Concerts

/Events/
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Zoe and Cloyd with Evan Murphy

The Burren 247 Elm Street, Somerville, MA

Zoe & Cloyd - The innovative “klezgrass” music of Zoe & Cloyd springs from the rich traditions and complementary styles of fiddler/vocalist Natalya Zoe Weinstein and multi-instrumentalist/vocalist John Cloyd Miller. Descending from a lineage of klezmer and jazz musicians, Natalya trained classically in her home state of Massachusetts before moving south in 2004. John, a twelfth generation North Carolinian and grandson of pioneering bluegrass fiddler, Jim Shumate, is a 1st place winner of the prestigious Chris Austin Songwriting Contest and the Hazel Dickens Songwriting Contest. Based in Asheville, NC, Natalya and John are also experienced educators and are both instructors in the traditional music program at Warren Wilson College. With B.B. Bowness and Nate Sabat. Evan Murphy opens. $20 advance; $25 at the door.

$20

Aoife O’Donovan and Hawktail: All My Friends Tour

Groton Hill Music Center 122 Old Ayer Road, Groton, MA

Aoife O’Donovan and Hawktail join together for a night of joyous music. Hawktail opens the evening with their signature songs and cosmopolitan sound. Aoife O’Donovan will then take the stage with Hawktail as her band, performing songs from the Grammy-award winning musician’s 4th studio album All My Friends (out March 22, 2024). O’Donovan continues to enchant audiences worldwide with her soul-stirring music and unwavering passion for storytelling through song. Deemed “a vocalist of unerring instinct” by the New York Times, she has released three critically-acclaimed and boundary-blurring solo albums including literarily crafted Age Of Apathy, which received three Grammy nominations. Her newest album, All My Friends is based around a collection of songs Aoife O’Donovan wrote, inspired by women’s suffrage and the passage of the 19th amendment. The album is a deep dive into the reimagining of the life of Carrie Chapman Catt – one of the movement’s leaders and founder of the League of Women Voters – juxtaposed with Aoife’s own experiences as a woman and mother. Hawktail is the acoustic instrumental trio of fiddler Brittany Haas, bassist Paul Kowert, and guitarist Jordan Tice. Though at first glance it looks like an acoustic super-picker side-project, their all-original music is cohesive and unique, distinguishing them as an ensemble with a sound built from the ground up. Flush with orchestral sweeps and sparse vigils, with strains of the American South and the North Atlantic. Together, they have fostered a reputation as a rare ensemble of composers and instrumentalists able to take the listener on a journey, without the use of words.

$51 – $71

Little Wishbone at Mr. Sippy’s BBQ

MrSippy BBQ 184 South Main Street, Rochester, NH

Little Wishbone is a rollicking old-time string band based in the New Hampshire & Maine seacoast.  If you like Old Hat Stringband or Green Heron, you'll love Little Wishbone!  $10 cover

$10

Meeting House Bluegrass Festival

Smith Meetinghouse 451 Meetinghouse Rd, Gilmanton, NH

New England’s Five Best Bluegrass Bands Saturday July 20, 2024 9:00AM - 8:00 PM 451 Meetinghouse Rd. Gilmanton, NH Free Rough Camping Fri & Sat with Advance Tickets Join us at “Smith Meetinghouse” for an AMAZING DAY OF BLUEGRASS! This event is the 250th Anniversary of the establishment of the Meetinghouse. The First Congregational Society in Gilmanton is a Non-Profit 501(c)(3) organization that maintains the historic buildings on this site. The Bluegrass Festival is a fundraising event to help the annual costs of maintaining and preserving the buildings and grounds. Bring your own lawn chairs, blankets and appetite, we will have great vendors onsite! *$50 Tickets at the gate or $45 available by check or money order through June 30, 2024 Please address check to “FCSG Meetinghouse” and mail to: 544 Meeting House Road, Gilmanton, NH 03237 Please include self-addressed, stamped envelope

