Teddy Thompson To Headline the Sag Harbor American Music Festival

Teddy Thompson may be London-born, but when he takes the stage as headliner of the Sag Harbor American Music Festival this month, he does so with a deeply held love of American music. And even though his parents are two beloved musicians in the English folk-rock scene, his influences always stretched across the pond.

“I was enamored by American ’50s and ’60s country and rock ’n’ roll at a young age,” said Thompson. “Buddy Holly, the Everly Brothers, classic American rock ’n’ roll and country — it sounded so much cooler than the English stuff.”

Maybe that’s why he moved to California at 18, where he first moved in with his father, the English musician Richard Thompson. Teddy lived in Los Angeles for five years and then moved to New York City, where he’s lived ever since.

As he joins an impressive list of musicians to headline SHAMF over the past 12 years, he brings his love of country music front and center.

“We always try to bring a performer who tells a story of American music in a new way,” said Kelly Dodds, the founder and executive director of the Sag Harbor American Music Festival. “Whether we’ve had people from New Orleans like Jon Cleary or the Fairfield Four in Gospel. Country and folk are stories we haven’t featured in our headliners. And Teddy is a prolific performer with vast experience.”

Thompson did an album of all covers called “My Love of Country,” which is an ode to American country music. He made the album during the pandemic as a kind of healing salve in a time that was otherwise wrought with struggle.

“I wasn’t writing songs at the time,” he said. “I was just lying around being depressed like everyone else. So I was looking for something musical that I could do that would be joyful. And even though these songs are terribly sad, I find great joy in them.”

He considers these classic country songs to be his musical foundation, so it was important for him to get back to those roots. But now, he’s been back to writing his own original tunes.

“We find a way to continue,” he said. “Now it’s back to me — it’s a base country style in there somewhere, mixed with a lot of pop and folk. It’s a combination of these sounds.”

The content — what’s been moving him — has been more of what’s always moved him.

“It’s the need for deep experiences,” he said, “despite my love of the superficial. It’s about love, heartache, the usual. I don’t want to write songs about anything else most of the time.”

It’s worked for him. With nine albums in his discography including a recent collaboration with Jenni Muldaur, Thompson has been performing originals and covers for over 20 years. And he’s performed here on the East End as well. Local audiences may recall his participation in the Guitar Masters at Guild Hall with G.E. Smith, but this will give him a showcase all his own.

“Recently, he’s been focusing on the country element and making that sing,” Dodds said. “His voice is incredible. When I listen to it, I go into a trance — I don’t know how else to describe it.”

The emphasis on country and folk allows Thompson to shine where his heart is. The songs from his album “My Love of Country” are like old friends, not only to Thompson, but to many of us.

“‘A Picture of Me Without You,’ ‘You Don’t Know Me,’” Thompson mused. “These are the big ballads made famous by the most iconic names. I wouldn’t have even have tried them 10 years ago — you have to have a certain life experience to sing them. They’re hard to do justice to — it was a challenge, but I felt I was ready to give them a try.”

When he takes the stage at Bay Street Theater on Friday night, kicking off the weekend for the Sag Harbor American Music Festival, he’ll be bringing this love of country music and his deep roots in folk. With local musician Sarah Gross, who identifies her own sound as alternative-country-folk, opening for him, the evening will be an ode to this facet of American music.

“American country music was my first musical love,” Thompson said. “I sing these songs for the joy of it.”