From singing together in a school choir to performing on the big stage, The Arcadian Wild have crafted a unique acoustic sound that blends traditional and contemporary genres.

Audiences can get a taste of their contemporary take on classic styles when the group brings their show to the Baker Street Centre on Friday, Nov. 5.

Further Up

According to Isaac Horn, guitarist and one of the songwriters for The Arcadian Wild, the choir program at Nashville’s Lipscomb University helped to shape the group’s distinctive musical flavor.

“The band got started in 2013, and it was like a ‘college band’ at first,” Horn told Whatzup in an interview.

“We all sort of sang in choir together and shared this love for vocal music, like formal vocal music, and also acoustic Americana folk music. I think whenever we started playing together, we fell into this combination of the two.”

Horn also said that the “revolving door” of band members through the years has contributed changes in melodic style.

“It feels like every time that that happens, a good band sort of becomes a different band just out of necessity of there being different people involved in it and different creative perspectives.”

Fiddler Bailey Warren and bassist Erik Coveney joined the band within the last few years. Horn applauded their talents as instrumentalists.

“To be frank, I think they are a lot better than I am,” Horn said. “I think that they just took the things that we had built up until meeting them and just took it to the next level as far as our instrumental playing goes.”

Horn said that when the band started, they were simply “playing at the same time.” But now, they are trying to play “together.”

“We’re trying to communicate and be conversational in our playing together.”

Discovering Americana

What audiences will hear in early November is a stark contrast from the music that Horn and his bandmate, Lincoln Mick, listened to growing up.

“We were sort of like in the punk rock world,” Horn said. “Relient K was probably my favorite band.”

The shift in taste for Horn from punk rock to Americana happened around the time he attended high school, when he heard an artist named The Tallest Man on Earth.

“All he did was play guitar and sing songs, and that was the first artist that I was like, ‘Oh, what’s this?’”

That exposure, Horn says, was the “doorway into this vast acoustic and folk world.”

Concertgoers may also witness the close chemistry of the group as they perform onstage.

“I really do love playing in a band with my friends,” Horn said. “Sometimes I’ll imagine doing this by myself, but then I just can’t imagine it. There’s something just so comforting, and uplifting as well, and encouraging about playing on stage, playing music in a group of people that you love, and that they care about you as well, and you’re invested in who they are and vice versa.

“And just sort of knowing that they’ve got your back. I think that’s been the coolest part for me. Just sort of the freedom to have a bad idea, and the freedom to make mistakes as a musician.”

He said the members of the band support each other through personal, emotional, and spiritual struggles as well.

“Someone else in the group can put their arm under your shoulder and help you along, and sort of lift you up and help you forward.”

Significant Name, Meaningful Music

The meaning behind the band’s name is significant.

“We stumbled across this word ‘Arcadia,’ I think it was just on Google, and we learned that, originally, Arcadia was this province in Greece,” Horn said.

“And in ancient Greek mythology, Arcadia is sort of this land that’s portrayed as eternally spring. So nothing ever dies, there’s no decay — sort of this natural utopia.

“What’s cool, though, is that it’s not devoid of people. There are still people living on the land. The people care and foster and take care of the land. And in return, the land cares for and sustains the people.

“We were drawn to that idea and had aspirations of making music that sort of harkened back to that sort of idea.”

Horn finds parallels between the Greek myth of Arcadia and the band’s connection to fans.

“And it’s been really cool as we’ve traveled around, and as the band has grown, and we’ve met more and more people, how we’ve sort of unintentionally begun to live into that idea as a band with our fanbase.

“We set out to make music that sustains people,” he said. “Sometimes that is like ‘hopeful’ music and ‘uplifting’ music, and sometimes it’s the more vulnerable and darker ‘real’ music. I think there’s a place for both of those things. I think that what’s been really cool is as we set out to make music that sustains people, we have in turn been sustained by the people that engage with our music, with our fans.”

“We are so incredibly appreciative of the people that engage with our music because in any way that they feel our music has affected them, they are affecting us. In an equal and very similar way, they are sustaining us.”

Horn said that The Arcadian Wild is excited to come to Fort Wayne. The band might try a few unreleased songs at the Baker Street Centre performance.

“We’re just really eager to get there and share our music.”