Evie Ladin w/ Squirrel Butter
Tickets: $13 advance, $15 door
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Evie Ladin is a banjo player, step-dancer, singer, songwriter and square-dance caller with a lifetime of experience in traditional American cultural arts. She grew up in a trad folk scene up and down the Eastern Seaboard of the US, travels the world, and calls the rich arts scene in Oakland, California home. The new project, the Evie Ladin Band, debuts her original songs in an expansive stringband led by gutsy clawhammer banjo and rich vocals. A natural performer, Evie loves rolling the music, dance and stories up in one dynamic package, with one foot rooted in traditional forms, and one foot striding on ahead. With Dina Maccabee – violin (Real Vocal String Quartet, Japonize Elephants) Erik Pearson - guitar, Dobro (Crooked Jades, Mushroom), and Keith Terry – bass & percussion (Slammin, Crosspulse).
With The Stairwell Sisters, all-gal old-time teardown, Evie performs traditional and original material on clawhammer banjo, vocals, clogging and hambone. With Keith Terry & Crosspulse, she performs rhythm-based multi-cultural music & dance works, bringing her Appalachian skills to collaborations with a variety of other cultural arts, including other styles with roots in the African Diaspora. Evie calls rowdy community square dances, performs for extremely diverse populations of school-kids, tears it up at clubs and festivals, and slogs away in the office, keeping all the plates spinning.
Very excited to see Float Downstream break free, Evie is writing songs for the next record, choreographing rhythm dance, working on a book for banjo called “Making the Leap” and playing swing chords on the guitar. She teaches banjo, singing and dance at home in Oakland when you can find her there, or on Skype!
Appearing with Evie Ladin is Squirrel Butter, the duo of Charlie Beck and Charmaine Li-Lei Slaven. Charlie and Charmaine began performing together in 2005 after meeting at the Portland Old Time Gathering and discovering that they lived merely blocks away from each other in Seattle. The pair began busking, and soon realized that their individual styles, sense of rhythm, and tendency towards the quirky and obscure blended well together. It wasn’t long before they began performing at venues off the street.
Charlie Beck, hailing from Indianapolis, Indiana, is a highly accomplished musician. His mastery of guitar and banjo come from years of consistent study. He is well versed in jazz and swing, is an avid enthusiast of old American blues and string band music. His repertoire includes a bushel of traditional folk tunes along with many jazz numbers. A talented songwriter, Charlie’s original compositions combine modern approaches with traditional styles, giving his songs a unique sound. Charlie is an outstanding vocalist, and also plays brilliantly on fiddle.
Charmaine “Lady Li-Lei” Slaven, from Stevensville, Montana, is a gifted dancer, and her skill at traditional percussive buckdancing is phenomenal. She is also an adept rhythm guitarist, ukulele player, and vocalist. Her clear, strong singing style is reminiscent of the Carter family. She brings a fine repertoire of traditional ballads to the duet, along with several of her original works.
Barton Carroll
Tickets: $10 advance, $12 at the door.
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“Let’s Get On with The Illusion,” sings Barton Carroll on his fourth album, Together You and I on Skybucket Records, out January 19, 2010.
It’s a song about love – but a shoulder-shrug type of love that resigns itself to “I guess this is good enough.” A cynical narrative runs through the album for sure, but Carroll’s sardonic wit is coupled with lightly shuffling horns, making for happy sounding songs instead of a somber ones. His tone and sleight-of-hand songwriting skill gained him critical acclaim for his previous release, The Lost One from Pitchfork, Harp, American Songwriter and more. Is Carroll is singing about his own experiences or smiling with a beer and watching others screw it up (and then taking home the girl)?
“I tried to think like Cole Porter when I wrote that song. He was a master at metaphor,” says Carroll. “His songs were sweet and dark, hopeless and happy, fresh and unashamedly cliché. Sounds a lot like love.”
A North Carolina native who now lives in Seattle, Carroll’s songs are structured in folk traditions he grew up with, but he trades in standard instrumentation for the west Coast horn sound of Craig Flory, and the production of Jazz bassist, Matt Weiner. The three bonded over a love of the Gerry Mulligan and Paul Desmond records of the 1960′s, and the influence comes through. He also sings his first duets with Seattle singer Anna Lisa Notter.
