Local 1000 AFM

The Traveling Musicians Union

Old Time

Annie Patterson

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One of America’s premiere song leaders and co-creator of the songbooks Rise Up Singing and Rise Again, Annie is also an accomplished performer and jazz vocalist. She carries with her a suitcase of incredible song knowledge and a repertoire that includes over 2400 songs from many genres, including Americana, contemporary folk, ballads, gospel, country and jazz.  Annie is a master song interpreter, accompanying herself on guitar and banjo. She loves to collaborate with other artists. Her folk recording, Mountain Side, features Annie’s stunning vocals along with haunting harmonies by the talented voices of Tracy Grammer, Katryna and Nerissa Nields and Mary Witt of the O-Tones.

Annie sings in the swing band Girls From Mars, the acoustic trio Dear Ella, and the Joni Mitchell tribute band Big Yellow Taxi.  She has also toured with well loved folk musicians and union buddies Charlie King, Emma’s Revolution, and Magpie, to name a few.  She is an accomplished side musician as well as solo performer, knows her way around sound (including running hybrid concerts) and has been involved in many studio projects for other musicians, as well as having several records of her own.

“It isn’t enough that Annie Patterson co-edited two of the most popular songbooks in history (Rise Up Singing and Rise Again).  She is also a compelling performer with  a passion for singing songs of hope, love and justice.  She can sing jazz standards or songs from the folk repertoire, with enthusiasm that can make the meekest singer join in on the chorus. Her musicianship, dynamic presence and commitment to making the world better through song ring out with every note she sings.” – Sally Rogers

 “Her stage presence is infectious; she could get a roomful of store mannequins to break out in song.”  – Peter Berryman

Lui Collins

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“…one of New England’s clearest and most distinctive folk voices, with unusually piercing lyrical insight…” – Hartford Courant

“Folksinger for our times.” – The Boston Herald

“…one of New England’s first and brightest stars.” – The Boston Globe

Folk singer/songwriter Lui Collins has been performing, writing and recording for over 45 years, her early Philo and Green Linnet recordings earning international acclaim and establishing her as a respected voice in the folk world. Lui has shared the stage with such notables as Pete Seeger, Bonnie Raitt, Stan Rogers, Dar Williams, and John Gorka. Renowned guitarist Dave van Ronk called her “one of the best guitarist-arrangers I have heard in years.”

“Lui sings my songs better than I do.” – Canadian folk icon Stan Rogers

From playful 4-string arrangements of some favorite original songs, to the fabulous jazz chords in American standards and Bossa nova, Lui translates her rich and complex guitar arrangements onto her tenor ukulele to create something unexpected and delightful.

Lui is often joined by guitarist/Grammy-nominated producer and longtime collaborator, Anand Nayak, accompanying her in a wide range of styles and languages. Their decade plus of creative collaboration is evident in the fluid musical dialogue of their live performance.

Additional quotes:

“Lui Collins sings the way people did a great long time ago, before most of us forgot how to breathe.” – Andrew Calhoun, Waterbug Records

“Lui’s got the juju!” – Geoff Bartley, singer-songwriter, guitarist

“Lui has a gentle way of capturing the hearts of her audience and having what amounts to a musical conversation with them during her performances… No one weaves a spell quite like she can.”

– Champlain Valley Folk Festival Newsletter

Joel Simpson

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Joel Simpson has been a self-employed musician since 2001. Growing up in a musical family, Joel started playing guitar as well as singing/songwriting at a young age. His passion for music led him to earn a music business degree from Elmhurst University, and found Randomosity Records in Downers Grove, Illinois. He splits his time between private instruction, music production, and music performance.  Joel is proficient on voice and many string instruments. His production work focuses on folk and jazz. Joel has recorded with Lee Murdock, Ashley & Simpson, The Chancey Brothers and many more.

