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HOUSE CONCERT SERIES 2013-2014
All shows will be in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York
October 6 - Danny Schmidt with special guest Carrie Elkin
November 3 - Joe Crookston & the BlueBird Jubilee with Peter Glanville
January 12 - The Kennedys
February 23 - Lauren Fox
March 23 - Suzzy Roche & Lucy Wainwright Roche
April 6 - Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line
May 4 - Fred Gillen, Jr. & Friends Farewell Show
For more information on these artists - scroll down
All Shows – Suggested donation:
$20 in advance ($20.88 after PayPal processing fee) or $22 at the door
100% goes to the musicians
Open seating.
Online orders end at midnight the Friday before the concert.
Donations are not exchangeable or refundable.
All online orders will be confirmed by email.
Concert address will be provided when reservation is confirmed.
If a show is cancelled, special arrangements will be made and posted on this site.
Online orders end at midnight the Friday before the concert.
Donations are not exchangeable or refundable.
All online orders will be confirmed by email.
Concert address will be provided when reservation is confirmed.
If a show is cancelled, special arrangements will be made and posted on this site.
| Oct. 6, 2013 | Danny Schmidt with special guest Carrie Elkin |  |
| Nov. 3, 2013 | Joe Crookston & the BlueBird Jubilee with Peter Glanville |  |
| Jan. 12, 2014 | The Kennedys |  |
| Feb. 23, 2014 | Lauren Fox |  |
| March 23, 2014 | Suzzy Roche & Lucy Wainwright Roche |  |
| April 6, 2014 | Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line |  |
| May 4, 2014 | Fred Gillen, Jr. & Friends Farewell Show |  |
For more information peter@riverspiritmusic.com
or call (347) MUSIC-76
OUR FIRST SHOW OF THE SEASON
October 6 - Danny Schmidt with special guest Carrie Elkin
This is Danny's only NYC area appearance this year
This is a concert you don’t want to miss.
Danny Schmidt is best known for his riveting poetic lyrics, which have drawn favorable comparisons to Leonard Cohen and Townes Van Zandt for their depth and complexity. And gypsy spirit Carrie Elkin is best known for her incredibly soulful and dynamic vocals, which have drawn favorable comparisons to Patty Griffin at her most powerful, and Nanci Griffith at her most intimate.
Together, the respective strengths they each bring, individually, merge into a much greater whole . . . a performance of great energy and spirit . . . and one that audiences seem to be able to connect with on a multitude of levels, at once: Emotionally, Spiritually, and Intellectually.
On Danny:
Named to the Chicago Tribune's 50 Most Significant Songwriters in the Last 50 Years, Austin, TX-based singer-songwriter Danny Schmidt has been rapidly ascending from underground cult hero status to being broadly recognized as an artist of generational significance. Danny is considered a preeminent writer, an artist whose earthy poetry manages to somehow conjure magic from the mundane, leading Sing Out Magazine to tag him: "Perhaps the best new songwriter we've heard in the last 15 years."
On Carrie:
With her Red House Records release, Call it my Garden, Carrie Elkin has emerged as one of the defining new voices in the world of Texas singer-songwriters, being celebrated by Texas Music Magazine as one of their artists of the year. The voice, the stories, the images, the grace, it's the complete package. But it's the power of her live performances that really have been creating an incredible buzz around this young artist. Maverick Magazine said it best, after a recent festival performance: "I have never seen a performer so in love with the act of singing. That's the gospel truth. Onstage, Elkin was simply a force of nature."
Don't miss these two great artists in a rare split-bill performance, sharing songs back and forth, lending their voices to each other's tunes, in harmony. And lending commentary to each other's tunes, in the form of smart-ass between-song banter.
From Ithaca, NY, Joe Crookston and his longtime DUO partner Peter Glanville will pick and twist their way through a high energy and sonically lush set of Joe Crookston originals…This is exciting…Joe with the BlueBird Jubilee… They have played to full houses at Festivals and Performing Arts Centers across the US. Joe and Peter will treat you to an evening of story songs, fingerpicking, collaboration, stomping rhythms and a deep well of musical magic. Check him out on You Tube. It's not the same. Decide to come to this show. You'll be glad you did.
Peter Glanville is a guitar picker, tenor guitar player, and harmony singer…. Hilarious and deep, they will tune up their Martins
and vintage Gibsons and weave their way through a set of music that will leave
you inspired and renewed and wanting more. "It's a good thing Joe is one
of the good guys…otherwise he'd be dangerous."
