Hello friends.
In recent news, Becky and I helped host the fifth annual Northern Roots Festival here in Brattleboro, VT. Once again it was a great day of very traditional music with local players and near-by friends sharing our music in workshops and performances, pub singing and jamming. It’s been wonderful to see our event grow steadily over the past few years. It’s always the last Saturday of January, so if you are in this part of the country, come and join us next year.
In other highlights, Becky and I returned to the (also annual) Tropical Dance Vacation in St Croix where we played for a week of contra dancing with Wild Asparagus. Unless you have come or are thinking of coming, you don’t even want to hear how good that is.
Another annual event that I just attended for the first time was Hanneke Cassel’s Pure Dead Brilliant Weekend. It’s an intimate weekend in central Massachusetts at the home of Jerry and Nancy Bell with a select group of fiddlers, cellos and guitarists. We had some great music.
Coming right up, I’ll be doing another small solo show, this time in the Boston area. That’s this Sunday, Feb 26th at 7:30pm in Somerville. Email Julie for reservations (julievallimont@gmail.com)
We have a family trip to France in March where we hope to take in some good music and dancing. I’ll report on that when we are back. In April, we are both going to Florida with Wild Asparagus for a little dance tour. We have a duo concert in Brooklyn at the end of April and I’ll do a solo show in New Jersey with the Folk Project gang later that weekend. I hope to have details up on our gig calendar soon.
Finally, planning ahead for the summer, Becky and I will once again run our Northern Roots teaching weekend just outside Brattleboro. This year we are very happy to have Shannon Heaton and Tina Lech joining us. Shannon is a dear friend and a truly outstanding Irish style flute player. She is also an incredible teacher. She was at our first Northern Roots weekend and we are really happy to have her again. Tina is a fantastic Irish fiddler based in Boston. I’ve known Tina for many years though we have never had a chance to play much together. Becky and I are really excited to have Tina at Northern Roots Weekend. The dates are July 6 – 8. It’s a small camp so if you are interested, you should consider signing up early. More info here http://bmcvt.org/summer/northern-roots-weekend
All for now. All the best,
Keith