Stowe Performing Arts

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	Click here to Purchase Tickets Online July 7 at 7:30 p.m. Union Bank presents Vermont Symphony Orchestra 2013 TD BANK SUMMER FESTIVAL TOUR Summer Songbook Anthony Princiotti, Conductor; Sara Jean Ford, Soprano Broadway star Sara Jean Ford joins the VSO for hits from the Great American Songbook— the golden age of American songwriting. Vocal numbers by Rodgers & Hart, Cole Porter, and Gershwin share the spotlight with irresistible big band tunes made famous by Benny Goodman. Orchestral favorites by Bernstein, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Rossini—drawn from the world of opera—add drama, fantasy, and exoticism to the songful theme. The concert closes with the traditional 1812 Overture, marches, and fireworks. This performance by the Vermont Symphony Orchestra is made possible in part by a grant from the State of Vermont. Fireworks photo by Bill Jalbert Additional support provided by Davis and Hodgdon CPAs and WCVT 101.7 Learn more about the Vermont Symphony Orchestra by visiting www.vso.org.
	Click here to Purchase Tickets Online July 28 at 7:00 p.m. BlueCross BlueShield of Vermont presents Citigrass GOT BLUEGRASS? The current all-star lineup was formed by banjoist/founder Sandy Israel, who pioneered the concept of Citigrass by combining the speed and virtuosity of bluegrass with the rebel yell of rock and roll. Sandy's road to banjo nirvana took him from the D.C. punk scene to performing on the crowded streets of Tokyo, and finally to Citigrass Headquarters in Brooklyn, where he leads one of the largest and most active banjo teaching studios in the New York area. BAND MEMBERS: SANDY ISRAEL - BANJO & VOCALS Sandy Israel is the visionary and spokesperson behind CITIGRASS. A top banjo innovator and teacher, Sandy set out to create a hot musical blend of bluegrass & rock with an urban twist; possessing an eye for talent he hand picked the members in the group. His intention from the start has been to innovate, cultivate and brand the band by forming a new genre "urban bluegrass." KENJI BUNCH- FIDDLE, VIOLA & VOCALS Fiddler Kenji Bunch wears many different hats. Mild-mannered Juilliard-trained classical violist and composer by day, Kenji unleashes musical mayhem at night with his dead on Johnny Cash impersonation, love of overblown 80's pop tunes, and general inclination toward the absurd. When no one was looking, he wrote two symphonies, an opera, and a whole stack of other music that has been recorded numerous times and performed by over thirty orchestras on six continents. Also a highly sought after arranger, he's worked, performed, and recorded with the likes of Paul McCartney, Aretha Franklin, The Who, Prince, Lenny Kravitz, Widespread Panic, Ornette Coleman, and Bobby McFerrin, to name a few. NOAH CHASE - LEAD VOCALS, MANDOLIN & GUITAR Mandolinist and lead vocalist Noah Chase is also front-man for the veteran rock band Soulfarm and has played and recorded with Perry Farrell, Bruce Hornsby, and Shawn Colvin among many others. Noah's pure gold voice and tremendous stage presence are well known on stages up and down the East Coast, and has achieved near-legendary status in Israel, where he first emerged as a musician. Noah often incorporates elements of his unique background into the band, infusing the strings with hypnotic djembe beats and Middle-Eastern inspired vocalizing. TIM KIAH - UPRIGHT BASS, VOCALS Versatile bassist Tim Kiah is yet another musical shape-shifter. With quite possibly the fastest fingers legally allowed on an upright bass, Tim is an active performer on the NYC jazz circuit, collaborating and touring the world with top jazz players including Ravi Coltrane, Ron Carter, and Roy Nathanson. Also a composer and dedicated music educator, Tim has received a grant from Chamber Music America. Regulars at Citigrass live shows learn early on to buckle in and hold on for dear life when Timmy gets that sparkle in his eye and unleashes the wrath of his "doghouse" bass. JAMES KERR - DOBRO, GUITAR, VOCALS James Kerr, Dobro, plays and sings the old songs the way they used to be played. Each twang of his resophonic guitar is an antique relic from a simpler time gone by. James was a top prize winner at the Roxbury Flatpicking Guitar Contest and his debut solo recording, "Atmosphere," has received extensive airplay on folk radio programs nationwide. He has become an in-demand dobro and steel player on the New York scene, and also plays and tours with progressive Newgrass outfit The Five Deadly Vemons. LEAH LATELLA - UKULELE, GUITAR, VOCALS Soulful songstress Leah Latella is a North Carolina native filled with southern charm. Her strong and clear vocals add a new and beautiful layer to the once all male band. Leah grew up singing in theatre, the pew at church and harmonizing with her father on car rides to school. She got her taste of New York when she sang the national anthem in Yankee Stadium with The UNC Loreleis and moved to New York after graduation. With ukulele and guitar she writes catchy melodies for Citigrass and her original folk band, PartyFolk.
