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| Utah Phillips, 2007 |
Thomasina Winslow, 2007 |
Tom Winslow, 2007 |
Bearfoot, 2008 |
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PDF Downloads:
Full Calendar
(2.6 MB) Dec-Feb |
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Fridge Calendar
(156 KB) Dec-Feb |
All ticket sales are handled by our box office service, Brown Paper Tickets.
Tickets are available online, or through a 24/7 call-in box office.
See our Ticket Info page. |
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Calendar
April 2009
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| Listed ticket prices are: Non-Member / Member. Tickets sold at door cost additional $2. |
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| Wednesday, Apr 1 • 7 PM |
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Poetry Open Mic |
| $3 |
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With Featured Reader Mary Cuffe Perez |
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Mary Cuffe Perez is a writer and amateur naturalist living in Galway, New York. She has written a book of poems, The Woman of Too Many Days (Calyx Press), and a children's novel, Skylar (Philomel Books, 2008).
Her short fiction has appeared in New England Quarterly, Groundswell, 13th Moon and Salvage magazines. Her poetry has appeared in numerous literary magazines over the years, including Washout Review, Blueline, Bitterroot, Yankee Magazine and The Seattle Review.
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 “A Canadian Pete Seeger with a voice like Tony Bennett cranked to 11.”
—Gordon Gibb, Peterborough Examiner
Six-time Juno Award Nominee Ken Whiteley is one of Canada's finest musical statesmen, offering blues, gospel, swing and folk with infectious passion and virtuoso musicianship. He is competent on twenty different instruments! He has worked with blues and folk legends from Pete Seeger to Lonnie Johnson, performed at countless festivals, and is a "playing encyclopedia."
Drawing from the deep wells of many traditions, Whiteley creates something fresh at every show that communicates themes of freedom, love, spiritual aspiration and social comment.
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 “Del Rey…channels the spirit of Memphis Minnie while maintaining a thoroughly hip, Left Coast sense of cool.”
Seattle blueswoman Del Rey combines country blues, classic jazz and hillbilly boogie with a whole bunch of complex guitar grooves and sly humor. She travels worldwide playing guitar and ukelele and lecturing on American women musicians from the first half of the last century.
Since 2004 she has been collaborating with Maria Muldaur on tributes to Sister Rosetta Tharpe and Johnny Cash.
Credentials aside, Del is just about the wittiest thinker and most colorful player we've encountered in recent years.
Tonight we get the rare treat of guest accompanist Craig Flory on bass clarinet. In Del's words, "Bass clarinet and ukelele are the perfect couple!"
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| Sunday, Apr 5 • 11 AM to 12:15 PM |
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Workshop with Del Rey: Blue Yuke |
$25 |
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Learn to fingerpick melodies and accompaniment on blues pieces suitable for
the ukulele. Students will receive an introduction to right hand fingerpicking, what makes
a melody "blue," and songs from 1920s giants such as Charlie Jordan and Barbecue Bob.
Audio recorders are encouraged. This is an intermediate level workshop. Students are asked to be familiar with basic chords and be able to keep time. Maximum of 15 students.
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 “They've got charisma, energy, and kazoos, and they definitely have fun up there, with compositions that are little bit dorky and a little bit dirty.”
—AM New York
What better musical prescription for troubled times than an impeccably dressed, throwback, neo-vaudevillian duo whose live performances are a festival of expert musicianship; clever, off-center original tunes; hilarious banter, rowdy audience interactions, and free kazoos for the crowd?
Hailing from New York City, The Two Man Gentlemen Band combines hot jazz, vintage rhythm & blues, old-time country, and Tin Pan Alley to create a joyous two-man sound that is all their own.
Performing with plectrum banjo, guitar, string bass, dueling kazoos, novelty percussion, and a cornet, The Gentlemen whip themselves into a frenzy that is unlike any acoustic duo on the road today.
Without giving away any of the treats that are in store for the audience, suffice to say that it's The Gentlemen's charismatic embrace of a forgotten brand of barnstorming vaudevillian showmanship that makes them a must-see!
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| Wednesday, Apr 8 • 7 PM |
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Emerging Artist Breakout Series |
| $3 |
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Lyle Divinsky |
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 “The next Boston-area musical sensation”
—Boston Magazine (2008)
Miss Tess is a singer and songwriter from Cambridge, Mass. (by way of Baltimore) who is stuck gloriously in the past. Aptly naming her style "Modern Vintage," her music melds the early jazz of Bessie Smith with the gritty, modern lyrical sense of Tom Waits.
Her vocals can soar or caress as she strums and picks her way through an array of styles, from ragtime to blues; country to swing. A typical set conjures a cast of dreamers and lovers, down on their luck and charming their way in and out of trouble.
Tess will be backed by her four-piece band The Bon Ton Parade, a dynamic, solo-swapping combo comprised of sax and clarinet, upright bass, brushes on drums, and backing harmonies.