$50

Meeting House Bluegrass Festival

Smith Meetinghouse 451 Meetinghouse Rd, Gilmanton, NH

New England’s Five Best Bluegrass Bands Saturday July 20, 2024 9:00AM - 8:00 PM 451 Meetinghouse Rd. Gilmanton, NH Free Rough Camping Fri & Sat with Advance Tickets Join us at “Smith Meetinghouse” for an AMAZING DAY OF BLUEGRASS! This event is the 250th Anniversary of the establishment of the Meetinghouse. The First Congregational Society in Gilmanton is a Non-Profit 501(c)(3) organization that maintains the historic buildings on this site. The Bluegrass Festival is a fundraising event to help the annual costs of maintaining and preserving the buildings and grounds. Bring your own lawn chairs, blankets and appetite, we will have great vendors onsite! *$50 Tickets at the gate or $45 available by check or money order through June 30, 2024 Please address check to “FCSG Meetinghouse” and mail to: 544 Meeting House Road, Gilmanton, NH 03237 Please include self-addressed, stamped envelope

$50

Larry and Joe

Club Passim Cambridge, MA

Larry Bellorín hails from Monagas, Venezuela and is a legend of Llanera music. Joe Troop is from North Carolina and is a GRAMMY-nominated bluegrass and oldtime musician. Larry was forced into exile and is an asylum seeker in North Carolina. Joe, after a decade in South America, got stranded back in his stomping grounds in the pandemic. Larry works construction to make ends meet. Joe’s acclaimed “latingrass” band Che Apalache was forced into hiatus, and he shifted into action working with asylum seeking migrants. Currently based in the Triangle of North Carolina, both men are versatile multi-instrumentalists and singer-songwriters on a mission to show that music has no borders. As a duo they perform a fusion of Venezuelan and Appalachian folk music on harp, banjo, cuatro, fiddle, maracas, guitar, upright bass, and whatever else they decide to throw in the van. The program they offer features a distinct blend of their musical inheritances and traditions as well as storytelling about the ways that music and social movements coalesce.

$25

Lonesome Ace Stringband

Club Passim Cambridge, MA

Masters of their trade, The Lonesome Ace Stringband bring grit, skill and abandon to Americana music, bridging old-time, bluegrass and folk traditions into a seamless hybrid of original material that is at once fresh and timeless. Instrumentation alone sets this Toronto-based trio’s sound apart: consisting simply of fiddle (John Showman), clawhammer banjo (Chris Coole), and upright bass (Max Heineman). The spine-tingling harmonies and interchanging lead vocals only bring more magic to the equation. They’ve become festival favourites at Rockygrass, Celtic Connections, Winnipeg Folk Festival, Merlefest and regularly tour the USA, UK, Germany and, of course, Canada. With more than a decade of group music-making under their belts, they’re releasing their fifth album, a feisty and mighty collection of all-original material titled ‘Try To Make It Fly’ (October 13, 2023).

$25

The Hazel Project at MrSippy

MrSippy BBQ 184 South Main Street, Rochester, NH

Some of New England's finest bluegrass musicians pay tribute to Hazel Dickens & Alice Gerrard.

$10

Hot Club of Cowtown at The Bull Run

The Bull Run Restaurant 215 Great Road, Shirley, MA

Award-winning Austin, Texas-based Hot Club of Cowtown may be the world’s most globe-trotting, effervescent string trio, who’s joyful sound blends the traditional Western swing of the 1940s American southwest with European hot jazz influences of the same era. 2024 marks three decades since guitarist Whit Smith and violinist Elana James met through a classified ad in the music section of New York City's legendary alternative newspaper, the Village Voice. A few years later Jake Irwin was added as Bass player and Hot Club of Cowtown was born. And thirty years on, they continue to surprise and delight with their trademark "arsenal full of technique and joy,” Jon Caramanica, New York Times. They have perfected a truly unique and infectious hybrid that playfully blurs musical boundaries, conjuring the spirit of both Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys and jazz legend Django Reinhardt.

$25