Upcoming Performance Dates
Catch us live at a venue near you! We're always adding new shows, so be sure to check back often.
March 6 8-10 pm Sonark Farm
March 13 6:30-8:30 pm Muse Gallery - Second Friday Carrboro Art Walk
March 26 6-9 pm Boomerang @ FRANK (private party)
April 18 7-9 pm Marion's Ford Roadhouse
April 19 11am-1pm Calico Studio Maker's Market, 1141 Smith Level Rd
April 25 6 pm Pat Saling Party (private party)
May 2 4:30 pm Higgins Wedding (private party)
May 3 2 pm Deb Clements House Concert (private party)
May 8 6:30 - 8:30 Muse Gallery - Second Friday Carrboro Art Walk
June 13 TBD Lake Ellen Neighborhood Block Party
June 25 5 pm Al's Burger Shack Porch Concert
June 26 TBD Hillsborough Wills & Trusts - Last Friday Hillsborough Art Walk
July 10 6:30 - 8:30 Muse Gallery - Second Friday Carrboro Art Walk
July 31 6 pm New Village Brewery - Oriental
about
Michael Goy and David Cooper formed Red Nucleus in 2013. We perform original music composed and arranged for guitar and bass. Our lively and emotional instrumental duets occupy a unique niche at the intersection of folk, rock, American primitive, and new acoustic music, where nuance, groove, and atmosphere take center stage. It’s music that invites you to lean in, breathe a little slower, and let melody and rhythm carry the conversation.
We bring decades of musical experience to our collaboration. Both retired academics, we’ve followed winding musical paths through rock bands, blues gigs, finger-style guitar traditions, and deep rhythmic study. Michael’s open-tuned guitar textures shimmer and resonate while David approaches the bass almost like tuned percussion — fluid, melodic, and groove-forward. The result is an emotional, dynamic dialogue between two instruments that feels both intimate and expansive.
Red Nucleus is based in Chapel Hill NC.
Contact: rednucleusband@yahoo.com
a bit of history
Michael and David are both retired academics. Along with their career choices, music has been deeply woven into their lives. Upon his parents’ suggestion, Michael began a short-lived affair with the clarinet in grade school; David was a drummer in his high school’s marching band. When Michael ditched clarinet for guitar, it turned out that the only reputable guitar teacher in his hometown (Beaverton, Oregon) taught flamenco. Soon, college life in Eugene would bring new sounds and styles for him to assimilate, ranging from the Grateful Dead to Hendrix to The Beatles to Little Feat. Meanwhile, on the East Coast, David had abandoned the drums and was playing guitar in a vocal ensemble at Brown University... but his fundamental commitment to rhythm soon led him to embrace the bass guitar. Gigs in rock and blues bands followed for both Michael and David. And then, while working in Boston, Michael encountered the music of Pierre Bensusan and Michael Hedges, and the world of fingerstyle guitar opened up for him. He began composing pieces in this genre, and used the rhythmicity and harmonic complexity of these compositions (along with persistent, heartfelt cajoleries) to lure David into the musical collaboration that gave rise to Red Nucleus.
-adapted from liner notes written by Steven Cornelius