Saskia Tomkins

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Saskia Tomkins is a master musician on Violin/Fiddle, Viola, Cello and Nyckelharpa, who moved to Canada from England in 2007. She is classically trained with a folk background and a B.A.hons. in Music (Jazz). Saskia won All Britain Champion Irish Fiddler and in October 2022, was given an award for her services to Irish music in Canada by Comhaltus Canada.

Over the years, Saskia has worked with many musicians, including:  Jimmy Bowskill, The Chieftains, Kim Doolittle, Tim Edey, Tim Garland, “Jabbour”, Robb Johnson, Sonja Kristina (Curved Air), Ron Korb, James McKenty, David Newland, Donald Quan, “Sin E”  Ted Staunton , “Sultans of String”, “Uriah Heep”, Lotus Wight (Sam Allison), Ken Whiteley, “Al-pha-X” and Astrid Young, her husband Steáfán Hannigan and son Oisín Hannigan, and a plethora of other amazing musicians, actors and dancers!

Her theatre work includes: Originating the “Celtic-ifying” of the Broadway hit “Come From Away” in it’s first 2 years of development; touring with The English Shakespeare Company and Michael Bogdanov; 8 seasons with 4th Line Theatre, Ontario;  and working with dancers at Sadler’s Wells Theatre, London UK;

Saskia’s current personal projects include and Irish instrumental duo: Steáfán & Saskia with husband Steáfán Hannigan, the instrumental jazz/roots duo: 2ish, with Brandon Scott Besharah; the Celtic crossover group: Cáirdeas and the jazz trio: Marsala and the Imports. She frequently plays Nyckelharpa with Sultans of String and fiddle/ viola in the Maple Leaf Jug Band. Saskia is principal 2nd violin for Quinte Symphony Orchestra, and also teaches at Upbeat! an El Systema organisation in Peterborough, Ontario.

She loves to do session work, collaborate with others, be on the road, and share her skills at workshops. Currently working on the P2 thing to be able to tour in the USA.

 

Sharon Abreu

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Sharon Abreu (“Ah-BRAY’oo”)

Sharon Abreu is a singer, songwriter, instrumentalist, teacher, and student of life. She was singing harmony with her family around the dinner table by the age of 3. Sharon grew up with many musical influences, from classical and opera to Broadway to folk, pop and rock, and she enjoys mixing those up in her concerts. She performs as a solo artist and also as half of the acoustic Irthlingz Duo with her partner Michael Hurwicz. She has performed at venues as diverse as the Northwest Folklife Festival, the Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, and the United Nations.

Sharon was studying classical singing in New York City when she attended a pumpkin festival in the West Village and ended up joining the sponsoring organization, Hudson River Sloop Clearwater. Through her work with Clearwater, she started using her voice and songs for environmental education and ended up singing in concert with legendary folksinger Pete Seeger.

Sharon has sung lead roles in operas including The Marriage of Figaro, Don Giovanni and The Magic Flute.  She’s been a soloist in performances of major choral works including Bach’s Magnificat and B Minor Mass and Mozart’s Requiem and Vespers. Sharon starred in a sold-out run of the musical The Taffetas at the Orcas Center and in summer stock at the Ferry Terminal in Bellingham, Washington. Sharon has provided music for major international Earth summits at the United Nations in New York and the World Summit on Sustainable Development in South Africa. And she was honored to sing for Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai in Berkeley, California in 2006.

In 2007, she prepared New York City high school students to perform her climate change musical revue Penguins on Thin Ice for the U.N. Commission on Sustainable Development, receiving a standing ovation from a full auditorium of international delegates.

In 2016, Sharon performed her one-woman musical show The Climate Monologues in the Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival, the United Solo Theatre Festival in New York, and for The MarshStream Theatre Festival online in 2021. She received the “Spirit of Nature, Ecology & Society” Environmental Justice Award for her performance of The Climate Monologues, at the Culture of Climate Change Colloquium at the City University of New York in 2011. Sharon composed and recorded the songs for Zero Waste Washington’s public school education program.