Carroll’s love for a previous era comes alive on the first track, “The Poor Boy Can’t Dance.” “I love how the band sounds on this one. They sound like a WWII era English Swing band: the kind of guys who are classically trained, but they have just been bitten by the Swing bug. Love that clarinet!,” says Carroll.
“Something Good” is the only song Carroll didn’t write, and it comes from an odd-sounding source for a Seattle based musician – The Sound of Music. “This has been a regular in my live set for the past few years. It was the first song that I decided to put on this album, and I think it sets the tone for the whole record. I think it lives beautifully between hope and sadness. And I thought the first line sounded a bit like a Barton Carroll song, ‘Perhaps I had a wicked childhood. Perhaps I had a miserable youth.’”
The title song is akin to a desultory short story – a follow up to “Burning Red And Blue,” a song of destructive love from the last record. But, with Notter’s vocal and traces of hope in the characters, maybe their ending will be okay after all. “The characters are a few years older. The man has been imprisoned, and the woman is trying to adjust to life alone in a foreign land. This is the conversation they have through the prison glass.” (MORE)
Barton Carroll grew up in Banner Elk, North Carolina. He has toured and recorded in Crooked Fingers, Azure Ray and Dolorean. “Together You And I” is his fourth solo album. He lives in Seattle.
Praise for The Lost One
“Putting his songwriting at the forefront, the straightforwardness of the arrangements make his character sketches sound believably plainspoken instead of clever. The Lost One is a fine way to spend 42 minutes, and probably best served with scotch.” Pitchfork
“While most folks are either struggling with something, creating tension in their music, and others are relying on more traditional methods and sounds to form their music, Carroll somehow makes it seem effortless… the beauty of his songs leaves a feeling of easiness…This is excellent Americana without a hint of twang, but so much soul and depth that it needs to be heard. Give your soul the dark light that it craves and give The Lost One a listen.” Hybrid Magazine
“One of the most stunning of these tracks, is “Burning Red and Blue”, built on a circling 12/8 blues riff that’ll put you in mind of “House of the Rising Sun”. There’s a menace in the verse, as the narrating character insinuates “I’ll be out back / In my blue jeans / And my gun” to a woman who is clearly not entirely free to make her own choices. It’s masterfully done, though, the whine of steel guitar, the deep baritone mutterings, the half-sketched portrait of destructive love.” Popmatters
Jeremy Facknitz & Teresa Storch
Tickets: $13 advance, $15 at the door.
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“Jeremy Facknitz is a one-man acoustic act with the panache needed to become a star, armed with a melodic voice and a truckload of charisma…” - Sydney Hamilton, Colorado Springs Independent
“As a solo artist, Facknitz clearly developed a driving rhythm style on the acoustic to propel his music. When his sound is backed by a band, the layers of rhythm and harmony are quite tasty.” - Bill Reed, Colorado Springs Gazette
Jeremy Facknitz didn’t even pick up a guitar and begin writing songs until he was 18 years old. His aunt, a songwriter herself, passed down her old Yamaha acoustic to Jeremy as Christmas gift. Within a few short months, the Michigan native found himself competing in local talent shows and jamming in various basement bands. In 1997 he made the trek upstairs and joined the Detroit-based band ‘The Ottomans’ (2001 Best New Alternative Band, Detroit Music Awards). Jeremy played bass guitar in the project, was the main music contributor to the groups compositions. After ‘The Ottomans’ parted ways in 2002, Jeremy and brother Jarod formed under the moniker ‘Standing Room Only’ and shared their not-so-subtle mix of deadly serious and comedic songs with intimate coffee shop gatherings throughout the mid-west. Since going solo in September 2003, Jeremy has lived and played all over the United States. Having completed U.S. mini-tours in 2006 and 2008, plans are underway for a 2010 tour to support his new album, “Music From The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack”. Jeremy is currently living in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where he performs and teaches lessons.
