lot of high profile gigs early on. But in all honesty, the band just wasn’t there. The idea and format were there, but we just hadn’t put in the road work and didn’t have enough experience to reach a certain level. The difference now is that we can capitalize on these types of gigs and get to these higher profile festivals. We’re getting really good slots because the band is able to show its full self, if that makes sense.

HT: You’re also exposed to audiences at places like All Good, High Sierra and Summercamp who didn’t necessarily come to see a specific type of band.

CG: Yeah, in the beginning, we really got pigeonholed as a bluegrass band, and while we are based in bluegrass, we have become so much more than that. The festival scene is so important because you have open minded audiences who know to expect a lot of different bands from a lot of different genres of music. From an ethnomusicologist perspective, if you’re at a festival and have just seen Ben Harper, you can wait around on that same stage and catch a fusion jazz band. The festivals have become a gathering place for that type of music fan, people whose minds are open and who come wanting something diverse.

HT: Cornmeal’s last album, 2006’s Feet First, is now three years old. Do you feel pressured to put out more music? Will you be?

CG: That comes up all the time, mostly because, yes, we’re so long overdue in getting back to the studio. But the last two years have really been spent honing our chops onstage and getting us to the point where we have a fanbase that would be ready and excited about a new album.

It’s really about timing. The material’s there, no question — we have three writers in the band, myself included, which is a blessing because you’re not always relying on one person to keep the material fresh. We have been trying to set aside some time for pre-production this fall, and I’ve also been gathering some live material to slide out because there’s so much of it out there. We’re just trying to find that balance.

HT: That has to be tough — you want more on the recorded side but you probably feel like any time spent off the road is time you could be working these markets that are just starting to embrace you. It’s a good problem to have, though, no?

CG: Definitely. All of this is pretty new for us, and it’s stepped up really fast. We want to go all over the place, but to cover the country takes more than even a year’s time. We’re just trying to continue to support each other and grab hold of every opportunity we can