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Featured Events
22sep3:00 pm- 5:00 pmSeptember Monthly Concert with Amanda Rheaume
Event Details
September Monthly Concert
more
Event Details
September Monthly Concert with Amanda Rheaume
Sunday, September 22, 2019
Doors 2:30pm | Music 3pm
Get your tickets here!
FREE for Members *While Supplies Last* | $10 Not-Yet-Members | $15 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF AMANDA RHEAUME
About Amanda Rheaume
The fifth album from Ottawa-raised, Toronto-based singer/songwriter Amanda Rheaume, The Skin I’m In presents a compellingly portrait of an artist fully comfortable in her own skin, personally and musically.
Produced by Colin Cripps (Blue Rodeo, Junkhouse) at The Tragically Hip’s famed Bathouse Studio, it sports a full-blooded band sound, thanks to the contributions of an A-list musical supporting cast.
Rheaume’s supple and expressive vocals fit neatly in the centre of the sonic landscape, while her eloquent and well-crafted songs were written with such noted collaborators as Jason Blaine, Melanie Brulée, Jim Bryson, Justin Glasco, and Tim Bovaconti.
One of Rheaume’s great gifts as a songwriter is her ability to take the personal and make it universal, drawing upon her own experience to deliver messages with a wide resonance. She digs deep on The Skin I’m In, reflecting upon her Metis heritage, as on the profoundly moving title track and “Return To The Water,” and addressing issues of identity and mental health.
Her earlier albums met with widespread critical acclaim. 2013’s Keep A Fireearned her a 2014 Canadian Folk Music Award for Aboriginal Songwriter of The Year as well as a Juno Award nomination for Aboriginal Album of the Year, while 2016’s Holding Patterns received a Canadian Folk Music Awards nomination.
An engaging performer, Rheaume has developed a following across Canada and in Europe, where she tours regularly.
She has long employed her music as a force for good, as shown by three trips to Afghanistan to perform for Canadian military personnel, plus visits to the Alert base in Canada’s far north and the troubled Indigenous community of Attawapiskat.
Rheaume co-founded Babes4Breasts, an initiative that, through concerts and recording projects, raised money for breast cancer charities across Canada over a 10-year period.
This is an artist with a heart as big as her talent.
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO AMANDA RHEAUME ON SPOTIFY
CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT AMANDA RHEAUME
**Ticketing Policy**
The Philadelphia Folksong Society is proud to offer its’ members one or two free tickets (depending on membership level) to our selected Monthly Member Concert and Monthly House Concert every month. Due to the large number of members and limited seating, we ask that members reserve tickets when they know they can attend. If a member has reserved a ticket and cannot make it to the member concert of their choosing, they must contact the PFS office by phone or email prior to the event to cancel. Failure to do so will result in an inability to reserve your free member ticket to the following member concert.
If you arrive at a PFS member concert and have not reserved a ticket, you will only be seated ten minutes before show time if seats are still available.
If a member concert is listed as “sold out,” please contact Katie Kresz at kkresz@pfs.org to secure your spot atop the waitlist. You will be notified prior to the concert if seats become available.
PFS asks that all members show respect to their fellow members and the Society through following this policy.
Time
(Sunday) 3:00 pm - 5:00 pm
27sep8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Jonathan Byrd & The Pickup Boys
Event Details
PFS Presents Jonathan Byrd &
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Jonathan Byrd & The Pickup Boys
Friday, September 27, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Get your tickets here!
$12 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $15 Not-Yet-Members | $18 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
About Jonathan Byrd
Jonathan Byrd and The Pickup Cowboys are musical gunslingers, vaudevillian hucksters, and old-fashioned tent revivalists. Between heartbreaking ballads and heart-lifting sing-alongs, the Cowboys entertain and get audiences involved in the show.
Byrd is a preacher’s son, a Gulf War veteran, and an award-winning songwriter from Chapel Hill, NC, known for literary, outsider songs that have become campfire favorites. The Chicago Tribune called Byrd “one of the top 50 songwriters of the past 50 years.”