THE KENNEDYS RETURN WITH A NEW CD
"Closer Than You Know" is the duo's twelfth album
“Byrdsy jangle, boy-girl harmonies…irresistible” -Rolling Stone
“Unabashed, hook-laden pop” -Village Voice
“More hooks than Marilyn Monroe’s closet” -Chicago Sun-Times
In a career that now spans two decades, New York duo Maura and Pete Kennedy have traversed a broad musical landscape, surveying power pop, acoustic songwriting, organic rock rooted in their early days in Austin, and a Byrds-inspired jangle that drew the attention of McGuinn, Steve Earle, and most notably Nanci Griffith. On their new release, "Closer Than You Know", The Kennedys strike out into new territory, this time inspired by a sojourn in Paris, where they immersed themselves in the turn of another century, the time when Debussy and Ravel were inventing the sonic palette of modern music.
February 23, 2014 - Lauren Fox
Lauren Fox was born and raised in New York City, where she still resides, happily, and just blocks away from everyone and everything she needs! She has been featured in several films, including "Pi," "Noon Blue Apples," "Revolution Summer," "The Hammer," and "We Need To Talk About Kevin," and on TV in FOX’s "New Amsterdam" and "Fringe." Her New York theater credits include: "Hillbilly Women," and "GO-SEE" at the ArcLight Theater, and "Heathens" at Theater For A New City. Lauren has several upcoming film and stage projects in development, including her screenplay, "Atlas of the Soul," which is in pre-production.
Lauren's last two shows, "Love, Lust, Fear & Freedom: The Songs Of Joni Mitchell & Leonard Cohen," and “Canyon Folkies: Over the Hills & Under the Covers,” both at Metropolitan Room, NYC, received critical acclaim from The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. She has performed at Jazz at Lincoln Center's Rose Theater, Carnegie Hall and Town Hall, as well as various performing arts centers around the country. Lauren is the 2012 recipient of the MAC and Bistro Award for Debut Artist, as well as the 2013 recipient of a Nightlife Award for Outstanding Cabaret Performer.
Lauren, along with her sister, Haley Fox, founded and co-owns Alice’s Tea Cup, three tea houses in New York City. In 2010 they co-wrote the Alice’s Tea Cup Cookbook, published by Harper Collins. Lauren is a New York City Ambassador for Healthy is the New Skinny’s PUP (perfectly un-perfected) program, and, in sharing her own struggles as a teenager growing up in New York City, works with young women to inform and empower them.
March 23, 2014 - Suzzy Roche & Lucy Wainwright Roche
A mother-daughter duo with impressive accomplishments in their own separate careers, Suzzy and Lucy recently released Fairytale & Myth, their first musical collaboration. Rob Morsberger, a Hudson Valley singer-songwriter, arranger and sideman (for artists like Crash Test Dummies and Marshall Crenshaw) co-produced the album before his untimely death in June due to brain cancer. Rob also played piano, accordion, organ, arranged strings and other odds and ends on the album. Suzzy was devastated to learn of Rob's diagnosis and wanted to work with him again to make an album that would be a tribute to his beautiful musical gifts. "In the face of his diagnosis, Rob threw himself into living and focusing on the true meaning of life, as well as making music. We made the record in the dead of winter huddled in the studio in our winter coats," says Suzzy, recalling the warmth and intimacy of the hours she and Lucy, spent with Rob recording this album. "It was one of the most magical musical moments of my life." When you listen to this album, the beauty and magic and power of Rob's piano and the Roches' sweet, exquisite harmonies will enchant and transport you. You'll mourn the loss of Rob Morsberger, but you'll celebrate the life, love, passion, energy, and warmth of his music.
Suzzy is a singer/songwriter/performer and founding member with her sisters of one of folk music's most celebrated bands, The Roches. She has recorded over fifteen albums, written music for TV and Film, and toured extensively for thirty years all across the U.S. and Europe. Zero Church: an unusual collection of prayers (a collaboration with Maggie Roche) which was developed at Harvard’s Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue was originally staged at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, and has been staged around the country. Suzzy has been an associate member of The Wooster Group; the experimental theater company based in New York City, and performed with them off and on for years throughout Europe. Her children’s book Want To Be In A Band (Random House) was published this past January. Wayward Saints (Hyperion/Voice) is her first novel and was a selection of the Spring 2012 B&N Discover Great New Writers Program. This Fall, Suzzy will be teaching at Princeton with Meg Wolitzer for the Princeton Atelier Program.
Lucy has been compared to Joni Mitchell and Patti Griffin by NPR. She was born in NYC into an influential musical family, but rebelled against the family business by teaching elementary school for several years before getting involved in music. Since 2007, Lucy has released two EPs and a studio album entitled Lucy (2010), toured the U.S., Canada and Europe, and has performed with a number of musicians including her brother Rufus, opening for her father Loudon Wainwright III, and touring with Dar Williams, Neko Case, Amos Lee, the Indigo Girls, Neko Case, and Over the Rhine. Lucy is known for her crystal clear voice and straightforward, funny stage presence. When not on tour, Lucy lives in Brooklyn.
