From Toad’s To Tbilisi, Eight To The Bar Brought – And Still Brings – The Swing
Cynthia Lyon and bandmates celebrate 50 years making music
Connecticut’s own Eight To The Bar celebrates 50 years of bringing the swing to crowds all over the world Thursday at Toad’s Place in New Haven. (Photo courtesy Cynthia Lyon)
For most of us, managing to do anything for 50 years is a monumental, if not impossible, task. But for Eight To The Bar founder and band leader Cynthia Lyon, keeping the band together for five decades has been much easier than not doing it.
“It was very simple,” Cynthia told 8495Jazz when she was asked how she managed to keep the band’s swinging good times rolling as long as she has. “I wasn’t doing very well in life. I was supposed to have been an English teacher and I just couldn’t find my place in the world at all. I had all these day jobs and because I didn’t care about the jobs, I was doing very badly. I realized I couldn’t get up in the morning, and if I wanted to be a teacher I had to get up early. I’m a nocturnal creature.
“I got my degree in English from Southern Connecticut State University, but the reality of being a teacher and getting up early in the morning was a terrible reality for me.”
Her alternate reality, forming Eight To The Bar, not only brought her the sense of purpose and happiness anybody deserves, but has also brought a lot of people 50 years of musical celebration. And Thursday night, though they have played literally around the world, they’ll be playing the third of three golden anniversary shows at a most fitting location, Toad’s Place in New Haven, the city where the band began. Starting at 7, the band’s original lineup will play a set of its western swing tunes, followed by a set from the current lineup.
But let’s go back to the beginning.
“One day I just sat up in bed and I decided I was going to start a band,” Cynthia said. “My background was my mother and her two sisters sang 1940s music in a USO band during World War II. I always heard them singing around the piano and they were very, very good. And my Dad played the ukulele. Many, many nights after supper I would listen to my parents playing music from the ’40s.
“It was quite a strange thing. First of all, I had never been in a band in my life,” she said, and, in fact, of the eight original members only three had been in a working band before. So they spent a year practicing, three nights a week, in a basement in Orange, CT, until they could all play their instruments well enough to get some gigs.
They started out as a western swing band because one of the original members, John Brown, had just learned how to play the steel guitar. Between John and his network, and Cynthia and her sisters, they soon had the eight-piece band going, with a first gig, as she recalls, somewhere on the SCSU campus.
Now, for those old enough to remember what music was hip and happening in 1975, starting a western swing band does not sound like it would have been a slam dunk to success. The sales charts were still dominated by party rockers like Kiss, progressive bands like Yes, R&B giants like Earth, Wind, & Fire and Stevie Wonder, and southern rock bands like Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Allman Brothers. Singer-songwriters’ sales were huge. Disco was just starting its run. And the “urban cowboy” trend wasn’t even a blip yet. So Eight To The Bar was greeted with a mix of confusion over the music, but a lot of positive feedback for its energy.
“People either loved us or they hated us,” Cynthia said. “I would hear people in the audience say ‘It’s not rock ‘n’ roll and it’s not disco – what is it?’ But what people would say to me a lot though, was ‘I don’t really like this kind of music, but you guys are so fun and entertaining that I love your band,’ and I’d say ‘Great, I’ll take it.’”
The band quickly built a following at Connecticut hot spots like the Anchor Cafe and Beverly’s in Bantam, the Marbledale Pub in New Preston, and of course, Toad’s, and throughout southern New England. When the steel guitarist left for Nashville, Cynthia developed a big band swing sound with a saxophone player, writing horn lines for the guitarist to emulate.
In the mid-1980s, though, they stopped playing; Cynthia said it was the result of being overbooked and overworked. Perhaps, she thought at the time, the workaday world would be more tolerable. Alas –
“I thought at that time that I was going to grow up and be able to return to the work force, but after one year I was suicidal because I realized I just couldn’t live without it,” she said. “I made a deal with God that if I could be allowed to re-create the band again, I would never leave.”
And she hasn’t. Perhaps, in a serendipitous coincidence of timing and skill, Eight To The Bar played the kind of music that slotted in well with the neo-swing boom that reached full flower in the 1990s with bands like the Cherry Poppin’ Daddies and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy hitting the national charts. That revival led Eight To The Bar to play swing epicenters in California like The Derby (where scenes from Jon Favreau’s Swingers were filmed), and eventually, in European cities like London, Copenhagen and Heidelberg. But after 50 years, Cynthia thinks the pinnacle of her career was a 2011 trip to the Republic of Georgia as musical ambassadors at the behest of the U.S. embassy there.