Joined on drums by Austin McCall (Kaira Ba, Violet Bell), and musical renaissance man Johnny Waken on guitar, saw, and mandolin, Byrd shares the often-missed, always poignant tales of the small people that make the world such a big place.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF JONATHAN BYRD
Time
(Friday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
28sep8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Talisk
Event Details
PFS Presents Talisk Saturday, September 28,
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Talisk
Saturday, September 28, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Click here to get your tickets!
$15 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $18 Not-Yet-Members | $21 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF TALISK
About Talisk
In their five years, Scottish firebrands Talisk have stacked up several major awards for their explosively energetic yet artfully woven sound, including 2018’s Belhaven Bursary for Innovation & 2017’s Folk Band of the Year both at the BBC Alba Scots Trad Music Awards, and a BBC Radio 2 Folk Award.
Mohsen Amini – the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards’ Musician of the Year 2018, Hayley Keenan and Graeme Armstrong seamlessly meld concertina, fiddle and guitar to produce a multi-layered, enthralling signature that has effortlessly captivated audiences from the USA to Australia, and throughout the UK.
Appearances at world-leading festivals – including the Cambridge Folk Festival, Denmark’s Tønder, WOMAD UK and Las Palmas, the Philadelphia Folk Festival, Celtic Colours, Milwaukee Irish Festival and five successive outings at Glasgow’s Celtic Connections – have amassed a die-hard following, whilst the world’s folk and world music media have also lauded high credits upon the trio. The release of their hotly anticipated second album, Beyond, in October 2018 was met with a five-star ‘Top of the World’ review in Songlines, praising the band as “incredibly infectious and endearing… fresh, invigorating, accomplished and playfully frisky.”
Time
(Saturday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
4oct8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Roanoke
Event Details
PFS Presents Roanoke
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Roanoke
Friday, October 4, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Get your tickets here!
$8 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $10 Not-Yet-Members | $15 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
About Roanoke
“Brimming with optimism, youthful exuberance and creative energy….” – The Huffington Post
Based in Music City, Nashville, TN, Roanoke is a 5 piece that bridges a gap between Alternative and Americana/Folk by writing palatable & melodic songs under a blanket of roots instrumentation, electric guitars, multi-part harmonies and the instantly-recognizable vocals of principle lead singers Taylor Dupuis and Joey Beesley. Transitioning to a
full-time touring entity in 2018, Roanoke’s 2017 touring resume includes appearances at MerleFest, SunFest and Master Musicians Festival, while also being sought for private, corporate functions for LinkedIn and Opryland Resort — all of which came as a surprise in the band’s inbox. Artistically, Roanoke’s praise has been sung by Huffington Post and Spotify, the latter of which includes four Roanoke originals, “Silent Films,” “Tennessee Stone,” “Jordan” and “The Light,” on its OFFICIAL playlists, “Southern Gothic,” “Rustic Romance,” “Fresh Folk,” “Pulse of Americana,” and “Seize The Day!” respectively. New EP, distributed by Tone Tree, was released in summer 2018.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF ROANOKE
Time
(Friday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
5oct8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Wild Ponies
Event Details
PFS Presents Wild Ponies
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Wild Ponies
Saturday, October 5, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Get your tickets here!
$12 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $15 Not-Yet-Members | $18 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
About Wild Ponies
Although they’re based in Nashville, Wild Ponies have always looked to Southwest Virginia — where bandmates Doug and Telisha Williams were both born and raised — for inspiration. There, in mountain towns like Galax, old-time American music continues to thrive, supported by a community of fiddlers, flat-pickers, and fans.
Wild Ponies pay tribute to that powerful music and rugged landscape with 2017’s Galax, a stripped-back album that nods to the band’s history while still pushing forward. Doug and Telisha took some of their favorite musicians from Nashville (Fats Kaplin, Will Kimbrough, Neilson Hubbard and Audrey Spillman) and met up with revered Old-Time players from Galax, Virginia (Snake Smith, Kyle Dean Smith, and Kilby Spencer). Recorded in the shed behind Doug’s old family farm in the Appalachians (steps away from the site where Doug and Telisha were married), it returns Wild Ponies to their musical and geographic roots.