April 6, 2014 - Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line
“Fans of Dixie Chicks, Alison Krauss and Dolly Parton, take notice: Nora Jane Struthers embodies everything you could want in an Americana singer-songwriter.” — NPR Music
Virginia-born Struthers was educated at NYU’s Steinhart School of Education and taught at a charter school in Brooklyn, while cutting her musical teeth as a folk-rock performer in New York clubs like CBGBs and the Cutting Room. She decided to move into music full-time after attending such convocations as Virginia’s Galax Old Time Fiddlers Convention and North Carolina’s Mount Airy Fiddlers Convention with her father.
Struthers’ touring band, the Party Line (which takes its handle from one of the record’s songs, about the early days of rural telephone calls), includes Struthers’ longtime collaborator P. J. George (upright bass, harmony vocals, pedal steel guitar, accordion and banjo), Joe Overton (clawhammer banjo and harmony vocals), Aaron Jonah Lewis (fiddle, three-finger banjo, baritone fiddle, mandolin) and Drew Lawhorn (drums). Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line have performed at the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival and Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion. The instrumentation and form of Struthers’
music draws on her traditionalist roots – her father Alan is himself a
bluegrass musician – but with the addition of drums, her latest album
takes a bend toward more progressive roots-rock bands like Mumford &
Sons and The Avett Brothers. “I’m really passionate about the stories
in the old ballads and story-songs,” says Struthers. “I’m trying to bring that
element of traditional music forward into a contemporary sonic space. I want
story-songs to live on in a way that will be accessible to more people. That’s
my artistic mission. When we hear another person’s story, we gain perspective
and are changed; we’re able to see our own lives through new eyes.”
May 4, 2014 - Fred Gillen, Jr. & Friends "Farewell Show"
Since his first solo concert in 1996, Fred has traveled all over the U.S. and Europe singing his songs of hope and struggle at all types of venues, building a devoted following along the way. He feels at home performing at any type and size of venue, from a "house concert" in Indiana to Irving Plaza in New York City, to the main stages of festivals, and everything in between. He has played at many prestigious and famous venues, and at many farmers markets, coffeehouses, pubs, and union rallies. With his sometimes partner Matt Turk, he played for several years in the New York City subways as part of the MUNY (Music Under NY) program. At every performance, he opens his heart and pours out the unglamorous but compelling tales of the marginalized and forgotten. His songs have often been described as both painfully intimate and universal, and this is what he strives for in writing them. His live performances are spontaneous celebrations of all that it is to be human; the joy and the pain, the comedy and the tragedy.
Fred's songs have appeared on ABC's All My Children and MSG Network's NYC Soundtracks, and he was awarded a NY Foundation For The Arts grant. In 2008, his song Fall Down was featured on the CMJ Music Marathon sampler CD, given to 11,000 CMJ conference attendees and radio programmers. He has been voted "best folk artist" for three straight years in Westchester Weekly. Last year, Fred's version of Woody Guthrie's song I Ain't Got No Home, was featured on the Appleseed Records CD Pete Remembers Woody, a recording of Pete Seeger telling stories about Woody, interspersed with various artists' versions of Woody's songs.
Fred is a prolific songwriter, recording artist, and producer. He has released eight independent studio solo albums, one live album, two albums with Hope Machine, and one as half of the duo "Gillen & Turk," all to substantial critical acclaim. His music has also been played on independent, commercial, public, and college radio all over the world. His latest album, Silence Of The Night, brings him back slightly to his rock roots, while also retaining a folky message and delivery. Sixteen tracks long, it features his first spoken-word piece on record in ten years and his first instrumental in sixteen years. The new record, while being truly an "album" and not a collection of singles, dips a big, colorful bucket into the wellspring of American music, touching on folk, Americana, rock, roots, and even funk. One of its songs This Old Car was featured, before its official release, on the NPR syndicated show "Car Talk."
Danny Schmidt is best known for his riveting poetic lyrics, which have drawn favorable comparisons to Leonard Cohen and Townes Van Zandt for their depth and complexity. And gypsy spirit Carrie Elkin is best known for her incredibly soulful and dynamic vocals, which have drawn favorable comparisons to Patty Griffin at her most powerful, and Nanci Griffith at her most intimate.
Together, the respective strengths they each bring, individually, merge into a much greater whole . . . a performance of great energy and spirit . . . and one that audiences seem to be able to connect with on a multitude of levels, at once: Emotionally, Spiritually, and Intellectually.
On Danny:
Named to the Chicago Tribune's 50 Most Significant Songwriters in the Last 50 Years, Austin, TX-based singer-songwriter Danny Schmidt has been rapidly ascending from underground cult hero status to being broadly recognized as an artist of generational significance. Danny is considered a preeminent writer, an artist whose earthy poetry manages to somehow conjure magic from the mundane, leading Sing Out Magazine to tag him: "Perhaps the best new songwriter we've heard in the last 15 years."