“We played for thousands of people,” she said. “We had no idea how they would react, and they just loved us. We ended up on Georgian television. I would probably say that was the high point of my career.”
And she honestly sees no end to that career. The band’s calendar is full, with shows at live music venues as well as private parties and weddings; they play the swing favorites as well as a lot of Motown classics. They are still recording; the original lineup has just released a limited-release CD, Eight To The Bar - The Wild Wester Years. And they are as popular as ever; they were voted “Best Musical Group” in 2024’s Connecticut Magazine poll.
“I hope to die before I retire,” she said. “I tried life without music that one year the band broke up and it made me suicidal, and I don’t think that will have changed.”
Eight To The Bar founder and leader Cynthia Lyon has fought the existential ennui of the day job world by bringing the swing to folks for 50 years.
Out and About with 8495Jazz
These listings are a curated sampling of shows in the region. As an independent resource for jazz news, 8495Jazz does not receive any consideration, free tickets, or affiliate fees for these listings. Please confirm events are still happening directly with the venue.
8495Jazz Wild Card Gigs of the Week
Academy Street Historic District, Poughkeepsie, NY
Poughkeepsie Porchfest, today, 12-6:30 pm. On the western edge of the 8495, Potown’s 6th annual celebration of community music. Booked jazz acts include the Poughkeepsie Jazz Project and true North Jazz Project. Also, if you like Celtic stuff, the Amerscot Highland Pipe & Drum Band. Grab a lawn chair! Free.
McLevy Green, Bridgeport, CT
Fifth Annual Bridgeport Jazz Festival, Saturday, August 30, 12-8 pm. Free.
8495Jazz Spur of the Moment Gig TODAY
The Parlour, Providence, RI
Grace Darko Quintet (vocals, combo), 5 pm. All ages show, $10.
Other Shows This Week
Music Mountain, Falls Village, CT
Paul Winter: Brazilian Journey (soprano sax, trio), Saturday, Aug. 30, 7 pm. GA $50-$65, student/teacher/veteran $20-$35, under 19 free.
Regattabar, Cambridge, MA
Berklee Garden Bar Series feat. Sofia Almeida Quartet (vocals, combo), Wednesday, August 27, 6 pm. Free.
The Side Door, Old Lyme, CT
Paul Cornish Trio (piano, combo) Friday, August 29, 8 pm. GA $49.16, student $22.68 including service fee.
Pizzeria Boema, Lenox, MA
Monday Night Jazz w/Andy Wrba & Friends, Monday, August 25, 6 pm (series finale). Free.
The Falcon, Marlboro, NY
Sexmob (combo), today, 7:30 pm. $30 suggested donation.
Pump House Music Works, S. Kingstown, RI
Glen David Andrews Band (New Orleans trombone, combo), Thursday, August 28, 8 pm. Advance GA $23.18 including service fee, $25 at the door.
Chan’s, Woonsocket, RI
Ken Vario Quintet (trumpet, combo), Friday, August 29, 8 pm. Advance GA $15.38 including service fee, $20 at the door.
Horan’s Landing, Sleepy Hollow, NY
Mark Morganelli and the Jazz Forum All-Stars Celoebrate Brasil (trumpet, combo), Tuesday, August 26, 6:30 pm. Free.
Jams
Cafe Nine, New Haven CT
New Haven Jazz Underground jam, usually 2nd and 4th Tuesday of every month: free admission
Saturday jazz jam most Saturdays, 4 pm. Free.
Blackeyed Sally’s, Hartford, CT
Jazz Wednesdays, featured set 7 pm, jam session afterward.
Carmine’s, East Hartford, CT
Paisley’s All Star Memorial Jam, 3rd Tuesday of the month, 7:30 pm. House band set followed by jam. Free.
Mahoney’s, Poughkeepsie, NY
Poughkeepsie Jazz Project, every Tuesday, 7 pm. Free.
Jazz Societies and Organizations (great info on events, festivals, and more)
Jazz Society of Fairfield County
Jazz Fridays at Three Sheets New Haven 1st/3rd Fridays from 6-9pm
Jazz Thursdays at The Cannon New Haven every other Thurs from 7-9pm.
8495Jazz takes its name from the two Interstate highways that cross our region, I-84 and I-95. Within short driving distances from either, you can find incredible entertainment, from local jams to world-famous festivals in New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts. 8495Jazz: From Newburgh to Newport!
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