Southport Magazine

I’ve said it before: There are many musicians here in the Cape Fear Region! Most of them in the Southport area are retired and happy to play a lot more without a work schedule. I once heard a local musician say you can throw a rock and hit an open mic in Southport. It really is a great community to be involved in. I have met and made lifelong musician friends and played alongside very talented musicians. And we have also lost a few over the years. It’s always challenging to get up in front of strangers and perform. But Southport always has a smiling face, a cold beverage, and people who just love music. 

My band, Cat-a-tonic, has been through some changes since its inception in 2020. Shortly after the band started getting gigs, our guitar player announced he was quitting, leaving a big hole to fill. It took us months of searching with ads on musician boards and Facebook groups for the right person who could play the variety of music and genres we play. And then, finally, I got a message from a guitar player. A great guitar player named Champ. And the rest is history.

The youngest of three children, with an older brother and sister, Champion Davis Saint-Amand, was born in Wilmington but grew up in Rocky Mount. He currently lives in Fayetteville and has a home on Oak Island. “My father was from Wilmington, and my mother was from Currie, in Pender County,” said Champ. “I taught high school English for 28 years, including one year at South Brunswick High School in 1993. The last 24 years were at Cape Fear High School in Fayetteville.”

Champ was a musician all his life, and he was heavily influenced by rock musicians of the ’60s and ’70s. “My first musical inspiration, like many people of my age, was the Beatles,” he said. “I wanted to be Ringo Starr. I began playing drums and played in school bands, etc.,” he said. “When I got to high school, I gave up drums and concentrated on playing high school baseball. I had a friend in high school who played guitar, and the music that I was listening to at the time was guitar-dominated, so I naturally started wanting to play the music I loved, which was all the 70s rock stuff,” he said. “I went to East Carolina University and met a guy who was quite accomplished on guitar, and after hearing him, I became fairly obsessed.” 

If you have ever seen Champ play solo at Ports of Call Restaurant in Southport, you can tell he loves to play jazz guitar, although jazz was not his first musical love. Learning how to play jazz came later. “I met a guy back home in Rocky Mount who owned a music store. His name is JD Joyner, and JD was really into jazz,” said Champ. “I had never really listened to jazz closely, but I started to get into jazz. I found a teacher in Greenville who helped me start learning to read music. After graduating from East Carolina, I lived in Rocky Mount for a year. I taught guitar privately at my friend JD’s store. I moved to Boston and attended Berklee College of Music for one year. I stayed in Boston after leaving Berklee and took lessons from a great music teacher named Charlie Banacos. Charlie was a great jazz pianist, but he taught his musical concepts to everyone, no matter the instrument. He was a great influence on me in many ways. I later moved to Atlanta and played with various rock, jazz, and wedding bands before joining a rock band and traveling with them on the road for almost a year. I got tired of that life and eventually moved back to North Carolina and began teaching English.”

Developing your chops as a musician takes a lot of practice and time. And there are a lot of ups and downs along the way. All musicians have that one gig where they forget everything! And Champ is no different. “My first event playing solo was memorable. It was a disaster! I was on a gig with my friend JD. We were playing for a lunch event at the local hospital in Rocky Mount. We were both going to play solo tunes and then play together. He did his tune and just played beautifully. I had learned a jazz tune note for note, but I really didn’t know the chords for the song. I just had memorized it. And once I started playing, I got nervous and forgot the piece! That experience taught me the importance of learning a song so well that if you do make a mistake, you can fall back into place and keep going.”

Champ is very busy playing solo guitar beach weddings when he is not playing with Cat-a-tonic. Our band has a Facebook page and Instagram where you can see all our upcoming events listed. “We have several gigs coming up in the fall that I’m looking forward to,” said Champ. “I also play solo jazz guitar at fine restaurants like Ports of Call in Southport and the CamCafe in Wilmington. I also play weddings and private parties,” he said. “I just enjoy playing music for people and hopefully spread some joy and happiness in the world.”

For more information on Champ, check out his website, www.saintamandmusic.com.

https://www.facebook.com/catatonicbandsptnc