On Carrie:
With her Red House Records release, Call it my Garden, Carrie Elkin has emerged as one of the defining new voices in the world of Texas singer-songwriters, being celebrated by Texas Music Magazine as one of their artists of the year. The voice, the stories, the images, the grace, it's the complete package. But it's the power of her live performances that really have been creating an incredible buzz around this young artist. Maverick Magazine said it best, after a recent festival performance: "I have never seen a performer so in love with the act of singing. That's the gospel truth. Onstage, Elkin was simply a force of nature."
Don't miss these two great artists in a rare split-bill performance, sharing songs back and forth, lending their voices to each other's tunes, in harmony. And lending commentary to each other's tunes, in the form of smart-ass between-song banter.
From Ithaca, NY, Joe Crookston and his longtime DUO partner Peter Glanville will pick and twist their way through a high energy and sonically lush set of Joe Crookston originals…This is exciting…Joe with the BlueBird Jubilee… They have played to full houses at Festivals and Performing Arts Centers across the US. Joe and Peter will treat you to an evening of story songs, fingerpicking, collaboration, stomping rhythms and a deep well of musical magic. Check him out on You Tube. It's not the same. Decide to come to this show. You'll be glad you did.
Peter Glanville is a guitar picker, tenor guitar player, and harmony singer…. Hilarious and deep, they will tune up their Martins
and vintage Gibsons and weave their way through a set of music that will leave
you inspired and renewed and wanting more. "It's a good thing Joe is one
of the good guys…otherwise he'd be dangerous."
From Ithaca, NY, Joe Crookston and his longtime DUO partner Peter Glanville will pick and twist their way through a high energy and sonically lush set of Joe Crookston originals…This is exciting…Joe with the BlueBird Jubilee… They have played to full houses at Festivals and Performing Arts Centers across the US. Joe and Peter will treat you to an evening of story songs, fingerpicking, collaboration, stomping rhythms and a deep well of musical magic. Check him out on You Tube. It's not the same. Decide to come to this show. You'll be glad you did.
Peter Glanville is a guitar picker, tenor guitar player, and harmony singer…. Hilarious and deep, they will tune up their Martins
and vintage Gibsons and weave their way through a set of music that will leave
you inspired and renewed and wanting more. "It's a good thing Joe is one
of the good guys…otherwise he'd be dangerous."
and vintage Gibsons and weave their way through a set of music that will leave
you inspired and renewed and wanting more. "It's a good thing Joe is one
of the good guys…otherwise he'd be dangerous."
THE KENNEDYS RETURN WITH A NEW CD
"Closer Than You Know" is the duo's twelfth album
“Byrdsy jangle, boy-girl harmonies…irresistible” -Rolling Stone
“Unabashed, hook-laden pop” -Village Voice
“More hooks than Marilyn Monroe’s closet” -Chicago Sun-Times
In a career that now spans two decades, New York duo Maura and Pete Kennedy have traversed a broad musical landscape, surveying power pop, acoustic songwriting, organic rock rooted in their early days in Austin, and a Byrds-inspired jangle that drew the attention of McGuinn, Steve Earle, and most notably Nanci Griffith. On their new release, "Closer Than You Know", The Kennedys strike out into new territory, this time inspired by a sojourn in Paris, where they immersed themselves in the turn of another century, the time when Debussy and Ravel were inventing the sonic palette of modern music.
February 23, 2014 - Lauren Fox
Lauren Fox was born and raised in New York City, where she still resides, happily, and just blocks away from everyone and everything she needs! She has been featured in several films, including "Pi," "Noon Blue Apples," "Revolution Summer," "The Hammer," and "We Need To Talk About Kevin," and on TV in FOX’s "New Amsterdam" and "Fringe." Her New York theater credits include: "Hillbilly Women," and "GO-SEE" at the ArcLight Theater, and "Heathens" at Theater For A New City. Lauren has several upcoming film and stage projects in development, including her screenplay, "Atlas of the Soul," which is in pre-production.
Lauren's last two shows, "Love, Lust, Fear & Freedom: The Songs Of Joni Mitchell & Leonard Cohen," and “Canyon Folkies: Over the Hills & Under the Covers,” both at Metropolitan Room, NYC, received critical acclaim from The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. She has performed at Jazz at Lincoln Center's Rose Theater, Carnegie Hall and Town Hall, as well as various performing arts centers around the country. Lauren is the 2012 recipient of the MAC and Bistro Award for Debut Artist, as well as the 2013 recipient of a Nightlife Award for Outstanding Cabaret Performer.
Lauren, along with her sister, Haley Fox, founded and co-owns Alice’s Tea Cup, three tea houses in New York City. In 2010 they co-wrote the Alice’s Tea Cup Cookbook, published by Harper Collins. Lauren is a New York City Ambassador for Healthy is the New Skinny’s PUP (perfectly un-perfected) program, and, in sharing her own struggles as a teenager growing up in New York City, works with young women to inform and empower them.
