When Stacy Phillips and His Bluegrass Characters broke into the Flatt and Scruggs’ classic “Dim Lights, Thick Smoke,” a special guest took over the bass line.
That special guest was New Haven’s top private-sector CEO, Yale President Peter Salovey.
Salovey, a bluegrass musician (read about that here), ventured across the town line Christmas Eve to watch his friend Phillips, a Grammy-winning Dobro player and fiddler who lives in Westville, play his regular fourth-Tuesday-of-the-month gig at the Outer Space. Phillips called Salovey to the stage for “Dim Lights”; click on the video to hear what it sounded like and see what it looked like amid the dim lights.
The musician who stole the crowd’s heart was teen phenom Korey Brodsky, a student at Jewish High School of Connecticut. Sample some of his licks at the end of the video (and read more about him here).