Music

Next Stage Arts Project and Twilight Music present country, swing, honky-tonk and old-time music sextet The Sweetback Sisters performing their annual Christmas concert at Next Stage on Sunday, December 21 at 7:30 pm.

Each December, Brooklyn’s favorite country band tours the east coast and spreads the holiday cheer with The Sweetback Sisters’ Country Christmas Singalong Spectacular. This supremely fun and wildly popular show requires audience participation (lyric sheets are provided) and a love for all kinds of holiday music. All the songs are presented with the Sweetback Sisters’ signature mix of harmony singing, rollicking telecaster and twin fiddling along with a healthy dose of holiday cheer.

Guilford, Vt. – Friends of Music at Guilford’s 42nd Annual Christmas at Christ Church program, featuring choral and instrumental music, a holiday reading, and carols, is set for 8:00 p.m. on Friday, December 12, and 4:00 p.m. on Saturday, December 13. Christ Church is at the corner of Rt. 5 south and Melendy Hill Road in the Algiers Village of Guilford.
      
This season’s theme for the program — “All My Heart Rejoices!” — is reflected in nine mostly familiar holiday song texts in unfamiliar arrangements by composers from the past five centuries, including Arthur Sullivan’s “It Came Upon the Midnight Clear” and Charles Gounod’s “O Come, O Come, Emmanuel.” Choral director Tom Baehr’s composing and arranging skills, featured in the repertoire of several recent Chamber Singers concerts, are represented in the version of “All My Heart This Night Rejoices!” being performed this weekend.

On the first day of Christmas
My true love sent to me:
A late property tax interest fee.

On the second day of Christmas
My true love sent to me:
2 Parking meter tickets,
And a late property tax interest fee.

On the third day of Christmas
My true love sent to me:
3 Unpaid utility invoices,
2 Parking meter tickets,
And a late property tax interest fee.

The Vermont Jazz Center will present its annual big band swing gala on Friday, December 5th at 8:00 PM. This year’s event celebrates the swing music of the 30s, 40s and 50s, when big band jazz served as North America’s popular music and provided the pulse for social dancing. The 17 piece Vermont Jazz Center Big Band will be joined by Rebecca Holtz and Rob Fletcher, two exquisite singers with strong affinities to Swing. For one exceptional evening, their voices will ride on the waves of the authentic big band sound, bringing to life the allure of glitter and fantasy that characterized the musical diversion we still cherish.

Brattleboro, Vt. – Friends of Music at Guilford invites singers and music lovers in the Tri-State region to start their holiday season at 1:00 p.m. on Saturday, December 6, with the 44th annual Community Messiah Sing, a benefit for the homeless. Centre Congregational Church, at 193 Main Street in Brattleboro, has been home for the Sing since 1982 and for a few prior seasons as well.

This year marks the return of conductor Terry Larsen for an eighth season at the helm after a few years’ hiatus. A music teacher in private and public schools for twenty-five years, Larsen was a member of the famed Chanticleer singers and director of the Napa Valley Symphony Chorus when he lived on the West Coast. Now a resident of Southampton, Mass., he has directed the Manchester (Conn.) Symphony Chorus and the Pioneer Valley Symphony Chorus, and is director of the Schola Nova choral ensemble.

Next Stage Arts Project and Twilight Music present acoustic swing and alt gypsy jazz quartet Caravan of Thieves at Next Stage on Friday, November 28 at 7:30 pm.

For the past six years, Caravan of Thieves has roamed the North American continent recruiting a family of avid thrill seekers at their high energy shows. Driving gypsy jazz rhythms, acoustic guitars, upright bass and violin lay the foundation for mesmerizing vocal harmonies and fantastic stories. It’s theatrical and humorous. It’s musical and intense. It entertains, dazzles and defies classification while welcoming the spectator to join the band throughout the performance in momentary fits of claps, snaps and sing-alongs.