Lauren Fox was born and raised in New York City, where she still resides, happily, and just blocks away from everyone and everything she needs! She has been featured in several films, including "Pi," "Noon Blue Apples," "Revolution Summer," "The Hammer," and "We Need To Talk About Kevin," and on TV in FOX’s "New Amsterdam" and "Fringe." Her New York theater credits include: "Hillbilly Women," and "GO-SEE" at the ArcLight Theater, and "Heathens" at Theater For A New City. Lauren has several upcoming film and stage projects in development, including her screenplay, "Atlas of the Soul," which is in pre-production.
Lauren's last two shows, "Love, Lust, Fear & Freedom: The Songs Of Joni Mitchell & Leonard Cohen," and “Canyon Folkies: Over the Hills & Under the Covers,” both at Metropolitan Room, NYC, received critical acclaim from The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. She has performed at Jazz at Lincoln Center's Rose Theater, Carnegie Hall and Town Hall, as well as various performing arts centers around the country. Lauren is the 2012 recipient of the MAC and Bistro Award for Debut Artist, as well as the 2013 recipient of a Nightlife Award for Outstanding Cabaret Performer.
Lauren, along with her sister, Haley Fox, founded and co-owns Alice’s Tea Cup, three tea houses in New York City. In 2010 they co-wrote the Alice’s Tea Cup Cookbook, published by Harper Collins. Lauren is a New York City Ambassador for Healthy is the New Skinny’s PUP (perfectly un-perfected) program, and, in sharing her own struggles as a teenager growing up in New York City, works with young women to inform and empower them.
March 23, 2014 - Suzzy Roche & Lucy Wainwright Roche
A mother-daughter duo with impressive accomplishments in their own separate careers, Suzzy and Lucy recently released Fairytale & Myth, their first musical collaboration. Rob Morsberger, a Hudson Valley singer-songwriter, arranger and sideman (for artists like Crash Test Dummies and Marshall Crenshaw) co-produced the album before his untimely death in June due to brain cancer. Rob also played piano, accordion, organ, arranged strings and other odds and ends on the album. Suzzy was devastated to learn of Rob's diagnosis and wanted to work with him again to make an album that would be a tribute to his beautiful musical gifts. "In the face of his diagnosis, Rob threw himself into living and focusing on the true meaning of life, as well as making music. We made the record in the dead of winter huddled in the studio in our winter coats," says Suzzy, recalling the warmth and intimacy of the hours she and Lucy, spent with Rob recording this album. "It was one of the most magical musical moments of my life." When you listen to this album, the beauty and magic and power of Rob's piano and the Roches' sweet, exquisite harmonies will enchant and transport you. You'll mourn the loss of Rob Morsberger, but you'll celebrate the life, love, passion, energy, and warmth of his music.
Suzzy is a singer/songwriter/performer and founding member with her sisters of one of folk music's most celebrated bands, The Roches. She has recorded over fifteen albums, written music for TV and Film, and toured extensively for thirty years all across the U.S. and Europe. Zero Church: an unusual collection of prayers (a collaboration with Maggie Roche) which was developed at Harvard’s Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue was originally staged at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, and has been staged around the country. Suzzy has been an associate member of The Wooster Group; the experimental theater company based in New York City, and performed with them off and on for years throughout Europe. Her children’s book Want To Be In A Band (Random House) was published this past January. Wayward Saints (Hyperion/Voice) is her first novel and was a selection of the Spring 2012 B&N Discover Great New Writers Program. This Fall, Suzzy will be teaching at Princeton with Meg Wolitzer for the Princeton Atelier Program.
Lucy has been compared to Joni Mitchell and Patti Griffin by NPR. She was born in NYC into an influential musical family, but rebelled against the family business by teaching elementary school for several years before getting involved in music. Since 2007, Lucy has released two EPs and a studio album entitled Lucy (2010), toured the U.S., Canada and Europe, and has performed with a number of musicians including her brother Rufus, opening for her father Loudon Wainwright III, and touring with Dar Williams, Neko Case, Amos Lee, the Indigo Girls, Neko Case, and Over the Rhine. Lucy is known for her crystal clear voice and straightforward, funny stage presence. When not on tour, Lucy lives in Brooklyn.
April 6, 2014 - Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line
“Fans of Dixie Chicks, Alison Krauss and Dolly Parton, take notice: Nora Jane Struthers embodies everything you could want in an Americana singer-songwriter.” — NPR Music
Virginia-born Struthers was educated at NYU’s Steinhart School of Education and taught at a charter school in Brooklyn, while cutting her musical teeth as a folk-rock performer in New York clubs like CBGBs and the Cutting Room. She decided to move into music full-time after attending such convocations as Virginia’s Galax Old Time Fiddlers Convention and North Carolina’s Mount Airy Fiddlers Convention with her father.
