The spotlight shone down on Bill Murray as he took the stage in a white Adidas bucket hat, the crowd cheering as the aged comedian lifted the microphone.<\/p>\n
\u201cThank you all for coming to church tonight,\u201d Murray said.<\/p>\n
Moody Center hosted the Crossroads Guitar Festival on Sept. 26 and 27, bringing musicians together for a guitar-fueled weekend. Famed guitarist Eric Clapton hosted the festival, marking the series\u2019 seventh installment. The event supports the Crossroads Centre Antigua, a charitable organization providing treatment for people suffering from substance addictions.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are incredibly fortunate to have this (festival),\u201d Nicos Peraticos, CEO of Crossroads Centre Antigua, said. \u201cAll these amazing musicians, this talent, that comes, plays, gives up their time, so this is an incredible gift to us.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clapton, who struggled with substance abuse, founded the Crossroads Centre in 1998 in Antigua after hearing about substance abuse on the island.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think (musicianship) can provide an excuse to continue drinking and using because people feel that they might lose their mojo, they might lose their creativity if they stop,\u201d Peraticos said. \u201cI can tell you from a lot of musicians that I know, they don\u2019t lose their creativity.\u201d<\/p>\n
Traveling from around the world, music fans gathered to witness the roster of 25 performers and bands, including Clapton, John Mayer and Gary Clark Jr. Hailing from southern England, sibling duo Gabe and Millie Davey attended the festival with their parents.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost of (the attendees are) older than me, more like my dad\u2019s age, and a lot of men,\u201d Millie said. \u201cBut there\u2019s a big range. I didn\u2019t expect so many different people from all kinds of different backgrounds.\u201d<\/p>\n
Partners of the festival \u2014 Guitar Center, Ernie Ball, Fender, Gibson, Martin & Co. and PRS Guitars \u2014 displayed guitars and gear for enthusiasts to test.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve grown up with my dad playing the guitar a lot, and my brother played the guitar quite a bit,\u201d Gabe said. \u201cIf (guitar) is played well, it\u2019s nice to hear. \u2026 Without music, life wouldn\u2019t be complete.\u201d<\/p>\n
Matthew Bowlin (journalism and radio-television-film \u201822) lives in Austin and said he returned to campus to attend the festival after a friend offered him an extra ticket.<\/p>\n
\u201cPart of the reason I have pride, being from (UT), is because (events like these are) \u2026 baked into the culture of the campus,\u201d Bowlin said. \u201cI\u2019ve never felt more like an Austinite than I did when I was going to UT.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The spotlight shone down on Bill Murray as he took the stage in a white Adidas bucket hat,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":451900,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133],"class_list":["post-451899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=451899"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451899\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/451900"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=451899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=451899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=451899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}