THIS CONCERT WILL TAKE PLACE IN THE PLEASANT FAMILY ASSEMBLY ROOM, LOCATED IN THE MAIN HALL OF WILSON LIBRARY DUE TO WEATHER FORECAST FOR THURSDAY.
March 31 Music on the Porch with Jon Shain, Rhiannon Giddens (of the Carolina Chocolate Drops) and Steve Kruger
Moderated by Peter Holsapple
Music on the Porch, southern music shaken and stirred, is an outdoor music series held four or five times a year at the Center for the Study of the American South. The series brings talented, knowledgeable, and eclectic musicians from around the region together to play and engage in discussion about sense of place, the creative process, and how the rich culture of the South influences music and musicians, with specific attention given to the thriving North Carolina music community. They take place at the Center’s offices, the Love House and Hutchins Forum, located at 410 East Franklin Street, Chapel Hill. Performances are Thursdays from 5 – 7 pm and are free and open to the public. There is limited seating on the porch, but lots of lawn. Bring a blanket and picnic and enjoy some wonderful music.
Jon Shain is the rare folkie who truly brings the “chops” to his songs along with the lyrics. From learning Piedmont Blues at the side of Big Boy Henry to his years playing with local folk-rock band Flyin’ Mice to his solo career, Shain has always weaved a variety of roots music influences into his songwriting. The last few years Shain has been playing esteemed listening rooms up and down the East Coast, in addition to doing some of the highest profile shows of his career – opening sold out theatre shows for John Hiatt, Keb’ Mo’, Little Feat, and others
It’s hard to contain the energy and enthusiasm of Rhiannon Giddens, a member of the Grammy winning Carolina Chocolate Drops. Her life story reads like a post-modern novel with overlapping plots. Talents and fascinations, whims and obsessions tumble over each other and pour out in a fiery stage performance rooted in disciplined virtuosity. It’s the training of opera overflowing into the unchained world of old-time music.
Steve Kruger picked up the guitar and banjo as a teenager, got bit by the old time bug and took up the fiddle and then spent the next 9 years playing in living rooms, dance halls and fiddlers conventions around North Carolina, East Tennessee and Southwestern Virginia. For his latest project, he is taking song texts from the Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore and putting them to music. He is a student in the University of North Carolina Folklore Program, and studies music, memory and land use issues.