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| Saturday, Apr 11 |
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Caffè Lena Poetry Festival |
| Tickets available at door. No advance reservations. |
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Starts at noon and runs through the evening |
Day Pass: $10
Workshops: $10 each (must have day pass to participate)
Evening performance: $10 for day pass holders, $15 without
Complete Schedule and information....
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“…Mass production, the glory and curse of the 20th century,
replays words, pictures, politics and bad art
until it all seeps in like an Eskimo winter,
and sometimes the only way to clear the synapses
is a vigorous cranial wallbanger—or a good poem.”
—Michael R. Brown
 This year Caffè Lena greets the approaching spring and the arrival of National Poetry Month with a torrent of words: an all-day festival of poetry performance and workshops.
The program will feature twenty-minute readings throughout the afternoon by eleven stylistically varied, widely read poets from NYC, Rhode Island, Maine, the Capital District and the Adirondacks. Included will be Bernadette Mayer, Joseph Bruchac, Cara Benson, Michael Brown, Lyn Lifshin, Alan Catlin, Steven Huff, Miriam Axel-Lute, Barbara Ungar, Nancy White, M. Miriam Herrera and Jordan Smith.
Finishing the day will be a potluck dinner followed by a full-length reading by legendary counter-culture hero Ed Sanders.
Please check the Caffè Lena website for a full schedule of readings, workshops, and for information about the potluck dinner.
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Gather for conversation and a meal of appetizers, salads and main course dishes. Bring a dish for 10 people and eat for free, or pay $10 and fill your plate at the eclectic buffet. Limit 50. Please RSVP at 583-0022, or sarah@caffelena.org.
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Complete Schedule and information....
 Headlining our first Caffè Lena Poetry Festival is Ed Sanders, famed counter-culture figure of the '60s, who built a bridge between the Beatnik and Hippy generations. Sanders arrived in Greenwich Village in 1958 where he opened the Peace Eye Bookstore and founded the avant-garde journal Fuck You: A Magazine of the Arts.
His first major poem was Poem from Jail, written on toilet paper in his cell after being jailed for anti-nuclear protest. Other career highlights include helping Abbie Hoffman exorcise the Pentagon, founding the Fugs with Tuli Kupferberg, and writing The Family, a highly regarded profile of the Manson Family.
Ed's poetry has been likened in its energy and ambition to William Blake, Walt Whitman and Allen Ginsberg, blending slang, neologisms, Classical Greek, and Egyptian hieroglyphs. His most recent work is 1968: A History in Verse (1997), a book-length poem tracing the events of that year. He currently resides in Woodstock, NY where he publishes the Woodstock Journal and builds inventive musical instruments.
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| Sunday, Apr 12 |
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Closed for Easter |
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| Wednesday, Apr 15 • 7 PM |
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Emerging Artist Breakout Series |
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C.E. Skidmore |
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| Friday, Apr 17 • 7:30 PM |
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Caffè Lena at the Charles R. Wood Theater |
| $25 |
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An Evening with Tom Paxton |
| www.tompaxton.com |
 Folk music legend and fun, topical songwriter Tom Paxton has spent more than four decades addressing issues of social justice, laying bare the absurdities of modern culture and celebrating the tender bonds of family, friends, and community.
Dirty Linen calls Tom, "Perceptive…clever…ranks up there with The Beatles and Bob Dylan."
In honor of his outstanding accomplishments and legendary passion and artistry, Tom Paxton was honored with a lifetime achievement award at the 51st Annual Grammy Awards in February of 2009.
His latest album, Comedians and Angels, was nominated for a Grammy in the category of Best Traditional Folk Album.
Tom was a regular performer at the Caffè Lena during the '60s and '70s. In order to accommodate Tom's many fans, and to bring Caffè Lena-style entertainment to new listeners, we have chosen to present this special concert at the Charles R. Wood Theater at 207 Glen Street in downtown Glens Falls.
To buy tickets please call The Wood Box Office at 518-798-9663, or buy online at www.woodtheater.org. |
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 Jo Henley is not actually the name of an individual. Rather it is an original, Boston-based roots-pop band whose catchy songs and accessible sound have earned them a regular string of shows up and down the East Coast. Following the release of their 2008 album, Sad Songs and Alcohol, the band is now starting to play the West Coast and has charted in the Americana Music Association's top 100 based on national radio play.
With a sound reminiscent of Neil Young meets Nickel Creek, Jo Henley offers, "sincere, strong and sweet music, with an acoustic bluegrass/folk authenticity and tuneful pop sensibility." —Michael Hochanadel, Daily Gazette |
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 Proud practioners of the American folk tradition, Phil Shapiro is a folksinger and guitarist, and Carrie Shore is a fiddle player, singer and harmonizer. Together they play fascinating, energetic songs from the last couple hundred years of American traditional song, and add newer songs written squarely in the folk tradition.
Carrie, a classically trained violinist, has a super repertoire of fiddle tunes, and Phil is a fine finger-style guitarist, creative and lively, good at getting his guitar to "talk", to be part of the song and the story. And true to the folk tradition, the other part of the equation is The Audience, which sings right back under Phil and Carrie's skillful direction.