Struthers’ touring band, the Party Line (which takes its handle from one of the record’s songs, about the early days of rural telephone calls), includes Struthers’ longtime collaborator P. J. George (upright bass, harmony vocals, pedal steel guitar, accordion and banjo), Joe Overton (clawhammer banjo and harmony vocals), Aaron Jonah Lewis (fiddle, three-finger banjo, baritone fiddle, mandolin) and Drew Lawhorn (drums). Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line have performed at the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival and Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion. The instrumentation and form of Struthers’
music draws on her traditionalist roots – her father Alan is himself a
bluegrass musician – but with the addition of drums, her latest album
takes a bend toward more progressive roots-rock bands like Mumford &
Sons and The Avett Brothers. “I’m really passionate about the stories
in the old ballads and story-songs,” says Struthers. “I’m trying to bring that
element of traditional music forward into a contemporary sonic space. I want
story-songs to live on in a way that will be accessible to more people. That’s
my artistic mission. When we hear another person’s story, we gain perspective
and are changed; we’re able to see our own lives through new eyes.”
May 4, 2014 - Fred Gillen, Jr. & Friends "Farewell Show"
Since his first solo concert in 1996, Fred has traveled all over the U.S. and Europe singing his songs of hope and struggle at all types of venues, building a devoted following along the way. He feels at home performing at any type and size of venue, from a "house concert" in Indiana to Irving Plaza in New York City, to the main stages of festivals, and everything in between. He has played at many prestigious and famous venues, and at many farmers markets, coffeehouses, pubs, and union rallies. With his sometimes partner Matt Turk, he played for several years in the New York City subways as part of the MUNY (Music Under NY) program. At every performance, he opens his heart and pours out the unglamorous but compelling tales of the marginalized and forgotten. His songs have often been described as both painfully intimate and universal, and this is what he strives for in writing them. His live performances are spontaneous celebrations of all that it is to be human; the joy and the pain, the comedy and the tragedy.
Fred's songs have appeared on ABC's All My Children and MSG Network's NYC Soundtracks, and he was awarded a NY Foundation For The Arts grant. In 2008, his song Fall Down was featured on the CMJ Music Marathon sampler CD, given to 11,000 CMJ conference attendees and radio programmers. He has been voted "best folk artist" for three straight years in Westchester Weekly. Last year, Fred's version of Woody Guthrie's song I Ain't Got No Home, was featured on the Appleseed Records CD Pete Remembers Woody, a recording of Pete Seeger telling stories about Woody, interspersed with various artists' versions of Woody's songs.
Fred is a prolific songwriter, recording artist, and producer. He has released eight independent studio solo albums, one live album, two albums with Hope Machine, and one as half of the duo "Gillen & Turk," all to substantial critical acclaim. His music has also been played on independent, commercial, public, and college radio all over the world. His latest album, Silence Of The Night, brings him back slightly to his rock roots, while also retaining a folky message and delivery. Sixteen tracks long, it features his first spoken-word piece on record in ten years and his first instrumental in sixteen years. The new record, while being truly an "album" and not a collection of singles, dips a big, colorful bucket into the wellspring of American music, touching on folk, Americana, rock, roots, and even funk. One of its songs This Old Car was featured, before its official release, on the NPR syndicated show "Car Talk."
Suzzy is a singer/songwriter/performer and founding member with her sisters of one of folk music's most celebrated bands, The Roches. She has recorded over fifteen albums, written music for TV and Film, and toured extensively for thirty years all across the U.S. and Europe. Zero Church: an unusual collection of prayers (a collaboration with Maggie Roche) which was developed at Harvard’s Institute on the Arts and Civic Dialogue was originally staged at St. Ann’s Warehouse in Brooklyn, and has been staged around the country. Suzzy has been an associate member of The Wooster Group; the experimental theater company based in New York City, and performed with them off and on for years throughout Europe. Her children’s book Want To Be In A Band (Random House) was published this past January. Wayward Saints (Hyperion/Voice) is her first novel and was a selection of the Spring 2012 B&N Discover Great New Writers Program. This Fall, Suzzy will be teaching at Princeton with Meg Wolitzer for the Princeton Atelier Program.
Lucy has been compared to Joni Mitchell and Patti Griffin by NPR. She was born in NYC into an influential musical family, but rebelled against the family business by teaching elementary school for several years before getting involved in music. Since 2007, Lucy has released two EPs and a studio album entitled Lucy (2010), toured the U.S., Canada and Europe, and has performed with a number of musicians including her brother Rufus, opening for her father Loudon Wainwright III, and touring with Dar Williams, Neko Case, Amos Lee, the Indigo Girls, Neko Case, and Over the Rhine. Lucy is known for her crystal clear voice and straightforward, funny stage presence. When not on tour, Lucy lives in Brooklyn.