Growing up, a young Doug Williams spent many an hour watching and learning as his grandfather played banjo alongside local musical legends like Snake and Kyle Dean. Although both of his grandparents have now passed away, they would surely be proud to see Doug and Telisha gathered in the shed with Snake, Kyle Dean, Kilby, and a diverse handful of the best musicians from Nashville. The result is a broad, bold approach to Appalachian music, created by a multi-cultural band whose members span several generations.
Wild Ponies proudly dive into their old-school influences with songs like “Pretty Bird” — a rendition of the Hazel Dickens original — and the traditional mountain song “Sally Anne.” “My grandfather used to say, ‘It oughta been the goddamn National Anthem!'” Doug says of the latter song, which kicks off the album with gang vocals and fiddle. Even so, don’t mistake Galax for a traditionally-minded folk album. Wild Ponies offer up plenty of contemporary material, too, building a bridge between past and present. The lyrics reflect a similar mix of old and new, with Doug and Telisha Williams writing songs inspired by family heirlooms (including a wooden-bound, 70 year-old book of poems written by Doug’s grandfather, whose lines form the basis of “Here With Me”), the Catawba tree on the farm, the nostalgic pull of one’s birthplace, a mother’s tough lough, leaving and believing, and the cyclical natures of death and love. Although named after the town in which it was recorded, Galax looks far beyond the southwestern tip of Virginia for its source material.
“We didn’t want to go home to Virginia and just make an Old-Time record,” explains Doug. “We wanted to make something that still sounded like Wild Ponies. We asked everybody to stretch and reach towards something new, something different. We wanted to not only reconnect with our roots, but learn how those roots can also weave into our current world.”
Once everyone had arrived at the farm, Neilson Hubbard set up a makeshift studio in the shed. Just a few nice microphones in a circle. There’s no cell phone signal on the mountain. No WiFi. No distractions. Instead, everyone focused on making raw, genuine music, filling Galax’s track list with upright bass, acoustic guitar, twin fiddles, Telecaster, banjo, pedal steel, mandolin, harmonies, gang vocals, and even some stripped-down percussion. They recorded the songs live, never once pausing the process to listen to the performance they’d just captured. It wasn’t until Wild Ponies returned home to Nashville that they finally heard the wild magic documented during those mountaintop sessions.
Released on August 25th on Gearbox Records, Galax salutes Wild Ponies’ traditional roots while exploring new, progressive territory. It’s an album about the pieces of our past that stick with us, informing our present while pushing us toward a future. An album about a town, a country, and a world that’s forever spinning toward something new. An album that redefines Wild Ponies’ sound, while highlighting influences that have always rested just beneath the surface.
“We’ll always be the pinball that bounces between folk, rock & roll and country,” says Telisha, “and this Old-Time style will always weave its way through everything we do. It’s been there from the start, even on the loudest songs we’ve made. It only took us a couple of days to record it, but this is the album we’ve been making our whole lives. We just needed the right people and the right songs to finish it.”
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF WILD PONIES MAKING THEIR ALBUM ‘GALAX’
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO SONGS FROM WILD PONIES
CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT WILD PONIES
Time
(Saturday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
19oct8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Sloan Wainwright & Meghan Cary
Event Details
PFS Presents Meghan Cary & Sloan
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Meghan Cary & Sloan Wainwright
Saturday, October 19, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
$10 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $12 Not-Yet-Members | $15 Doors
About Meghan Cary & Sloan Wainwright
Meghan Cary didn’t mean to be a musician. When her fiancé unexpectedly died, she picked up his guitar, figured out how to play it, and wrote her debut, earning her Billboard Magazine’s Critic’s Choice for Best Newcomer. “I wrote my grief into song, and sang my way out of the abyss. I keep making music to help others connect with their own stories and find their joy.” Known for her unabashed willingness to connect with her audience, Cary brings listeners to their feet and at times to tears with high-energy tunes, masterful storytelling, and deeply personal lyrics that resonate universally. After pushing pause on performing to raise two children, Cary launched back onto the scene at Philly Folk Fest and was awarded an Emerging Artist Showcase at Falcon Ridge Folk Festival. Cary’s smoky voice, emotional singing, and vulnerable writing garner favorable comparisons to Melissa Etheridge, Shawn Colvin, and even Bruce Springsteen.