	Click here to Purchase Tickets Online August 25 at 6:00 pm KneeBinding, Inc. presents Carolyn Wonderland Band A musical force equipped with the soulful vocals of Janis and the guitar slinging skills of Stevie Ray, CAROLYN WONDERLAND reaches into the depths of the Texas blues tradition with the wit of a poet. She hits the stage with unmatched presence, a true legend in her time. She'd grown up the child of a singer in a band and began playing her mother's vintage Martin guitar when other girls were dressing dolls. She'd gone from being the teenage toast of her hometown Houston to sleeping in her van in Austin amid heaps of critical acclaim for fine recordings Alcohol & Salvation, Bloodless Revolution, and most recently, Miss Understood. Along with the guitar and the multitude of other instruments she learned to play - trumpet, accordion, piano, mandolin, lap steel - Wonderland's ability to whistle remains most unusual. Whistling is a uniquely vocal art seldom invoked in modern music, yet it's among the most spectacular talents the human voice possesses. That vocal proficiency was well-established in the singer's midteens, landing her gigs at Fitzgerald's by age 15. She absorbed Houston influences like Little Screamin' Kenny and soaked up the Mad Hatter of Texas music, Doug Sahm. The Lone Star State was as credible and fertile a proving ground for blues in the 1980s as existed, especially in Austin with Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble, the Fabulous Thunderbirds, Angela Strehli, Omar & the Howlers, and Lou Ann Barton all in their prime. By the following decade, Austin's blues luster thinned, but Houston, always a bastion of soul and R&B, boasted the Imperial Monkeys with the effervescent Carolyn Wonderland as ruler of the jungle. In the early 1990s Wonderland & the Imperial Monkeys were invited to the Guadalupe Street Antone's in Austin. There, they were treated like royalty with the singer as the queen of hearts in the club's post-Stevie Ray Vaughan stable, which included Toni Price, Johnny and Jay Moeller, Sue Foley, Mike and Corey Keller, and the Ugly Americans. It was a good bar for the Monkeys to hang, and Austin felt so comfortable that when the band called it quits a few years later, she set her sights on Austin at the start of the millennium. Living in Austin renewed Carolyn Wonderland's focus on her multiple talents, underlining luxurious vocals with fine guitar work, trumpet, and piano, as well as that remarkable ability to whistle on key. A series of each-better-than-the-next discs began with Alcohol & Salvation in 2003 ("songs about booze and God; records are a time capsule of what happened that year"). Her music played in television series such as Time of Your Life and Homicide. Her circle of musician friends and admirers broadened to include not only Ray [Benson, who produced Miss Understood] but also the late Eddy Shaver, Shelley King, and yes, Bob Dylan, who likened her composition "Bloodless Revolution" to "a mystery movie theme." She began co-writing with locals Sarah Brown, Ruthie Foster, Cindy Cashdollar, and Guy Forsyth; sat in with Los Lobos, Robert Earl Keen, and Ray Wylie Hubbard; recorded with Jerry Lightfoot; and toured with Buddy Guy and Johnny Winter. She also claims membership in the all-girl Sis Deville, the gospel-infused Imperial Crown Golden Harmonizers, and takes aw-shucks credit for inspiring Amsterdam's annual WonderJam. It was magic in the studio, too, as Miss Understood came to life, a canny mix of Benson's production, Wonderland's compositions, and select covers of Terri Hendrix, J.J. Cale, and Rick Derringer that punched her sound up a notch. As soon as the album roared to life, it was clear the singer-songwriter-guitarist-whistler had delivered on her long-awaited promise. (Photo by Todd V. Wolfson)

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