Singer/songwriter Teresa Storch is constantly moving, either on stage or in her Pontiac Vibe. She has been releasing albums and touring
nationally since 2003, spreading her funky-soulful folk throughout the country. She’s now known as a voice and presence not to be missed, with a passion you feel from the audience and a connection like she’s known you forever. She’ll draw you in with her rich, engaging voice, rhythmic, percussive guitar and writing that has roots in folk, jazz and blues–pulling stories from real-life and taking snapshots of what matters most.
“She inhabits her songs so fully you can’t help but be pulled into her world.” – Boston Herald writer Daniel Gewertz
“One of the most inventive writers and solid performers coming out of Boston today. Makes me proud to be one.” –Vance Gilbert
“Storch infuses contemporary singer/songwriter with traditional folk vibe…It’s no wonder she’s being recognized in her genre.” –Soundcheck Magazine
Rachel Harrington & Rita Hosking
Tickets:$20 advance / door (advance tickets strongly recommended.)
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Reared among the Pentecostal pines of Oregon, Rachel Harrington has been doing things in the wrong order for quite some time. She’d had extensive radio play before performing her live show, and she was opening for Grammy winners and nominees before releasing her first record.
Rachel’s critically acclaimed 2007 debut, The Bootlegger’s Daughter, (featuring guest musicians John Reischman and Danny Barnes) went to #1 on the Euro-Americana Chart and landed the Seattle siren smack in the center of the UK Americana scene when legendary BBC DJ Bob Harris proclaimed Bootlegger’s Daughter one of the best albums of the year. The following year of aggressive touring saw Harrington playing festivals in a dozen countries with some of the top names in bluegrass and country music.
Rachel’s 2008 follow-up record, City of Refuge, features several guests including Tim O’Brien and Pieta Brown. City of Refuge garnered further acclaim, reaching millions of listeners when Starbucks requested three of the cds 10 tracks for in-store play throughout the US, supported by national US distribution from Burnside.
After three straight months of touring internationally during the summer of 2009, which included headline spots the Glasgow Americana Festival (Scotland) and the Maverick Festival (England), Rachel is being touted as the hardest working woman in Americana. 2010 sees Rachel headlining the UK’s largest festival, Celtic Connections, and showcasing at the prestigious International Folk Alliance Conference.
Q Magazine: FOUR STARS! “Gothic tracks on an inspiringly original album”
Mojo: FOUR STARS! “Beguiling!”
Sound Northwest: FOUR STARS! “Harrington has a gift of making the old new again”
Utne Reader: “like the young Emmylou”
Kitchen tables, springs, loss, miners, mountains, culture clash, trailers, stray dogs, loggers, hope, forest fires—Rita Hosking‘s country-folk music is this and more, and always fierce and lovely. Her delivery is, to put it simply, intense. “From the first time I heard Rita sing, her voice gripped me and did not let go,” (Joe Craven.)
That voice, called a “soulful howl from the mountains” (California Bluegrass Association) is calling attention around the country—”What? California girls don’t sing like that!!?” But Rita, called “the real thing” by CA acoustic music fans, will tell you about her upbringing in rural Shasta County, and the old-time band of seasoned mountain characters that took her under their wings. “This California girl comes by her mountain-music sensibility with true authenticity, with original songs deeply rooted in her family’s frontier experience,” (Dan Ruby, FestivalPreview.com.) A descendant of Cornish miners who sang in the mines, Rita grew up with deep regard for folk music and the power of the voice.
Rita’s songs have been lauded for story and sense of place, and her performances praised for capturing the audience. Honors include winner of the ’08 Dave Carter Memorial Songwriting Contest at the Sisters Folk Festival, finalist for the ’09 Telluride Troubadour Contest, and others as well. She has played her songs for appreciative listeners at the Strawberry Music Festival, Kate Wolf Music Festival, and many more. Rita points out that she likes to “get to the heart of the matter.” As with a mystic, this means a loaded and stunning, yet gentle and compassionate delivery. As Craven adds, “Rita’s messages are immediate yet patient and her quiet conviction most strong.”
Ali Marcus, Trina Willard and Michael Connolly
Tickets: $13 advance, $15 at the door
Sorry – this show has sold out!