April 6, 2014 - Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line
“Fans of Dixie Chicks, Alison Krauss and Dolly Parton, take notice: Nora Jane Struthers embodies everything you could want in an Americana singer-songwriter.” — NPR Music
Virginia-born Struthers was educated at NYU’s Steinhart School of Education and taught at a charter school in Brooklyn, while cutting her musical teeth as a folk-rock performer in New York clubs like CBGBs and the Cutting Room. She decided to move into music full-time after attending such convocations as Virginia’s Galax Old Time Fiddlers Convention and North Carolina’s Mount Airy Fiddlers Convention with her father.
Struthers’ touring band, the Party Line (which takes its handle from one of the record’s songs, about the early days of rural telephone calls), includes Struthers’ longtime collaborator P. J. George (upright bass, harmony vocals, pedal steel guitar, accordion and banjo), Joe Overton (clawhammer banjo and harmony vocals), Aaron Jonah Lewis (fiddle, three-finger banjo, baritone fiddle, mandolin) and Drew Lawhorn (drums). Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line have performed at the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival and Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion. The instrumentation and form of Struthers’
music draws on her traditionalist roots – her father Alan is himself a
bluegrass musician – but with the addition of drums, her latest album
takes a bend toward more progressive roots-rock bands like Mumford &
Sons and The Avett Brothers. “I’m really passionate about the stories
in the old ballads and story-songs,” says Struthers. “I’m trying to bring that
element of traditional music forward into a contemporary sonic space. I want
story-songs to live on in a way that will be accessible to more people. That’s
my artistic mission. When we hear another person’s story, we gain perspective
and are changed; we’re able to see our own lives through new eyes.”
May 4, 2014 - Fred Gillen, Jr. & Friends "Farewell Show"
Since his first solo concert in 1996, Fred has traveled all over the U.S. and Europe singing his songs of hope and struggle at all types of venues, building a devoted following along the way. He feels at home performing at any type and size of venue, from a "house concert" in Indiana to Irving Plaza in New York City, to the main stages of festivals, and everything in between. He has played at many prestigious and famous venues, and at many farmers markets, coffeehouses, pubs, and union rallies. With his sometimes partner Matt Turk, he played for several years in the New York City subways as part of the MUNY (Music Under NY) program. At every performance, he opens his heart and pours out the unglamorous but compelling tales of the marginalized and forgotten. His songs have often been described as both painfully intimate and universal, and this is what he strives for in writing them. His live performances are spontaneous celebrations of all that it is to be human; the joy and the pain, the comedy and the tragedy.
Fred's songs have appeared on ABC's All My Children and MSG Network's NYC Soundtracks, and he was awarded a NY Foundation For The Arts grant. In 2008, his song Fall Down was featured on the CMJ Music Marathon sampler CD, given to 11,000 CMJ conference attendees and radio programmers. He has been voted "best folk artist" for three straight years in Westchester Weekly. Last year, Fred's version of Woody Guthrie's song I Ain't Got No Home, was featured on the Appleseed Records CD Pete Remembers Woody, a recording of Pete Seeger telling stories about Woody, interspersed with various artists' versions of Woody's songs.
Fred is a prolific songwriter, recording artist, and producer. He has released eight independent studio solo albums, one live album, two albums with Hope Machine, and one as half of the duo "Gillen & Turk," all to substantial critical acclaim. His music has also been played on independent, commercial, public, and college radio all over the world. His latest album, Silence Of The Night, brings him back slightly to his rock roots, while also retaining a folky message and delivery. Sixteen tracks long, it features his first spoken-word piece on record in ten years and his first instrumental in sixteen years. The new record, while being truly an "album" and not a collection of singles, dips a big, colorful bucket into the wellspring of American music, touching on folk, Americana, rock, roots, and even funk. One of its songs This Old Car was featured, before its official release, on the NPR syndicated show "Car Talk."
Struthers’ touring band, the Party Line (which takes its handle from one of the record’s songs, about the early days of rural telephone calls), includes Struthers’ longtime collaborator P. J. George (upright bass, harmony vocals, pedal steel guitar, accordion and banjo), Joe Overton (clawhammer banjo and harmony vocals), Aaron Jonah Lewis (fiddle, three-finger banjo, baritone fiddle, mandolin) and Drew Lawhorn (drums). Nora Jane Struthers & The Party Line have performed at the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival and Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion. The instrumentation and form of Struthers’
music draws on her traditionalist roots – her father Alan is himself a
bluegrass musician – but with the addition of drums, her latest album
takes a bend toward more progressive roots-rock bands like Mumford &
Sons and The Avett Brothers. “I’m really passionate about the stories
in the old ballads and story-songs,” says Struthers. “I’m trying to bring that
element of traditional music forward into a contemporary sonic space. I want
story-songs to live on in a way that will be accessible to more people. That’s
my artistic mission. When we hear another person’s story, we gain perspective
and are changed; we’re able to see our own lives through new eyes.”
bluegrass musician – but with the addition of drums, her latest album
takes a bend toward more progressive roots-rock bands like Mumford &
Sons and The Avett Brothers. “I’m really passionate about the stories
in the old ballads and story-songs,” says Struthers. “I’m trying to bring that
element of traditional music forward into a contemporary sonic space. I want
story-songs to live on in a way that will be accessible to more people. That’s
my artistic mission. When we hear another person’s story, we gain perspective
and are changed; we’re able to see our own lives through new eyes.”