Sloan Wainwright. Defying standard categorization, singer/songwriter Sloan Wainwright, consistently demonstrates her easy command of a variety of American musical styles — pop, folk, jazz and blues — held together by the melodious tone of her rich contralto, with the end result being a unique and soulful hybrid. Her family tree (brother and folk-music luminary Loudon Wainwright, nephew Rufus Wainwright, nieces Martha Wainwright and Lucy Wainwright Roche) reads like a who’s who of contemporary folk music. Sloan’s incredible gift is not only her unique songwriting ability but also her dramatically voiced rendition of original songs.
“She’s folk influenced, but the real star here is her voice. Warm and smoky and smooth, it makes her earthy, ominous lyrics seem all the more intense.” With a solid and impressive discography of 10 original CD releases to her credit, Sloan continues to write, sing and perform live and has won two songwriting awards at the annual EmPower Posi Music Awards. In addition, Sloan has written numerous musical compositions for theater and dance and teaches at many of the best-known master songwriter series and workshops.
Sloan’s open spirit and first-hand experience is welcome –year after year– in the musical classrooms of such prestigious song camps as Richard Thompson’s Frets and Refrains, The Swannanoa Gathering, SummerSongs, WUMB Radio’s Summer Acoustic Music Week (SAMW), Winter Acoustic Music Weekend (WAMW), Moab Folk Camp, Cape Cod Songwriting Retreat and emPower Music & Arts Totally Cool Song School.
Time
(Saturday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
16nov8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Irish Mythen
Event Details
PFS Presents Irish Mythen with
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Irish Mythen with Andrea Nardello
Saturday, November 16, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Get your tickets here!
$14 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $17 Not-Yet-Members | $20 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
About Irish Mythen
Irish Mythen was born in Ireland and now resides in Charlottetown Prince Edward Island Canada.
“This Island creates music and musicians, art and artists. I found a shift to take things more seriously when I moved here.” And she did just that. Her latest release, the self titled Irish Mythen, gained her recognition around the globe with nominations and wins coming from Music PEI, East Coast Music Association, Folk Alliance International and Socan. Write-ups in Australian Guitar Magazine, the Rolling Stone, and a plethora of online publications world wide have helped plant Irish firmly on the map of ‘Must See Artists’.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF IRISH MYTHEN
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO IRISH MYTHEN ON SPOTIFY
CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT IRISH MYTHEN
OPENING ACT: ANDREA NARDELLO
Philly’s Andrea Nardello has garnered favorable comparisons to Melissa Etheridge and Shawn Colvin for melding pop songwriting smarts with a confessional and literate songwriting style, exploring relationships, romance, and her out family life. Nardello’s refined accessibility draws from folk, pop, rock, and even the swagger of hip-hop. She can tug at your heartstrings with her softer tunes and get you dancing on your feet with her upbeat songs and powerful voice. Fans ride an unforgettable emotional roller coaster during her live shows.
Nardello has been busy touring and has opened for well known artists like Colbie Caillat, Brandi Carlile, Tony Lucca, Gabe Dixon, Ron Pope, Emerson Hart of Tonic Fame, and Tim Reynolds of The Dave Matthews Band. After releasing ECHO, Nardello won the prestigious Philadelphia Songwriter’s Project Contest and won Tri-State Indie’s “Acoustic Artist Of The Year.” Her songs, “Leave The Light On” and “Home To Me” each won WSTW’s Award for Folk Song Of The Year.
Nardello also spends time fundraising for important causes like The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and The MILE (Music Is Love Exchange). Nardello completed two service trips to Guatemala in support of the MILE. The MILE is a network of artists, musicians, and music lovers that bring positivity and change to the lives of disadvantaged and underserved children, strengthening families and communities both in the U.S. and abroad. Nardello is always willing to help, offer her time and believes that music is a universal language that helps heal and connects us all.