Please join us for this “in-the-round” style show as Ali Marcus, Trina Willard, and Michael Connolly share the Empty Sea stage for a night of tight harmonies, singing strings, and general merriment.
Ali Marcus is a Seattle-based songwriter who tours the country singing songs for people. She has sang at festivals around America, including CMJ, Northwest Folklife Festival, and Noise for the Needy. She has sang in lots of awesome joints, like the Bluebird Cafe in Nashville, IOTA Cafe in Virginia, the Evening Muse in Charlotte, the Starry Plough in Berkeley, the Experience Music Project in Seattle. She runs her own label and produces her own music and books her own tours. She also writes her own press releases, and talks about herself in the third person.
In the past year, Ali has toured in 15 states, including NYC’s CMJ, Nashville’s Bluebird Café, DC’s IOTA Café, Cambridge’s Lizard Lounge, Berkeley’s Starry Plough, and Seattle’s Experience Music Project. She has recently wrapped up a four-month tour of the Pacific Northwest with a trip to Oregon and California, hitting up places like the Makeout Room in San Francisco, the East Village in Monterey, and the redwoods along the way.
Trina Willard is a third generation folk singer from Missouri, her musical roots grounded both in the Southern Baptist music she
grew up with and the traditional Appalachian songs her grandparents brought to her from the coal mines. During her early years in St. Louis, she performed with St. Louis Opera Theater as well as the Repertory Theater of St. Louis. Upon moving to the Northwest her folk roots were nurtured by our region’s vibrant folk music scene.
She has performed with the Seattle Peace Chorus, which also commissioned her work as a composer, debuting one of her pieces at the International Choral Festival in Santiago de Cuba. Trina directed the vocal trio, Trillium, writing unique harmonies for traditional and original spirituals, folk songs, and a cappella works. She has performed her uplifting, socially conscious music across the country at conferences, protests, and gatherings, anywhere people want to sing their hopes, dreams, questions, and passion for life.
“One of the purest voices mixed with a soul from heaven leaves us with a musical experience not to be forgotten.”
“A voice like Baez with poetry that rivals Emily Saliers.”
A versatile multi-instrumentalist, performer, and teacher, Michael Connolly has been steeped in acoustic music since his childhood in Memphis, Tennessee. While his most called-for instruments are fiddle, mandolin, and accordion, Michael also performs and records on Hammond organ, piano, uilleann pipes, tinwhistle, harp, and guitar.
Michael’s familiarity with a range of genres from classical to jazz, Irish to old-time has landed him in a number of performance situations from recording with the University of Michigan Symphony to playing celidh dances in Saint Paul pubs to sharing the stage with the Indigo Girls. As a sideman, Michael has backed musicians such as Coyote Grace, Korby Lenker, Captain Gravel, Amber Darland, The Starlings, Kate Graves and others.
Folklife Masters: Kevin Burke & Mark Graham
Tickets: $35 advance / door
Note: The first concert in the Folklife Masters series sold out very quickly. Don’t lose your chance to claim a seat at this one-of-a-kind venue!
Click here to purchase advance tickets.
Northwest Folklife and Empty Sea Studios are proud to present the second concert in the 2009 Folklife Masters concert series.
Folklife Masters presents one-of-a-kind concerts which bring master musicians from different traditions together to collaborate and inspire on stage. In our intimate 45-seat listening room, every nuance of these masters’ performances can be savored.
A portion of the proceeds go directly to support Northwest Folklife.
Kevin Burke & Mark Graham
Master Irish fiddler Kevin Burke joins old-time harmonica wizard Mark Graham for an evening of kindred acoustic music. Kevin Burke and Mark Graham founded the popular group Open House in the 1990s, along with percussive dance master Sandy Silva and mandolinist Paul Kotapish. The group was an instant hit, signed to Green Linnet records, and toured extensively. Their blend of old-world and new-world melodies with Mark’s tongue-in-cheek songs, all anchored by Kevin’s dazzling fiddling, was a wonderful mélange and Open House became a seminal group in the traditional music scene. Following the band’s breakup in 1999, Kevin Burke went on to become a National Heritage Fellow (our nation’s highest honor for traditional artists) and to tour with Celtic Fiddle
Kevin Burke
Festival and various guitar masters. Mark founded the Kings of Mongrel Folk with Orville Johnson and released a definitive album of Southern old-time music on harmonica.