May 4, 2014 - Fred Gillen, Jr. & Friends "Farewell Show"
Since his first solo concert in 1996, Fred has traveled all over the U.S. and Europe singing his songs of hope and struggle at all types of venues, building a devoted following along the way. He feels at home performing at any type and size of venue, from a "house concert" in Indiana to Irving Plaza in New York City, to the main stages of festivals, and everything in between. He has played at many prestigious and famous venues, and at many farmers markets, coffeehouses, pubs, and union rallies. With his sometimes partner Matt Turk, he played for several years in the New York City subways as part of the MUNY (Music Under NY) program. At every performance, he opens his heart and pours out the unglamorous but compelling tales of the marginalized and forgotten. His songs have often been described as both painfully intimate and universal, and this is what he strives for in writing them. His live performances are spontaneous celebrations of all that it is to be human; the joy and the pain, the comedy and the tragedy.
Fred's songs have appeared on ABC's All My Children and MSG Network's NYC Soundtracks, and he was awarded a NY Foundation For The Arts grant. In 2008, his song Fall Down was featured on the CMJ Music Marathon sampler CD, given to 11,000 CMJ conference attendees and radio programmers. He has been voted "best folk artist" for three straight years in Westchester Weekly. Last year, Fred's version of Woody Guthrie's song I Ain't Got No Home, was featured on the Appleseed Records CD Pete Remembers Woody, a recording of Pete Seeger telling stories about Woody, interspersed with various artists' versions of Woody's songs.
Fred is a prolific songwriter, recording artist, and producer. He has released eight independent studio solo albums, one live album, two albums with Hope Machine, and one as half of the duo "Gillen & Turk," all to substantial critical acclaim. His music has also been played on independent, commercial, public, and college radio all over the world. His latest album, Silence Of The Night, brings him back slightly to his rock roots, while also retaining a folky message and delivery. Sixteen tracks long, it features his first spoken-word piece on record in ten years and his first instrumental in sixteen years. The new record, while being truly an "album" and not a collection of singles, dips a big, colorful bucket into the wellspring of American music, touching on folk, Americana, rock, roots, and even funk. One of its songs This Old Car was featured, before its official release, on the NPR syndicated show "Car Talk."
Since his first solo concert in 1996, Fred has traveled all over the U.S. and Europe singing his songs of hope and struggle at all types of venues, building a devoted following along the way. He feels at home performing at any type and size of venue, from a "house concert" in Indiana to Irving Plaza in New York City, to the main stages of festivals, and everything in between. He has played at many prestigious and famous venues, and at many farmers markets, coffeehouses, pubs, and union rallies. With his sometimes partner Matt Turk, he played for several years in the New York City subways as part of the MUNY (Music Under NY) program. At every performance, he opens his heart and pours out the unglamorous but compelling tales of the marginalized and forgotten. His songs have often been described as both painfully intimate and universal, and this is what he strives for in writing them. His live performances are spontaneous celebrations of all that it is to be human; the joy and the pain, the comedy and the tragedy.
Fred's songs have appeared on ABC's All My Children and MSG Network's NYC Soundtracks, and he was awarded a NY Foundation For The Arts grant. In 2008, his song Fall Down was featured on the CMJ Music Marathon sampler CD, given to 11,000 CMJ conference attendees and radio programmers. He has been voted "best folk artist" for three straight years in Westchester Weekly. Last year, Fred's version of Woody Guthrie's song I Ain't Got No Home, was featured on the Appleseed Records CD Pete Remembers Woody, a recording of Pete Seeger telling stories about Woody, interspersed with various artists' versions of Woody's songs.
Fred is a prolific songwriter, recording artist, and producer. He has released eight independent studio solo albums, one live album, two albums with Hope Machine, and one as half of the duo "Gillen & Turk," all to substantial critical acclaim. His music has also been played on independent, commercial, public, and college radio all over the world. His latest album, Silence Of The Night, brings him back slightly to his rock roots, while also retaining a folky message and delivery. Sixteen tracks long, it features his first spoken-word piece on record in ten years and his first instrumental in sixteen years. The new record, while being truly an "album" and not a collection of singles, dips a big, colorful bucket into the wellspring of American music, touching on folk, Americana, rock, roots, and even funk. One of its songs This Old Car was featured, before its official release, on the NPR syndicated show "Car Talk."