Just in case you don't recognize his name in this context, this is the Phil Shapiro who hosts WVBR's Bound for Glory radio show, North America's longest-running live folk concert, broadcast on Sunday nights out of Ithaca NY since 1967.
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| Sunday, Apr 19 |
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Tom Chapin |
3 PM – One Hour Concert for Kids, $25 adult / $12.50 child
7 PM – Concert for Adults, $25 for adults, no children’s discount available
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| www.tomchapin.com |
 For more than thirty years Tom Chapin has entertained audiences of all ages with life-affirming original songs told in a sophisticated array of musical styles.
The New York Times calls Tom Chapin "one of the great personalities in contemporary folk music."
He has recorded seven albums of adult-oriented material inspired by Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie, and his numerous family albums have received awards from the American Library Association, Parents' Choice, five Grammy nominations for Best Musical Album For Children, and three Grammy Awards for Best Spoken Word Album for Children.
In 2008 Tom joined the likes of Benny Goodman, Odetta, Stephen Sondheim and Dave Brubeck as a winner of the prestigious American Eagle Award in recognition of his "great contribution to music and music education in our nation."
Tom's next CD, Let The Bad Times Roll, is due out in Apr. Following that will be another family CD due out in June.
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 Originally from New Orleans and currently based in Nashville, Mary Gauthier has battled back from hard knocks and bad habits to emerge as one of the most poignant and powerful songwriters of her generation.
Gauthier draws moving portraits of the disenfranchised and edgier characters among us, and the darker corners of the heart and soul. She shows the hard-earned knowledge of herself in her understanding and compassion for the stories of others.
Her latest album, released in 2008 on Lost Highway, is Between Daylight & Dark. Paste Magazine writes, “Gauthier's fifth album is a triumph that should catapult her to the forefront of Americana singer/songwriters.”
Boston singer-songwriter Chris O'Brien was named WUMB Artist of the Year, was a finalist in Prairie Home Companion's People In Their 20s Talent Contest and the Mountain Stage New Song Competition. His song Rosa has become a sing-along favorite in folk circles. |
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| Wednesday, Apr 22 • 7 PM |
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Emerging Artist Breakout Series |
| $3 |
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Tristan Allen |
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 Called "a cross between the Dixie Chicks and O' Brother, Where Art Thou'' this hot NYC trio blends their voices on irresistible songs by Gillian Welch, Iris DeMent and Hank Williams, adding in bluegrass standards, old-time southern gospel, and classic American tunes.
You simply can't hear them without falling in love.
Their latest album, Love and Other Tragedies, made it to the Americana Music Association's Top 100 albums of 2008, The Online Folk Festival's Top 10 of 2008 List, the Best of 2008 WFUV Staff Picks, and DJ Ron Olesko's Favorite CDs of 2008. Good job, Red Molly!
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Tom Winslow is an old-school acoustic bluesman, picking and singing in a classic style. He studied with Rev. Gary Davis, collaborated with Pete Seeger, and released an album on the Biograph label.
He first came to Saratoga to work with the horses and has for many years enjoyed playing gigs around the area, including at Lena's.
His daughter Thomasina spent her childhood performing and touring with her father. Now a mature talent in her own right, Thomasina blends classics with her own deep originals.
Nick Katzman is Thomasina's European touring partner. He learned his skills directly from the old masters of the pre-war blues generation. His repetoire mixes low-down delta blues, folk-blues tunes, "hokum" ragtime numbers and virtuoso instrumentals.
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 From her birthplace on a Vermont sheep farm to Beirut cafés, Cairo apartments and Austin recording studios, Anaïs Mitchell has been around. In her unique, poetic songs listeners hear the Virginia countryside, bathe in New Mexico moonlight and listen to the world whizzing by from inside a hobo's train car.
This remarkable young artist with an innocent girlish voice, who set out to do no more than indulge her love of language and truth, was catapulted into the national folk spotlight after capturing the prestigious Kerrville New Folk Award and getting signed to Righteous Babe Records, the indie label run by Anais's musical hero Ani DiFranco.
Anais's Righteous Babe debut The Brightness is a  decidedly intimate listening experience. Spilling over with worldly metaphors, intense emotions and unshakeable reverence to the art of song, it shimmers with creative spark. In the words of reviewer Margaret Reges, "She has the earthiness of Shawn Colvin, the child-like bite of Joanna Newsom, and the urban jumpiness of Ani DiFranco." |
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| Wednesday, April 29 • 7 PM |
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Emerging Artist Breakout Series |
| $4 |
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Rik Kent & Eric Hauenstein |
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Photo:
Utah Phillips
© 2007, Joseph Deuel
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Photo:
Thomasina Winslow
© 2007, Joseph Deuel
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Photo:
Tom Winslow
© 2007, Joseph Deuel
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Photo:
Bearfoot
© 2008, Joseph Deuel |
Copyright © 1998-2010, Caffè Lena, Inc.
All Rights Reserved |
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