Kevin Burke’s partnership with Mark Graham enabled both artists to explore their diverse influences and their love of the West Coast’s musical melting pot. Kevin has made his home in Portland, Oregon for more than 25 years, and Mark was born and raised in Seattle and Renton. Both artists draw from Celtic and Americana sources, as well as Eastern European and South American traditions. Playing together, the fiddle and harmonica blend effortlessly and these masters convey both a deep respect and a great irreverence for their traditions.
Kevin Burke: Master Irish Fiddler
Considered by many to be the greatest living Irish fiddler, we have been uncommonly fortunate to have Kevin Burke as a Northwest resident for the past 30 years. His smooth bowing, virtuosic ornaments, and masterful interpretations of Irish tunes have made him an inspiration to three generations of Irish traditional musicians. He has collaborated with artists as diverse as Christy Moore, Kate Bush and Arlo Guthrie. In 2002, he was granted a National Heritage award; this award is the highest honor our nation bestows on traditional artists. He is now in the company of luminaries like Earl Scruggs, Clifton Chenier, Doc Watson and B.B. King.
Born in London, Burke’s family came from County Sligo in Ireland and his playing retains the dazzling ornaments and smooth bowing of this Irish county. Kevin Burke has been a member of the seminal Bothy Band, as well as Patrick Street, Open House, and Celtic Fiddle Festival, and he has recorded landmark albums with Irish artists like Jackie Daly and Michael O Domhnaill. It is his solo fiddling, however, that holds such a draw for traditional music aficionados. Burke is able to touch the inner depths of Irish music, drawing unheard of subtleties from traditional tunes. His sensitivity to the music is best explored in an intimate, house concert setting, and we are very proud to be able to offer just that.
Mark Graham: Southern Old-Time Harmonica & Topical Songs
Mark Graham (by Mimi Torchia Boothby)
One of the few harmonica players schooled in the melodic and rhythmic intricacies of Southern string band music, Mark Graham plays in a powerful but lyrical, blues tinged style that recalls the feel of the finest banjo and fiddle playing. With over 35 years of harmonicizing, Graham has gained an encyclopedic knowledge of American country and blues styles. As a member of the Hurricane Ridge Runners in the 1970s and Boston’s Chicken Chokers in the 1980s, Graham helped set the standard for hell-raising Southern old-time string band music. As a member of the acclaimed world music ensemble, Kevin Burke’s Open House, he brought new respect to the harmonica in Celtic and world music. Graham is equally as well known for his songwriting as for his harmonica. His songs speak of a singular universe of surreal mountain hilarity and lonesome terror that covers the big subjects. Graham is the author of dozens of comic gems such as “I Can See Your Aura and It’s Ugly”, “Zen Gospel Singing”, and “Life is Hard When You’re Dumb.” His songs have been covered by artists such as Danny Barnes, The Austin Lounge Lizards, Brian Bowers, and The Limelighters.
Kat Eggleston & Robyn Landis
Tickets: $13 in advance, $15 at the door.
Click here to purchase advance tickets.
Kat Eggleston is one of the most accomplished guitarists and singer/songwriters in the folk, Celtic and traditional music genres. Elating, moving, and amusing audiences with her beautiful blend of sweet melodies, gentle honesty and searing humor, Kat’s music reflects a wide range of life’s experiences with unusual clarity and authority.
In a clear alto with flawless intonation, Kat Eggleston goes straight to the lyrical and emotional truth of every word and every note. Her musings on home, childhood, and her father’s garden are gems of direct, unassuming plainspokenness. Her narratives push hard at our senses and demand we return again and again to pick up the pieces we dropped on first hearing, expanding our comprehension of difficult, personal and universal experience
Kat has released five CDs to date, three of which are available from Waterbug Music, one from Redwing Music, and the most recent – Speak – in August 2009 as an independent release.