Nardello teamed up with long time friend and collaborator, Matt Duke, to produce her new EP, Human, which was released on Noble Steed Music, last year. This beautifully haunting EP was recorded in Nardello’s home. She is excited to share it with her fans and expects to tour in the fall.
“For me, “Human” is a collection of songs that explores vulnerable topics. Loving someone when they are broken. Striving to challenge yourself when you are stuck. The final stages of life and all that is unknown. It is truly a soundtrack of my life and the people in it. I always get nervous before releasing new music and my only hope is that anyone who listens can connect to these songs in some special way.”
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF ANDREA NARDELLO
Time
(Saturday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
Upcoming Events
september 2019
22sep3:00 pm- 5:00 pmSeptember Monthly Concert with Amanda Rheaume
Event Details
September Monthly Concert
more
Event Details
September Monthly Concert with Amanda Rheaume
Sunday, September 22, 2019
Doors 2:30pm | Music 3pm
Get your tickets here!
FREE for Members *While Supplies Last* | $10 Not-Yet-Members | $15 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF AMANDA RHEAUME
About Amanda Rheaume
The fifth album from Ottawa-raised, Toronto-based singer/songwriter Amanda Rheaume, The Skin I’m In presents a compellingly portrait of an artist fully comfortable in her own skin, personally and musically.
Produced by Colin Cripps (Blue Rodeo, Junkhouse) at The Tragically Hip’s famed Bathouse Studio, it sports a full-blooded band sound, thanks to the contributions of an A-list musical supporting cast.
Rheaume’s supple and expressive vocals fit neatly in the centre of the sonic landscape, while her eloquent and well-crafted songs were written with such noted collaborators as Jason Blaine, Melanie Brulée, Jim Bryson, Justin Glasco, and Tim Bovaconti.
One of Rheaume’s great gifts as a songwriter is her ability to take the personal and make it universal, drawing upon her own experience to deliver messages with a wide resonance. She digs deep on The Skin I’m In, reflecting upon her Metis heritage, as on the profoundly moving title track and “Return To The Water,” and addressing issues of identity and mental health.
Her earlier albums met with widespread critical acclaim. 2013’s Keep A Fireearned her a 2014 Canadian Folk Music Award for Aboriginal Songwriter of The Year as well as a Juno Award nomination for Aboriginal Album of the Year, while 2016’s Holding Patterns received a Canadian Folk Music Awards nomination.
An engaging performer, Rheaume has developed a following across Canada and in Europe, where she tours regularly.
She has long employed her music as a force for good, as shown by three trips to Afghanistan to perform for Canadian military personnel, plus visits to the Alert base in Canada’s far north and the troubled Indigenous community of Attawapiskat.
Rheaume co-founded Babes4Breasts, an initiative that, through concerts and recording projects, raised money for breast cancer charities across Canada over a 10-year period.
This is an artist with a heart as big as her talent.
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO AMANDA RHEAUME ON SPOTIFY
CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT AMANDA RHEAUME
**Ticketing Policy**
The Philadelphia Folksong Society is proud to offer its’ members one or two free tickets (depending on membership level) to our selected Monthly Member Concert and Monthly House Concert every month. Due to the large number of members and limited seating, we ask that members reserve tickets when they know they can attend. If a member has reserved a ticket and cannot make it to the member concert of their choosing, they must contact the PFS office by phone or email prior to the event to cancel. Failure to do so will result in an inability to reserve your free member ticket to the following member concert.
If you arrive at a PFS member concert and have not reserved a ticket, you will only be seated ten minutes before show time if seats are still available.
If a member concert is listed as “sold out,” please contact Katie Kresz at kkresz@pfs.org to secure your spot atop the waitlist. You will be notified prior to the concert if seats become available.
PFS asks that all members show respect to their fellow members and the Society through following this policy.
Time
(Sunday) 3:00 pm - 5:00 pm
27sep8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Jonathan Byrd & The Pickup Boys
Event Details
PFS Presents Jonathan Byrd &
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Jonathan Byrd & The Pickup Boys
Friday, September 27, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Get your tickets here!
