Jordan Foley has been a mainstay of Orlando’s roots-music scene, playing on stages all over town either solo, with his band the Wheelhouse, or in tandem with folks like Terri Binion or Oak Hill Drifters. Now this chapter of Foley’s creative life is coming to a close with a move to Nashville imminent. But before all that, there’s the matter of a goodbye show at (where else?) Will’s Pub this week featuring performances by Foley and The Wheelhouse, a songwriter round and, crucially, tearful goodbyes and community.
Foley’s music career started with playing covers at World of Beer in Clermont, then expanding to other World of Beer locations, before meeting scene fulcrum Beth McKee of the Swamp Sistas. “She was doing a songwriter showcase at the Smiling Bison,” Foley tells Orlando Weekly. “I just went from there and I got hungry.”
Foley began connecting with other local artists and scene movers, including Frankie Messina, Mike Dunn and Jessica Pawli.
“I just got into the right crowd at the right time, and everybody was so welcoming and treated me like family right off the bat,” Foley remembers. “I’ve opened for some really amazing acts along the way, but a lot of the people that have really inspired me … these folks, you could tell that they’ve been doing it for a bit and they had a really great camaraderie with everybody. I just wanted to be a part of it.”
Soon enough he would be very much part of it at venues all over town, including the storied stage at Will’s Pub. “I’ve gone from playing to two people there on a Sunday afternoon at 2 p.m. to almost selling it out at my album release show in 2023,” Foley says. “I’m doing the farewell show at Will’s because the venue has just meant so much to me over the years. Will Walker and the team have always taken such good care of me.”
Foley and his wife, Mariah, will be moving to Tennessee for Mariah’s new job opportunity — and for Foley’s career opportunities as well. “There have been many times where I’ve said, ‘Hey, I should probably figure out how to get to the next level,’” Foley says. “And it really just came down to my wife having a really great opportunity to go work at the Caverns and knowing that it’s near Nashville and in that area that I can tour around a little bit easier; it’s really hard to get out of Orlando.”
Both Foley and his wife have lived in the area for over 20 years. Mariah has worked in Orlando in the music scene, and will be continuing that as a booker at the Caverns, a music venue inside an actual cave. Foley’s band, The Wheelhouse, and the other half of his duo, Tyler Hood, all live in Orlando, making this an even harder goodbye.
“The band’s my family. I don’t look at them as just a band. They’re friends, and they’re family to me. My guitarist, Tyler Hood, we’ve played as a duo for years and years. He was a groomsman at my wedding. Everybody in the band was at the wedding,” Foley says. “I definitely think we’re going to want to incorporate them and include them in the future to be able to play.”
In the midst of all the moving and goodbyes, Foley has been working on his upcoming album, which features several songs inspired by not just the move, but how long the move has been a dream for Foley and Mariah. “My wife and I actually wrote a song together called ‘Forever and a Day,’” Foley says. “One night I was just kind of stuck. I was editing it and revising it, and I felt like it wasn’t getting to where I wanted it to go. Mariah came in, sat down and worked with me on it, which is something we’d never done before.”
Immediately, the song became a duet, a meditation on their dreams of moving to the mountains and surrounding themselves with the calm and peace nature brings.
“Literally in the first verse, we talk about moving to Tennessee, being in the mountains, because in our relationship, one of the things that we really focus on was that’s where we want to be,” Foley says. “Wandering On,” another song on the new record, is inspired by what-ifs. The song follows what Foley’s life would’ve been had he not met Mariah, imagining Jordan playing dive bars every night until he got tired of doing the thing he loves most: connecting with the community and playing music.
“I think when it comes to playing in Orlando, when you build the crowd, when you build the following, you build the group of people who want to come and see you over and over again. When they show up, and then they show up again two weeks later, they show up again to see you over and over again,” Foley says. “That created this sense of confidence and comfort of being able to be like, ‘All right, well, these people really like what I’m doing,’ and they’re not just fans. They’re friends.”
The move doesn’t mean that Foley will never play an Orlando show again; he’s already planning to play as many shows as he can in the City Beautiful when he goes on his next tour.
“I don’t know what to expect when I do these in Nashville or wherever I do them elsewhere. I don’t know what it’s going to look like in the future, but the ones that I’ve done in Central Florida have been the foundation and helped me believe that they’re the way to go,” Foley says. “I think there’s something special about banter and talking with one another.”
7 p.m. Friday, Aug. 14, Will’s Pub, 1042 N. Mills Ave., willspub.org, $22.21.