Also an actor, teacher and hammered dulcimer player, Kat has been a lead singer with The Otters and with Bohola, and recorded a duo CD with Kate MacLeod. She has played live and on recordings with David Bromberg, Bohola, the David Munnelly Band, Niamh Parsons, Jim Tullio, Tom Dundee, Dennis Cahill, Michael Smith, Brooks Williams, Andrew Calhoun, and many others. She has toured in Europe, Australia, Ireland, England, and Scotland as well as the U.S.
Robyn Landis is a writer of unusual depth and literacy. Her distinctive, powerful command of songcraft garners repeated
comparisons to Richard Shindell and Dar Williams.
Writing poetry at four and her first published magazine piece by 19, Robyn had a full career as a writer and author (publishing two bestselling health books in her twenties) before turning her focus to music. Her gifts and skills as a writer, applied to songcraft, earned her quick recognition. Since 2005 she has accrued more than 40 songwriting awards and honors.
She has won Grand Prize in the John Lennon Songwriting Contest, first place at Woody Guthrie Folk Festival, second place in the Unisong International Songwriting Competition, a Telluride Troubadors honorable mention, and was a Falcon Ridge Folk Festival Emerging Artist in 2009.
Robyn is especially respected for her unflinching honesty, vulnerability, and fierce intelligence. Her courageous, heartfelt songs tackle subjects ranging from war to weather to love; adoption and dementia, betrayal and longing, friendship, child abuse, old sitcoms, and the environment.
Unpretentious, wistful and intimate vocals infuse her memorable folk-pop-Americana melodies with warmth and feeling.
Her followup/solo recording Many Moons, released May 2009, has guest appearances by Michael Lille, Mark Graham, Kat Eggleston, Larry Murante, Joe and Karena Prater (Cat Loves Crow), and Hans York; and features Paul Elliott on fiddle and Cary Black on bass.
Mark Tucker of Folk & Acoustic Music Exchange (FAME) says of Many Moons, “Every cut here is a keeper, and Landis obviously either lavished a good deal of time on the arrangements or has a natural gift for it, probably both. Like David Wilcox, her work is rich with sympathy for human frailty and the thousand and one disappointments the flesh is heir to… Robyn Landis, I’m quite sure, waited until her art was fully matured and, man, does it ever show.”
Indie-Music.com says, “Smooth vocals, like an earthy Laurie Lewis…Landis has won a lot of songwriting awards, and it’s easy to see why…Her writing is like a good short story.”
Nancy Vivolo, VICTORY REVIEW: “…smooth vocals caress the sensitive poetry and bittersweet sorrow…With each literary illustration, the landscape blurs by around another winding curve and bump in the road; another set of headlights grow then disappear in a flash, and yet a ghostly image remains…she can put you behind the wheel with her cohesive words and melody. Landis has been turning heads at many songwriters’ contests and festivals and as a result has chocked up her share of nominations and awards. Listening to the content and production quality of Many Moons, there is no doubt as to why…Many Moons is a brightly polished piece of work that will capture and carry you gently along on an intricate narrative adventure; an exceptional release.”
Sarah Sample & Kate Graves w/ Michael Connolly
Tickets: $10 in advance, $12 at the door.
Click here to purchase advance tickets.
Sarah Sample dishes up a plate of acoustic folk rock that is salty and sweet. In an era littered with shoegazing introverts, tragically detached hipsters, and overly stylized pop tarts, she stands out like a big, beautiful sore thumb. She lets the audience in by witnessing to what is known and felt by most of us. And wrapping it up in a way we may never have heard- or felt- it before. Engaging, witty, real. The songs and the moment become everyone’s. Just ask audiences from Austin, Texas to Logan, Utah where Sarah has played coffeehouses, concert halls, amphitheaters, and street corners with artists like Stacey Earle & Mark Stuart, Peter Breinholt, Julie Hill, and Colors.
