January 9, 2015 Jill Andrews with Dom Flemons Trio
Jill Andrews began her music career in 2004 by co-founding the alt-country group, the everybodyfields. After releasing three albums and touring the country with the band, she decided to make a go of it on her own. And in 2009, she released her self titled EP, followed up with the full-length album, The Mirror in 2011. Jill has been on the road with The Avett Brothers and many other super talented folks. Her songs have been showcased on such shows as Grey’s Anatomy, Nashville, Hart of Dixie, American Idol…etc. She just finished recording a new record, “The War Inside,” and is working on an upcoming release date for late 2014/early 2015. Jill currently resides in beautiful Nashville, TN.
Dom Flemons is the “American Songster,” pulling from traditions of old-time folk music to create new sounds. Having performed music professionally since 2005, he has played live for over one million people just within the past three years. As part of the Carolina Chocolate Drops, which he co-founded with Rhiannon Giddens and Justin Robinson, he has played at a variety of festivals spanning from the Newport Folk Festival to Bonnaroo, in addition to renowned venues such as the Grand Ole Opry. In July 2014, Dom released his third solo record with Music Maker Relief Foundation, and his first since leaving the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Prospect Hill finds Flemons digging deeply into ragtime, Piedmont blues, spirituals, southern folk music, string band music, jug band music, fife and drum music, and ballads idioms with showmanship and humor, reinterpreting the music to suit 21st century audiences. He was featured on NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross and his new album has received praise from The Boston Globe, Paste Magazine, Living Blues Magazine, and more.
Time – Doors Open at 7:15 PM
Tickets – $22 Click Here for Tickets
Call 276-628-3991 or visit the Barter Box Office to purchase tickets as well.
January 10th, 2015 – David Bromberg Quintet with Scott Miller
played with everyone, toured everywhere, full of warmth, wit & a new cd!
“He can hold an audience in his hand with a touching anecdotal song, and then set it romping with a raucous bit of raunch. He is electrifying.” – The New York Times
Bromberg’s sensitive and versatile approach to guitar-playing earned him jobs playing the Village “basket houses” for tips, the occasional paying gig, and employment as a backing musician for Tom Paxton, Jerry Jeff Walker and Rosalie Sorrels, among others. He became a first-call, “hired gun” guitarist for recording sessions, ultimately playing on hundreds of records by artists including Bob Dylan (New Morning, Self Portrait, Dylan), Link Wray, The Eagles, Ringo Starr, Willie Nelson, and Carly Simon. An unexpected and wildly successful solo spot for 600,000 concert goers at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival in Great Britain led to a solo deal with Columbia Records, for whom David recorded four albums. His eponymous 1971 debut included “The Holdup,” a songwriting collaboration with former Beatle George Harrison, who also played slide guitar on the track. David also met the Grateful Dead and wound up with four of their members playing on his next two albums.
In 2013, content with the balance of both his violin business and performing career, David was ready to record again with his live band. Enlisting old friend Larry Campbell (three-time Grammy-winning producer for Levon Helm and multi-instrumentalist with Bob Dylan) and engineer Justin Guip, David and his group entered Levon Helm Studios in Woodstock, NY, in March 2013. Enlisting some of Helm’s former recording and touring musicians for added instrumentation, the David Bromberg Band emerged twelve days later with ‘Only Slightly Mad,’ a return to his genre-bending albums of the Seventies and Eighties. Bromberg fans will find blues, bluegrass, gospel, folk, Irish fiddle tunes, pop and English drinking songs happily coexisting as they can only on a Bromberg album. For newcomers, Only Slightly Mad will be an introduction to an astonishing performer whose range and musical depth have delighted devoted audiences for over forty years and will for many years hence.
Opening in support of the David Bromberg Quintet, is local favorite songwriter, Scott Miller. Ever since Steve Earle declared Miller a “world class” songwriter – signing him and his former band The V-Roys to his record label E-Squared and producing their two bedrock Americana albums JUST ADD ICE and ALL ABOUT TOWN with Twangtrust partner Ray Kennedy – Miller has been known as a writer’s writer. Even on the next four albums Miller recorded and releasedon Sugar Hill Records from 2001 to 2008, Miller’s songwriting remained genuinely thoughtful, for the most part regional and history based– but always cloaked in what one New York Times reviewer called an “epic vernacular.” In other words, he wrote big.
Time – Doors Open at 7:15 PM
Tickets – $40 Click Here for Tickets
Call 276-628-3991 or visit the Barter Box Office to purchase tickets as well.
January 16, 2015 – Heritage Blues Orchestra with Holy Ghost Tent Revival
The grit of low-down country and urban blues with the bold brass of New Orleans; the hand-clapping fervor of gospel punctuated with fiery postmodern, jazz-infused horn arrangements; the haunting cries of work songs and pulsating drums that reach back to the real roots of it all. You’ll journey across the Middle Passage, be driven down Highway 49 from Clarksdale to New Orleans, go from chain gangs and juke joints to orchestra pits, church pews and even back porches. HBO’s music is an inspiring testament to the enduring power, possibilities and boundless beauty of African-American music.
