DANBURY, CONN. — When The Black Crowes first swooped into the national music scene with a cover of Otis Redding’s “Hard to Handle” in 1990, they caused quite a commotion. The song winged its way into the Top 40, propelling the group’s debut album, “Shake Your Money Maker,” into the Top 10. Since then, there have been breakups, make-ups and band members moving on, but the one constant has been brothers Chris and Rich Robinson, who first formed the group in Atlanta, Ga., in 1984.

The latest incarnation of The Black Crowes, featuring the brothers Robinson, will perform at 7:30 p.m. on Friday, Aug. 17, at the Ives Concert Park on the Westside campus of Western Connecticut State University, Lake Avenue Extension in Danbury. Gates to the venue will open at 5:30 p.m. Tickets, which range from $31 to $81, are on sale at www.wcsu.edu/tickets or by calling (203) 837-8499.

The well-received “Shake Your Money Maker” also featured the popular ballad “She Talks to Angels,” which became the band’s second Top 40 hit in spring 1991. The album went platinum and eventually sold more than 5 million copies.

In 1992, the band released “Southern Harmony and Musical Companion,” which produced the Top 100 singles “Remedy” and “Thorn in My Pride.” Two years later, the controversial (due to its cover art) “Amorica” album followed, but failed to produce a hit single. The late ’90s brought “Three Snakes and One Charm” in 1996, the box set “Sho’ Nuff” in 1998 and “By Your Side” in 1999.

In 2000, former Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page joined the group for the recording of “Jimmy Page & The Black Crowes: Live at the Greek.” That same year, “Greatest Hits 1990-1999: A Tribute to a Work in Progress” was released and the band gained some additional notoriety when Chris Robinson married actress Kate Hudson.

The studio album “Lions” was released in 2001, but on Halloween Day of that year, The Black Crowes announced a hiatus. In 2002, a live album taped at two previous sold-out shows in Boston’s Orpheum Theatre was released. Then, silence.

In the ensuing four years, fans wondered and waited through solo projects by the Richardson brothers for a much-anticipated reunion.

A series of small, northeastern shows in 2005 by a group calling itself Mr. Crowes Garden soon proved to be what the faithful had waited for: The Black Crowes’ hiatus had ended. As 2005 came to a close, the band, again calling itself The Black Crowes — albeit with a modified lineup — had performed in venues like San Francisco’s Fillmore Auditorium and New York’s Madison Square Garden.

Several compilations of live video footage and “lost tracks” were released in 2006, and according to their official Web site, The Black Crowes are now at work on an album containing 16 new songs to be released this year or early 2008.

The summer tour that brings them to Danbury began on June 15 at the Jubilee Jam in Jackson, Miss. It will cover 24 states and is expected to end just before Halloween at the Voodoo Musical Festival in New Orleans.  

The rest of the 2007 Ives Concert Park lineup currently includes: Open House at The Ives featuring the Ives Festival Orchestra on Sunday, Sept. 23. This family-friendly, daylong event will be free.

For more information, call the Office of University Relations at (203) 837-8486.