The last thing Sarah Sample wanted to make was just another folkie -girl-with-acoustic-guitar album. Sure, the songs were born as just an acoustic guitar and a voice. And, in the folk tradition she loves and respects so much, would likely be taken across America that way. But she didn’t want to document them that way. At least not this time. Enter Scott Wiley (Bonnie Raitt, Tracy Chapman, Elliott Smith) and a new sonic palette. With plenty of reverence for the songs– because, after all, it’s all about the songs– they set out to take Sarah’s music into new territory. The album Never Close Enough is to Sarah Sample as “Flaming Red” is to Patty Griffin: a marked departure from a promising, acoustic debut but never too far away from her soulful folk roots.
Kate Graves writes little songs….little songs that are raw. She tries to spread them around like wildflower seeds. She likes wildflowers. If she could be a plant, she would be a thistle branch. She sometimes worries that by saying she would be a thistle branch, she is saying that she symbolically pricks things, but she still picks the thistle branch as her flower totem.
Kate Graves is neurotic. She’s okay with this term and generally uses it as a term of endearment…or when somebody is really bugging her.
Kate Graves likes kissing. And singing. And trying to explain to the world that her chihuahua is just scared and not really cold-hearted.
Appearing with Kate is Empty Sea’s own Michael Connolly, a versatile southern-born multi-instrumentalist whose fiddle, mandolin, and accordion have shared the stage with Coyote Grace, Captain Gravel, Korby Lenker, the Barbed Wire Cutters, and the Indigo Girls.
Kate and Michael share tight harmonies, beautifully understated phrasing, and the love of a good novelty song.
Sin Fronteras
Tickets: $13.00 advance, $15.00 at the door
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Sin Fronteras performs Latin American traditional and Nueva Cancion Music throughout Seattle and the Pacific Northwest. Inmerse yourself in vibrant rhythms, soulful melodies, and breathtaking harmonies, weaving throughout the uncommon poetry of Latin America’s common people — songs of life, humanity, equality, justice, and hope.
Since 2002, the group has shared their music and commitment to promoting an understanding of the complexities of Latin America’s pueblos. Their music draws on the Canto Nuevo (New Song) tradition originating in the social movements of the southern cone. The New Song of Latin America is defined by lyrics which speak to the everyday experiences of the working class and the dispossessed. The form focuses its energy on the struggle against oppression.
Sin Fronteras blends original arrangements with the harmony of folkloric rhythms found in the music of Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, Argentina and Chile. Following in the steps of Violeta Parra, one of the originators of the Canto Nuevo, Sin Fronteras is reconstructing the collective memory of Latin American musical traditions. To that end, they also weave Andean and classical musical styles with the folkloric traditions of Mexico and Chile, rejuvenating and reinventing the rich musical history of Latin America.
Their members hail from the US, Colombia, Mexico and Chile.
Al and Emily Cantrell In Concert
Tickets: $14 ($12 for SFS and PNA members)
Make reservations at 206-528-8523 or online at www.seafolklore.org
It’s a pleasure to team up with the Seattle Folklore Society to present Al and Emily Cantrell.
Al and Emily Cantrell
Al and Emily Cantrell cast a magical spell with their airy, joyful acoustic songs. Emily uses her voice as an instrument on soaring vocals like a country Joni Mitchell, while Al plays spirited fiddling and dazzling mandolin. Currently based in Nashville, the Cantrells have been touring and playing their original folk and bluegrass music in concerts and festivals since 1985. Their performances feature Emily’s songs, and Al’s contest-winning fiddling in traditional, swing and Irish styles, their duet harmonies, ”fiddlesticks” (“playing the straws”) and the wide variety of cover tunes from traditional bluegrass to Broadway musicals.
They have recorded four CDs of mostly original songs featuring Jerry Douglas, Bela Fleck, Ranger Doug and Too Slim from “Riders in the Sky”, Jim Hurst, Rob Ickes, Tim O’Brien and Mark Schatz of “Nickel Creek”.
For several seasons the Cantrells taught swing guitar and fiddle at Jorma Kaukonen’s Fur Peace Ranch. They will also be presenting swing guitar and fiddle workshops Sunday, May 10 at Dusty Strings.
Come hear the magic of this special Seattle Folklore Society concert.
Make your reservations by telephone, 206-528-8523 or online at www.seafolklore.org