$12 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $15 Not-Yet-Members | $18 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
About Jonathan Byrd
Jonathan Byrd and The Pickup Cowboys are musical gunslingers, vaudevillian hucksters, and old-fashioned tent revivalists. Between heartbreaking ballads and heart-lifting sing-alongs, the Cowboys entertain and get audiences involved in the show.
Byrd is a preacher’s son, a Gulf War veteran, and an award-winning songwriter from Chapel Hill, NC, known for literary, outsider songs that have become campfire favorites. The Chicago Tribune called Byrd “one of the top 50 songwriters of the past 50 years.”
Joined on drums by Austin McCall (Kaira Ba, Violet Bell), and musical renaissance man Johnny Waken on guitar, saw, and mandolin, Byrd shares the often-missed, always poignant tales of the small people that make the world such a big place.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF JONATHAN BYRD
Time
(Friday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
28sep8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Talisk
Event Details
PFS Presents Talisk Saturday, September 28,
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Talisk
Saturday, September 28, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Click here to get your tickets!
$15 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $18 Not-Yet-Members | $21 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF TALISK
About Talisk
In their five years, Scottish firebrands Talisk have stacked up several major awards for their explosively energetic yet artfully woven sound, including 2018’s Belhaven Bursary for Innovation & 2017’s Folk Band of the Year both at the BBC Alba Scots Trad Music Awards, and a BBC Radio 2 Folk Award.
Mohsen Amini – the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards’ Musician of the Year 2018, Hayley Keenan and Graeme Armstrong seamlessly meld concertina, fiddle and guitar to produce a multi-layered, enthralling signature that has effortlessly captivated audiences from the USA to Australia, and throughout the UK.
Appearances at world-leading festivals – including the Cambridge Folk Festival, Denmark’s Tønder, WOMAD UK and Las Palmas, the Philadelphia Folk Festival, Celtic Colours, Milwaukee Irish Festival and five successive outings at Glasgow’s Celtic Connections – have amassed a die-hard following, whilst the world’s folk and world music media have also lauded high credits upon the trio. The release of their hotly anticipated second album, Beyond, in October 2018 was met with a five-star ‘Top of the World’ review in Songlines, praising the band as “incredibly infectious and endearing… fresh, invigorating, accomplished and playfully frisky.”
Time
(Saturday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
october 2019
4oct8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Roanoke
Event Details
PFS Presents Roanoke
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Roanoke
Friday, October 4, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Get your tickets here!
$8 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $10 Not-Yet-Members | $15 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
About Roanoke
“Brimming with optimism, youthful exuberance and creative energy….” – The Huffington Post
Based in Music City, Nashville, TN, Roanoke is a 5 piece that bridges a gap between Alternative and Americana/Folk by writing palatable & melodic songs under a blanket of roots instrumentation, electric guitars, multi-part harmonies and the instantly-recognizable vocals of principle lead singers Taylor Dupuis and Joey Beesley. Transitioning to a
full-time touring entity in 2018, Roanoke’s 2017 touring resume includes appearances at MerleFest, SunFest and Master Musicians Festival, while also being sought for private, corporate functions for LinkedIn and Opryland Resort — all of which came as a surprise in the band’s inbox. Artistically, Roanoke’s praise has been sung by Huffington Post and Spotify, the latter of which includes four Roanoke originals, “Silent Films,” “Tennessee Stone,” “Jordan” and “The Light,” on its OFFICIAL playlists, “Southern Gothic,” “Rustic Romance,” “Fresh Folk,” “Pulse of Americana,” and “Seize The Day!” respectively. New EP, distributed by Tone Tree, was released in summer 2018.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF ROANOKE
Time
(Friday) 8:00 pm - 10:00 pm
5oct8:00 pm- 10:00 pmPFS Presents Wild Ponies
Event Details
PFS Presents Wild Ponies
more
Event Details
PFS Presents Wild Ponies
Saturday, October 5, 2019
Doors 7:30pm | Music 8pm
Get your tickets here!
$12 for Members *While Supplies Last* | $15 Not-Yet-Members | $18 Doors
CLICK HERE TO RSVP ON FACEBOOK
About Wild Ponies
Although they’re based in Nashville, Wild Ponies have always looked to Southwest Virginia — where bandmates Doug and Telisha Williams were both born and raised — for inspiration. There, in mountain towns like Galax, old-time American music continues to thrive, supported by a community of fiddlers, flat-pickers, and fans.