Sunday, November 23 there will be a contra dance at the “Stone Church” on Main St in Brattleboro. Dances will be called by Quena Crain, with live music from Everest Witman, Peter Siegel and Audrey Knuth. Witman, 16, is the youngest of this trio, and is a thoughtful, intelligent and clearly-spoken young man with the ability to laugh at himself. He and his band, Nova, appeared earlier this year at the Brattleboro Contra Dance to loud cheering and stomping from the crowd of dancers.

Witman is this year’s recipient of the Johnny Trombly Memorial Scholarship. The fund was established to support and encourage young musicians interested in playing instruments used for traditional New England dance music.

Next Stage Arts Project and Twilight Music present veteran folk/rock icon Jonathan Edwards plus singer/songwriter Lisa McCormick and newgrass/contemporary folk trio The Stockwell Brothers at Next Stage on Sunday, November 16 at 7:30 pm. Southern Vermont-based Lisa and brothers Bruce, Barry and Alan have toured with Jonathan in the past, and will again add their voices, guitars, banjo, mandolin and bass to “Sunshine,” Shanty” and a handful of his other hit songs.

The Vermont Jazz Center welcomes two treasured alumni to perform at the Vermont Jazz Center on November 15th at 8:00 PM as part of their Emerging Artist Series. After years of study and performance, vocalists Sarah Elizabeth Charles and Integriti Reeves have risen from dedicated students to seasoned professionals and in doing so have cultivated respect from peers and professionals throughout the national jazz scene.

When Integriti and Sarah Elizabeth began their studies with Sheila Jordan and Jay Clayton at the VJC’s summer jazz workshop about 10 years ago, the seeds of their commitment, self-discipline, diligent effort and abundant talent were already bearing fruit. Both have recently completed their academic training and are currently “in the trenches,” teaching, recording and confidently performing at some of jazz’s most prestigious venues. Their hard work has paid off and “now is the time” for them to develop recognition amongst a wider public.

Please join us for another Friends of the Library fundraising concert on Friday, November 7, 7:30 PM, with Vermont folk-based traditions duo Hungrytown.

Hungrytown is the musical and married duo of Rebecca Hall and Ken Anderson. They have released two highly acclaimed CDs, Hungrytown (2008) and Any Forgotten Thing (2011), both of which continue to receive much airplay on folk and Americana stations worldwide. Tickets are available at Main Circulation Desk and at Brattleboro Tix, $10, Friends of Library member; $15/non-member.

Electric Fence Halloween Dance

Reaper Madness – Dance , Drink, Scream

at Pleasant Valley Brewing

Halloween

8 to 10:30 pm

On November 1st at 8:00 PM, The Vermont Jazz Center will present 3-time Grammy Winner, Jeff Coffin, saxophonist for the Dave Matthews Band and Béla Fleck’s Flecktones. At the VJC, he’ll be performing with the Mu’tet, a group that reflects Coffin’s philosophy that “music must change and mutate in order to evolve.” Their repertoire consists of catchy tunes set over an array of complex feels: deep funk, New Orleans, Latin and swing. Their sound is propelled by rhythms you’ve never heard before and imbued with world music influences. The surprise factor is that the compositions are often in odd meters, delivered over precise, danceable grooves.

Twilight Music and Next Stage Arts Project present International Bluegrass Music Association award-winning mandolin prodigy Sierra Hull and her Tennessee-based bluegrass quintet Highway 111 at Next Stage on Sunday, October 26 at 7:30 pm.

Sierra Hull is a leading light in the new generation of bluegrass musicians. Her phenomenal mandolin playing, eloquent vocals and musical maturity well beyond her years have drawn comparisons to Alison Krauss. A seasoned performer, Sierra has appeared on Garrison Keillor’s “A Prairie Home Companion” and the Grand Ole Opry radio and television shows, as well as at numerous music festivals including Merlefest, the Newport Folk Festival, Rockygrass and the Carnegie Hall Family Concert Series. She has shared the stage with the likes of Alison Krauss, Sam Bush, Ricky Skaggs, Bobby McFerrin and Edgar Meyer.