Tickets – $30 Click Here for Tickets
Call 276-628-3991 or visit the Barter Box Office to purchase tickets as well.
January 17, 2015 – The Blind Boys of Alabama with The Jarekus Singleton Band
Touring throughout the South during the Jim Crow era of the 1940s and 1950s–when blacks were denied the use of whites-only water fountains, bathrooms, and restaurants–the Blind Boys persevered and even flourished thanks to their unique sound, which blended the close harmonies of early jubilee gospel with the more fervent improvisations of hard gospel. During the 1960s, they sang at benefits for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and provided a soundtrack to the Civil Rights movement, which adopted both the Christian message and the dignity of old gospel songs. During the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, gospel groups that had originated in the church began recording secular music, yet the Blind Boys of Alabama stuck to their calling. “We sing gospel music,” says Carter. “That’s what we do. We’re not going to ever deviate from that.”Few would have expected them to still be going strong–stronger than ever, even–so many years after they first joined voices, but they’ve proved as productive and as musically ambitious in the twenty-first century as they did in the twentieth. In 2001, they released Spirit of the Century on Peter Gabriel’s RealWorld label, mixing traditional church tunes with songs by Tom Waits and the Rolling Stones, and winning their first Grammy Award. Subsequent Grammy-winning albums have found them working with Robert Randolph & the Family Band (2002’s Higher Ground), a plethora of special guests including Waits and Mavis Staples (2003’s Go Tell It On The Mountain), Ben Harper (2004’s There Will Be a Light), and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band (2007’s Down in New Orleans).
Nearly seventy-five years after they hit their first notes together, the Blind Boys of Alabama are exceptional not only in their longevity, but also in the breadth of their catalog and their relevance to contemporary roots music. Since 2000, they’ve won five Grammys and four Gospel Music Awards, and have delivered their spiritual message to countless listeners. “We appreciate the accolades and we thank God for them,” says Jimmy Carter, a founding member and the Blind Boys’ leader for five years now. “But we’re not interesting in money or anything other than singing gospel. We had no idea when we started that we would make it this far. The secret to our longevity is, we love what we do. And when you love what you do, that keeps you motivated. That keeps you alive.”
At just 29 years old, Jarekus Singleton is a musical trailblazer with a bold vision for the future of the blues. Springing from the same Mississippi soil as Charley Patton, Muddy Waters and B.B. King, Singleton’s cutting-edge sound—equally rooted in rap, rock and blues traditions—is all his own. He melds hip-hop wordplay, rock energy and R&B grooves with contemporary and traditional blues, turning audiences of all ages into devoted fans. With his untamed guitar licks and strong, soulful voice effortlessly moving from ferocious and funky to slow and steamy to smoking hot, Singleton is a fresh, electrifying bluesman bursting at the seams with talent.
Time – Doors Open at 7:15 PM
Tickets – $42 Click Here for Tickets
Call 276-628-3991 or visit the Barter Box Office to purchase tickets as well.
January 23, 2015- Ben Sollee & Special Guests David Wax Museum with Cereus Bright
Kentucky-born cellist and composer Ben Sollee likes to keep moving. He kicked off 2014 with the release of his score for the documentary film Maidentrip. In March, he performed at Carnegie Hall as part of a tribute to Paul Simon. And you may have caught Sollee on the road supporting song-writer William Fitzsimmons throughout April and May. If you’ve seen him perform, you know it’s not to missed.
For listeners just discovering Ben’s music, you’ll find that there’s a lot more to it than songs. Over the 6 years following the release of his debut record, Learning to Bend, Sollee has told an unconventional story with his rugged cello playing. Seeking a deeper connection to communities on the road, Ben first packed his touring life onto his bicycle in 2009. Since then he has ridden over 4,000 miles from show to show. He has been invited to perform and speak on sustainability at a number of festivals including South by Southwest Music (2011) and TEDx San Diego (2012).
Like his contemporaries Chris Thile and Abigail Washburn, Sollee’s music is difficult to pin down. Following a performance at the Lincoln Center’s American Songbook series, the New York Times remarked how Sollee’s “…meticulous, fluent arrangements continually morphed from one thing to another. Appalachian mountain music gave way to the blues, and one song was appended with a fragment from a Bach cello suite, beautifully played.” It’s Ben’s quality of narrative and presence on stage that unifies his musical influences.
David Wax Museum join Ben on stage as special guests, which will be a performance dubbed “Mountain Stories”.They’ve been featured on NPR, Daytrotter and PBS, as well as traveled the festival circuit extensively, being dubbed the breakout act at the Newport Folk Festival. The NewYorker says about DWM: “Kicks up a cloud of excitement with its high-energy border-crossing sensibility.” and Time Magazine describes their sound as: “Joyful Mexo-Americana fusion, with virtuosic musical skill and virtuous harmonies.”
