Chuck E. Costa & Amber Darland
Tickets: $10.00 in advance, $12.00 at the door.
Click here to purchase advance tickets.
Chuck E. Costa‘s candid and visceral delivery of literate and well-crafted contemporary folk tunes has steadily raised his profile on the national club, coffeehouse and festival circuits.
Chuck never started playing guitar. Instead, he started rummaging through the basement in search of his grandfather’s baseball cards. Meddling through stacks of old china and piles of winter coats, he never found them. Something found him instead. Strumming it’s scraggly strings; a progression of broken chords, he played with an honesty and innocence that would be preserved in the songs he would later write.
Since earning a degree in philosophy in Boulder, Chuck, a native New Yorker, returned to the Northeast and released 3 independent albums and an EP since 2002. He is a modern day troubadour who has been touring the country consistently for several years cutting his teeth as a performer and songwriter. With his dulcet voice and emotive lyrics Chuck has grown into a singer/songwriter with a unique and honest voice.
Last year, Chuck released his third independent release Where the Songs Come From. Chuck teamed up with Mark Thayer of Signature Sounds to create an album of rich arrangements that stay true to the heart of each of Chuck’s candid and visceral songs. The opening track was selected to be featured on a compilation released by Hear Music in every Starbucks in North America. The album appeared on the Billboard charts in its first week of release.
He has shared the stage with such diverse nationally touring acts as; Rosanne Cash, The Weepies, Pete Seeger, Peter Case, Dar Williams, Josh Ritter and Andrew Bird to name a few.
“Sensitive, introspective…inspired.” – The New York Times
Amber Darland is one of the most exciting up-and-coming singer songwriters of the Pacific
Northwest. Darland’s
intensely personal music has the passion reminiscent of Patty Griffin, Lucinda Williams and Shawn Colvin and the soulfulness of k.d. lang, the Carpenters and Dar Williams. She is a master at making the simple, evocative.
Amber’s music is compelling because it’s both political and deeply personal – and by design, purposeful. In her performances, the listener becomes an integral part of the moment. Darland’s delivery of powerful, honest poetry with pure vocals, strong melodies, infectious rhythms and personal stories keep the audience engaged and experiencing a wave of emotions. It is not uncommon for her listeners to move from tears to laughter or from personal reflection to political action in response to her music.
Amber Darland has shared the stage with Ferron, Tret Fure, Catie Curtis, Mary Gauthier, Laura Love, Adrianne, Sweet Talk Radio, Coyote Grace, Angie Evans, Nedra Johnson, Jen Todd, Gene Tagaban, Chris Pureka, Misled, and many others.
Danny Schmidt
Tickets: $13.00 advance, $15.00 at the door
Sorry — this show has sold out!
Austin, TX-based singer/songwriter Danny Schmidt has been building an enthusiastic (nearly cult-like) following while simultaneously inspiring the admiration of his fellow artists and critical acclaim from industry professionals. He is the real deal, an authentic timeless troubadour in the tradition of Townes Van Zandt, Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, and Dave Carter, who delivers his craft with a quiet power, a level of complexity, and an underlying humanity that is truly rare in this age of sound bite marketeering.
It’s his songwriting which won him the prestigous Kerrville New Folk award, but it’s his intense live performances that leave listeners with a sense that each of his songs is necessary, plain and simple. His guitar work is effortless and sparkling, his arrangements are fresh and unpredictable, his voice ageless. Stylistically and musically, Danny’s writing spans an impressively diverse reach, from deeply-rooted Appalachian mountain gospel to haunted English balladry, from syncopated Piedmont country blues to vagabond 60’s protest folk-stumpery.
He tackles universal themes of love, loss, and longing . . . restless discontent and grateful joy. And he captures both the sorrow and the beauty inherent in our everyday lives with the wisdom of a perceptive, compassionate elder and with the innocent awe and tenderness of a child.
In the words of Sing Out Magazine: “He is perhaps the best new songwriter we’ve heard in the last 15 years.” And in the words of Texas Monthly: “With seductive simplicity, his music simply demands your attention.”
This is one show not to be missed.
Courtney Robbins w/ Jeremy Serwer, Kate Graves
Tickets: $8.00 advance, $10.00 at the door.
Click here to purchase advance tickets.
Courtney Robbins’ music is a little bit folk, a little bit rock, and whole lot of awesome. From percussive guitar rhythms reminiscent of train engines to the mellow, heartbreaking vocals of her ballads, this Tucson-based independent singer-songwriter spans several genres. Her energetic performance, hard- hitting riffs, and smart lyrics have established a powerful connection with her fast growing fan-base and earned her such descriptions as ““Powerful… [one] of Tucson’s best singer-songwriters” – Tucsonscene.com.
Known to “play the shit out of [the guitar],” Courtney’s blistering guitar style often leaves her fingers bleeding; her straightforward songwriting skills are a figurative match. She has landed both a finalist spot in the 2008 Tucson Folk Festival Songwriting Competition, and the praise of critics. Dramanonymous.com’s Anna Pulley cheers: “Robbins’ muscular rhythms and melodic grace are impossible not to tap along to. Infused with raw nostalgia and emotional urgency, Robbins’ music artfully blends the taut intimacy of an acoustic affair with galloping riffs and a fragile, folk sensibility.”