Wild Ponies pay tribute to that powerful music and rugged landscape with 2017’s Galax, a stripped-back album that nods to the band’s history while still pushing forward. Doug and Telisha took some of their favorite musicians from Nashville (Fats Kaplin, Will Kimbrough, Neilson Hubbard and Audrey Spillman) and met up with revered Old-Time players from Galax, Virginia (Snake Smith, Kyle Dean Smith, and Kilby Spencer). Recorded in the shed behind Doug’s old family farm in the Appalachians (steps away from the site where Doug and Telisha were married), it returns Wild Ponies to their musical and geographic roots.
Growing up, a young Doug Williams spent many an hour watching and learning as his grandfather played banjo alongside local musical legends like Snake and Kyle Dean. Although both of his grandparents have now passed away, they would surely be proud to see Doug and Telisha gathered in the shed with Snake, Kyle Dean, Kilby, and a diverse handful of the best musicians from Nashville. The result is a broad, bold approach to Appalachian music, created by a multi-cultural band whose members span several generations.
Wild Ponies proudly dive into their old-school influences with songs like “Pretty Bird” — a rendition of the Hazel Dickens original — and the traditional mountain song “Sally Anne.” “My grandfather used to say, ‘It oughta been the goddamn National Anthem!'” Doug says of the latter song, which kicks off the album with gang vocals and fiddle. Even so, don’t mistake Galax for a traditionally-minded folk album. Wild Ponies offer up plenty of contemporary material, too, building a bridge between past and present. The lyrics reflect a similar mix of old and new, with Doug and Telisha Williams writing songs inspired by family heirlooms (including a wooden-bound, 70 year-old book of poems written by Doug’s grandfather, whose lines form the basis of “Here With Me”), the Catawba tree on the farm, the nostalgic pull of one’s birthplace, a mother’s tough lough, leaving and believing, and the cyclical natures of death and love. Although named after the town in which it was recorded, Galax looks far beyond the southwestern tip of Virginia for its source material.
“We didn’t want to go home to Virginia and just make an Old-Time record,” explains Doug. “We wanted to make something that still sounded like Wild Ponies. We asked everybody to stretch and reach towards something new, something different. We wanted to not only reconnect with our roots, but learn how those roots can also weave into our current world.”
Once everyone had arrived at the farm, Neilson Hubbard set up a makeshift studio in the shed. Just a few nice microphones in a circle. There’s no cell phone signal on the mountain. No WiFi. No distractions. Instead, everyone focused on making raw, genuine music, filling Galax’s track list with upright bass, acoustic guitar, twin fiddles, Telecaster, banjo, pedal steel, mandolin, harmonies, gang vocals, and even some stripped-down percussion. They recorded the songs live, never once pausing the process to listen to the performance they’d just captured. It wasn’t until Wild Ponies returned home to Nashville that they finally heard the wild magic documented during those mountaintop sessions.
Released on August 25th on Gearbox Records, Galax salutes Wild Ponies’ traditional roots while exploring new, progressive territory. It’s an album about the pieces of our past that stick with us, informing our present while pushing us toward a future. An album about a town, a country, and a world that’s forever spinning toward something new. An album that redefines Wild Ponies’ sound, while highlighting influences that have always rested just beneath the surface.
“We’ll always be the pinball that bounces between folk, rock & roll and country,” says Telisha, “and this Old-Time style will always weave its way through everything we do. It’s been there from the start, even on the loudest songs we’ve made. It only took us a couple of days to record it, but this is the album we’ve been making our whole lives. We just needed the right people and the right songs to finish it.”
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A VIDEO OF WILD PONIES MAKING THEIR ALBUM ‘GALAX’
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO SONGS FROM WILD PONIES
CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT WILD PONIES
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PFS Mission
The Philadelphia Folksong Society (PFS) is dedicated to preserving the past, promoting the present, and securing the future of folk music and related forms of expression through education, presentation, and participation
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