Cereus Bright finds its muse—and its name—from the Cereus: a white desert flower that blooms only at night. This flower, blossoming in the most desolate of places, is a symbol of art and story, which draw their beauty from brokenness and heartache. In their lyrics and melodies, Cereus Bright aims to embrace life as both messy and beautiful. Their songs showcase strong, passionate harmonies singing stories of real life—hope and heartbreak, adventure and stillness. Ideologically, Cereus Bright makes a strong case for Folk music. Recently the genre of folk has come to mean “acoustic pop”, blending together into a sea of kick drums, hand claps, and escalating banjo riffs. This is Cereus Bright’s goal—drawing you in with beautiful melodies so they can move you with poetic yet direct lyrics. Connections with bands like the Avett Brothers, Fleet Foxes, and the Head and the Heart are apt comparisons and major compliments.
Time – Doors Open at 7:15 PM
Tickets – $30 Click Here for Tickets
Call 276-628-3991 or visit the Barter Box Office to purchase tickets as well.
January 24, 2015 – Greensky Bluegrass with The Last Bison
“There’s this great duality to our band,” reflects Greensky Bluegrass mandolinist, vocalist, and songwriter Paul Hoffman. “We’re existing in a few different places at once: we’re a bluegrass band and a rock band, we’re song-driven and interested in extended improvisation.” “We play acoustic instruments,” adds dobro player Anders Beck, “but we put on a rock’n’roll show. We play in bigger clubs and theaters, there’s a killer light show, and we’re as loud as your favorite rock band. It’s not easy to make five acoustic instruments sound like this – it’s something we’ve spent years working on.”
From these seemingly irreconcilable elements, the five members of Greensky Bluegrass have forged a defiant, powerful sound that, while rooted in classic stringband Americana, extends outwards with a fearless, exploratory zeal. The tension and release between these components – tradition and innovation, prearranged songs and improvisation, acoustic tones and electric volume – is what makes them so thrillingly dynamic, in concert and on record. “In theory,” Hoffman explains, “greensky is the complete opposite of bluegrass. So, by definition, we are contrasting everything that isn’t bluegrass with everything that is.”
That their sound is so seamless, so organic, is testament to Greensky’s enduring vision and tireless dedication. Since their first rumblings at the start of the millennium, they have emerged as relentless road warriors, creating a captivating live show while at the same time developing a knack for evocative, disarming songcraft.
In 2012 The Last Bison seemingly rose from the marshes of southeastern Virginia to captivate the national music scene with a rare blend of music that NPR dubbed, “Classical influenced southern folk rock.” Having drawn comparisons in the past to indie superstars the likes of Mumford & Sons, The Decemberists, and Fleet Foxes, their most recent project harvests a more dynamic, and anthemic sound from the soil of their folk roots. The addition of electric bass and keyboards to their extensive collection of acoustic instruments has been compared to Bob Dylan going electric at Newport in 1965. After a performance at Norfolk, Virginia’s Harborfest, the The Daily Press commented on the new musical direction saying, “The result is a more rocking sound, though the band still remains true to its folkie roots.”
Time – Doors Open at 6:45 PM Show at 7:30 PM **special extended set**
Tickets – $24 Click Here for Tickets
Call 276-628-3991 or visit the Barter Box Office to purchase tickets as well.
January 29, 2015 (Thursday) – Mavis Staples with Cody Chesnutt
She is, simply, a Legend. For more than sixty years, from her early days with The Staples Singers to her recent 2013 Grammy Award, Mavis Staples has been a legend of the Gospel and Blues worlds.
“All of my songs are me, but in a different way, with a different sound,” says Mavis Staples. “The phrasing, the tempos, the arrangements are different, but the messages are the same things I’ve been saying down through the years. They’re about the world today—poverty, jobs, welfare, all of that—and making it feel better through these songs.”
With her bold new album, One True Vine, the legendary vocalist adds a remarkable new chapter to an historic career. Staples is a Rock and Roll Hall of Famer, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winner, and a National Heritage Fellowship Award recipient. VH1 named her one of the 100 Greatest Women of Rock and Roll, and Rolling Stone listed her as one of the 100 Greatest Singers of All Time.
Cody ChesnuTT is a soul troubadour whose frank, socially conscious ruminations on life continue to challenge popular notions of what modern soul music can look and sound like: A raw storyteller for the people wearing a guitar and a toothpick-chewing smirk; a. A wide-eyed, intense soul brother in a crazy-fly get-up singing about bedraggled love in the land of Los Angeles. He’s all of that, but wiser now while still wearing poetic license on his skin like a battle scar.
Time – Doors Open at 7:15 PM
Tickets – $49 Click Here for Tickets
Call 276-628-3991 or visit the Barter Box Office to purchase tickets as well.
Abingdon Music Experience 
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