All Souls Day falls on Sunday, November 2, and marks a collaboration between Brattleboro Area Hospice and Friends of Music at Guilford. FOMAG’s “Rest in Peace” concert, co-directed by Tom Baehr and Amy Cann, begins at 3:00 p.m. that afternoon in the sanctuary of Guilford Community Church. Two song series and a few instrumental interludes are featured in this first of four arts programs—including music, art, film, and theater—scheduled during the “Love Lives On” series honoring Hospice’s 35th Anniversary in November.

Next Stage Arts Project and Twilight Music present singer, guitarist, fiddler and banjo player Sam Amidon and his band at New England Youth Theatre on Wednesday, October 22 at 7:30 pm.

Sam Amidon grew up immersed in folk as part of a musical family based in Brattleboro, VT. His parents, Peter and Mary Alice Amidon, perform and teach traditional forms of song, dance and storytelling, and his brother Stefan plays drums with the Sweetback Sisters. Sam started on fiddle at the age of three and by eleven had formed a band called Popcorn Behavior, with childhood friend Thomas Bartlett and younger brother Stefan, to play New England fiddle tunes. They toured internationally, gathering attention from NPR, CNN and The Boston Globe, and released five albums. Sam’s first solo album, released in 2001, was a collection of traditional Irish fiddle tunes, simply titled “Solo Fiddle.”

Saturday, October 18th, the Brattleboro Farmers’ Market hosts live music by Mary Lea and friends from 11-1.

As always, there’s lots of great produce at the market and this time of year there are bountiful apples, pears, cider, donuts and pies from local orchards, plus pumpkins, winter squash (including bulk sales!), potatoes, onions, hardy fall greens, fresh lettuces and bunched carrots and beets, and lots more.

Brattleboro singer/songwriter and guitar instructor, Lisa McCormick, is teaching the world to how play the guitar. Senior faculty with the leading online guitar education provider, GuitarTricks, McCormick’s comprehensive new Guitar Fundamentals course went live on the internet on October 10. 

“Hundreds of thousands of people are going to learn to play the guitar from this course,” says Jon Broderick, Founder and CEO of GuitarTricks. The online education site has a subscription base of over two million members. 

McCormick has been teaching guitar in the Brattleboro area for over 20 years, combining her professional music skills with her Bachelors of Science degree in Education. 

The Vermont Jazz Center will present the Dafnis Prieto and his creative working ensemble called the Si o Si Quartet. This group features Prieto on drums and percussion with longtime collaborators Peter Apfelbaum on saxophones, Manuel Valera on piano and Johannes Weidenmueller on bass. Bass Musician states: To “hear such a world class quartet navigating this music live is an experience not to be forgotten.”

The Vermont Jazz Center will receive an Acclaim Award from Chamber Music America on Saturday, October 18th at 8:00 PM during a concert offered by Cuban drum virtuoso, Dafnis Prieto.  The concert and award ceremony will take place at the Vermont Jazz Center, 72 Cotton Mill Hill, in Brattleboro, Vermont.

The CMA Acclaim award recognizes “extraordinary cultural contributions in a locality or region.” The CMA Acclaim award is offered by Chamber Music America (http://www.chamber-music.org/) an institution that serves thousands of members through  grants, commissions, networking opportunities a monthly magazine and an annual conference in New York City. CMA’s definition of chamber music “encompasses myriad forms including contemporary and traditional jazz, classical and world genres.”  Their membership includes musicians, presenters, educators, patrons, managers and producers.

Next Stage Arts Project and Twilight Music present contemporary folk singer/songwriter Patty Larkin at Next Stage on Saturday, September 27 at 7:30pm.

Patty Larkin is a true phenomenon among singer/songwriters in the American folk music scene today. She has been described as “riveting” by the Chicago Tribune, “hypnotic” by Entertainment Weekly and a “drop dead brilliant performer” by Performing Songwriter.