Steve Austin - $7

Art in the cafe...

Laurel Statz


"The Spectator"


December 2025



Laurel Statz is a painter and Madison area native. Her work, while figurative, is influenced by abstraction and minimalism. The paintings often have a quick and instinctual nature, capturing just what’s needed. While she often times herself to eliminate extra details and over-precision, she has ventured into more detailed works as well. Laurel does not attach narrative to her pieces. Rather, she thinks of them like a journaling process for her scatter-brained psyche. The figures in the pieces are meant to be processing tools for the artist and the viewer. She hopes that seeing these figures helps the...
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Friday, December 26, 2008

Nashville-based entertainer Steve Austin demonstrates through his performances the faith in yourself and in your craft can work miracles. His positive pickin' style on the guitar and banjo, combined with his lively harmonica work and energetic "percussive dancing" using an amplified board, keeps his listeners smiling -- and returning for more.

Austin's original blend of folk, bluegrass, gospel and country music is reaching an increasingly larger audience. He plays 225 shows per year, and he has opened for such notables as Roy Clark, Don Williams, Mel Tillis, Tammy Wynette, Jerry Reed, Boxcar Willie, John Hartford, The Kendalls, Charlie Daniels, The Ozark Mountain Daredevils, Michael Martin Murphy, Kathy Mattea and Patty Loveless.

To date, Austin has released five original albums. His first nationally released song "Queen of the Radio", charted in Indie Bullet and Cashbox in 1990. This led to a performance of his humorous "Resurrection Of The '50 GMC" on The Nashville Network's American Magazine. Now, his song "Sundown Highway", the title track of his most recent country album, is climbing several national charts, and it has also been released on video. His current Christian country album features the self-penned title song One Light.