Sharon teaches voice, violin and piano, and she has been the vocal coach for musicals including Billy Elliot and Mamma Mia. For 2-1/2 years, she was a Musician-in-Residence with the Orcas Island Chamber Music Festival, bringing music and singing to local preschools. She is featured in Professor Mark Pedelty’s books, Ecomusicology (2012) and A Song to Save the Salish Sea: Environmentalist Musicians in the Pacific Northwest (2016).

Sharon has been a member of the Local 1000 North American Traveling Musicians Union, American Federation of Musicians, AFL-CIO since 1997.

Windborne

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“A quartet the likes of which I haven’t seen since… Coope, Boyes and Simpson, the Watersons, or The Voice Squad. Just absolutely phenomenal!” -BBC Traveling Folk

Windborne combines bold and innovative harmonies, styles from a variety of cultures with traditions of harmony singing, and a vocal blend that comes from longtime friendship and years of singing together. They also carry on the alliance of folk music and social activism, breathing new life into songs of change from the past that still ring true in modern times.

“The best musical discovery of the year…Stunningly powerful vocal harmony… Windborne sets a new bar for folk harmony singing today”  -Brian O’Donovan, WGBH-NPR

 

Hear Windborne in action:

Song of the Lower Classes – a protest song from the Chartists in England in the 1840s, a grassroots movement for voting rights

Stabat Mater (Corsica) live in Mont-Saint-Michel – a traditional setting of the Stabat Mater text from southern Corsica. A clip of this video went viral on TikTok in 2021, getting over 2 million views!

The Song of Hard Times  – Windborne’s arrangement and expansion of a song from the 1930s, found in the archives at the Library of Congress

WindborneSingers.com

Facebook.com/WindborneSingers

Instagram / TikTok: @WindborneSingers

YouTube.com/WindborneSingers

 

MORE ABOUT WINDBORNE:

Internationally acclaimed vocal ensemble Windborne is a group of vocal chameleons who specialize in close harmony singing, shifting effortlessly between drastically different styles of traditional music within the same concert. Their musical knowledge spans many cultures, but they remain deeply rooted in American folk singing traditions – a typical concert program includes music ranging from American labor anthems and English ballads to ancient Corsican polyphony and traditional Quebecois tunes.

 

Hailed as “the most exciting vocal group in a generation,” Lynn Mahoney Rowan, Will Thomas Rowan, Lauren Breunig, and Jeremy Carter-Gordon share a vibrant energy onstage – their connection to each other and to the music clearly evident. They educate as they entertain, telling stories about the music and explaining the characteristics and stylistic elements of the traditions in which they sing. 

 

But there’s another, crucial dimension to Windborne. They are adherents to folk music’s longtime association with social activism, in particular its ties to the labor and civil rights movements and others that champion the poor, the working class, and the disenfranchised. Breathing new life into old songs, they seek out music from movements over the past 400 years and sing them for the struggles of today’s world. They believe deeply in the power of music to change hearts.

In addition to performing in New England and around the world, Windborne has taught workshops in schools, community centers, singing camps, and universities. Seasoned teachers and song-leaders, they delight groups young and old with enthusiastic, clear, and nuanced instruction for musicians of all levels of experience. Singers not only learn the notes of a song, but also work on the varied vocal styles, language pronunciation, and gain an understanding of the song in its original cultural context.

In 2014, Windborne was one of 10 groups selected by American Music Abroad and the US Department of State to tour as cultural ambassadors through music. They traveled to Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Angola, touring with internationally known artists, performing at sold-out national theaters, and collaborating with traditional musicians in each country. They also taught music and dance workshops to schoolchildren, English-language learners, dance schools, choirs, and music conservatories.

 

Ash Devine

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The award-winning and versatile Appalachian-indie-folk-country-fusion singer-songwriter, performance artist, and multi-generational arts program designer Ash Devine is based the Blue Ridge Mountains of Blacksburg, VA and Asheville, North Carolina. Devine, who is considered by some as one of the last ‘folk troubadours’ is also known for her unique finger-style ukulele and guitar sound, and for her participation in humanitarian efforts through music, education, and the arts.