Courtney has not only established herself as a rising star in Arizona, but is also garnering the admiration of folk fans nationwide. Her dichotomy of personal experience and broad-spectrum emotion draws crowds, and she is finding a loyal audience as she winds a path of live shows across the country performing solo and warming up the stage for artists like Melissa Ferrick, Lucy Kaplansky, Catie Curtis, Edie Carey, Meghan Toohey, Eddie from Ohio, and Dar Williams.
“Bittersweet ballads from the nether world,” states Angela Yeager of Salem Oregon’s Statesman Journal, a description as good as any other for the sound of Jeremy Serwer. Jeremy’s songs are a meandering journey through Americana, angst, sorrow and disenchantment with US social policy.
KINK Radio in Portland says, “His songs run the gamut from emotionally charged heartbreakers to pointed political statements. His ability to generate emotion in an audience is testament to his songwriting expertise and a powerful bluesy expressive delivery.” Jeremy is no stranger to the road, having embarked on several jaunts about the US and has also performed around South Korea. Jeremy has been active in bands including Rich Man’s Burden, Acoustic Minds and Thistle. He has accompanied songwriter/performer veteran Anne Weiss and worked in recording and live performances with Eric Pollard (Low, Retribution Gospel Choir, Sun Kil Moon), Skip Von Kuske (Portland Cello Project, M. Ward, Vagabond Opera), Jimi Cooper (Dukes of Hubbard, No Wait Wait, The Fractals) and many others.
Jeremy’s latest release FM is a portrait of a nine year existence in Portland’s ebb and flow musical aura. Jeremy currently resides in Tucson, AZ and is very active with his new band Seashell Radio. Jeremy is now working on his second solo release with producer/bandmate Fen Ikner.
Kate Graves writes little songs. She tries to spread them around like wildflower seeds.
Kate Graves likes wildflowers. If she could be a flower, 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.
Kate Graves just went off on a tangent while writing her bio…
Kate Graves writes little songs. Sometimes they are sparse…sometimes filled with lots of words.
Often they are written about things like tasting sweet orange on your lips and wanting to kiss someone, so that they can experience tasting sweet orange on their lips.
Kate Graves likes kissing. And singing. And trying to explain to the world that her chihuahua is just scared and not really cold hearted.
Kate Graves hopes that you will forgive her for writing her name 7 times over in this little bio. She hopes very much so that you will listen to her songs.
Ben Mallott & Chris Marshall
Tickets: $13 advance, $15 at the door.
click here to buy advance tickets.
Roots formed in old standards, a juvenile heart, and his mother’s Ray Charles albums, Austin’s Ben Mallott uses his grainy timbre to remove the punctuation between singer and songwriter.
For his first solo release, Look Good, Feel Good, Mallott’s songs range from sentimental to sad to what he calls “unpredictably genuine”. A songwriter who admits his journeys have taken him from window seats to bathroom floors, he sticks to what works and in turn churns out his distinctive brand of Americana confession.
“I’m strange about where and when I write,” Mallott explains. “I try not to move my residence too often, because it usually takes a couple of months for me to find the place in the house that sounds and feels right. Where I live now, I stand about six inches from the back door and sing into it. It didn’t take me long to have a glass door installed.”
Personal as they are, Mallott confesses that his songs don’t distinguish between the literal and metaphorical. A blend of Americana heart and soul, each are shrouded in a little mystery to both the listener and the creator.
“I don’t know what they mean to me. I think if I really ever figured that out, I’d have to stop writing. I love the art of songwriting. I love the struggle involved. The songs are just windows. Some let in more light than others.”
Growing up in Portland, Oregon, Chris Marshall followed a fairly typical adolescent path. He found his mom’s acoustic guitar, taught
himself to play, then worked his way into what he calls “many short-lived punk, hardcore and emo bands.” He also honed his skills by playing in the church his dad founded when he was 14.
Then Marshall discovered the gospel of Willie and Johnny—as in Nelson and Cash—and the spirit of Elvis, as well as the poetic and literary influences that infuse the thoughtful songwriting found on his new EP, Starting Out.
The five-song collection is an exploration of life experiences: physical and metaphysical journeys, passion, pain, friendship, faith. It’s the work of a man who found his songwriting voice when he unlatched his cerebral cortex from the process and engaged his heart instead.
“I tried so hard in the beginning to write songs that would honor the tradition of the artists I admire, namely songwriters like Sam Cooke and Jackie Wilson,” Marshall admits. “They possessed such an unaffected, uncomplicated writing style.” His own lyrics frustrated him at first because they weren’t as simple and clearcut. But once he let go of expectations that he should write or sound a certain way, Marshall freed his muse and let in all of his influences, including writers and philosophers like Walt Whitman, C.S. Lewis and Soren Kierkegaard, as well as musical icons like Dylan and Kristofferson.
In the process, he’s developed a sound he describes as “uniquely American.”
“My generation seems interested in redefining what it means to be a member of the American musical heritage,” he explains. “That is precisely what I am doing with my work: borrowing and borrowing until we find something new.”