In addition to producing several albums of original music, Ash has performed and studied along side Nobel peace prize nominee Patch Adams M.D., Heritage award winning ballad singer Sheila Kay Adams, Grammy award nominee and folklorist David Holt, and a number of other renowned folklorists and internationally acclaimed musicians. Her versatile Appalachian folk revival-fusion sound is bursting with stylistic variety, relatable story, and historical facts. Her music is influenced in style by Traditional Appalachian, Joan Baez, Joni Mitchell, Jean Richie, Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, Maybelle Carter, Leslie Riddle, Ani Difranco, Kate Wolfe, Bob Dylan, and reggae/world music influences such as the Wailers, Jimmy Cliff, and west African traditional music.

In 2015 Ash Devine starred as the legendary Maybelle Carter and musically directed the play Esley: The Life and Music of Leslie Riddle. From 2016-2019 Ash Devine studied Appalachian traditional folk songs from the Western, NC area with Smithsonian Folkways Award winning ballad singer Sheila Kay Adams. In 2018, Devine was invited to perform with a group of WNC Appalachian song carriers at the Library of Congress at the American Folk Life Center in Washington, DC. Ash is award winning, in 2013 her original music was selected for 1st place at the Twin Rivers Media Festival in Asheville, NC, in 2008 she won 1st place for Brown Bag Songwriter’s Competition in Asheville, NC, and in 2001 Devine was awarded best composition for an original song at Roanoke, VA’s downtown Music Lab.

Devine performs all original concerts, blended traditional/contemporary/original variety style concerts, a one woman show about the legendary Carter Family and the influences and origins of the music they played, and Devine performs personalized therapeutic and formal concerts for the care setting.

Dan Schatz

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Traditional and contemporary folksinger, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer

Chuck Mitchell

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Chuck is a hubert humphrey democrat sensitive new age guy. He started singing in Detroit folk clubs and saloons back in the 1960’s. In Toronto, on his first out of town gig, he met a bony blonde Canadian songwriter named Joni Anderson. They married, and as a duo Chuck and Joni Mitchell played the coffeehouse circuit and gin rummy until she was 48,760 points and 50 home made songs ahead, and then they divorced.

In 2018, Chuck’s fellow FARM (Folk Alliance Regional Midwest) folk gave him the Lantern Bearer Award for “significant contribution to folk music in the Midwest”.  He couldn’t have been more grateful, telling his fellow farmers that after fifty-some years glowing next to a floodlight, it was really nice to be recognized.

In his one man show, Mitchell plays 6 and 12 string guitar and sings cabaret songs, animal songs, story songs, and Mitchell songs. He weaves poetry by Sandburg-Frost-Brecht-Hopkins and others into his shows. He has appeared on the Merv Griffin show (once) and A Prairie Home Companion’ (thrice).

His acting credits include ‘The World of Carl Sandburg’ (in the USA and the UK), Harold Hill in ‘The Music Man’, Woody in ‘Woody Guthrie’s American Song’, and Stephen Foster in ‘Mr. Foster & Mr. Twain’.  Ask Siri and Alexa and the other streamers to play Chuck’s music. On YouTube, enter “Chuck Mitchell Sings”. 

Hey, you say, is Chuck a Renaissance Man? Well, he’s old enough.

 

Erin Mae Lewis

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Mountain Dulcimer Aficionado and Folk Music Educator

Erin Mae is a mountain dulcimer virtuosa who has taken an obscure American folk instrument, and with it has developed a high level of technical proficiency and musical expression. Erin has been playing traditional mountain dulcimer for over twenty years and chromatic mountain dulcimer for over ten years. In that time, she has developed a unique and progressive style. Carrying the rhythm section with her signature percussive chop and flat-picking fiddle tunes with impressive dexterity; audiences nationwide show amazement as they watch her fingers dance over her dulcimer strings.

Erin Mae is also a respected teacher who has taught at hundreds of dulcimer festivals and conferences around the world. She has pioneered online mountain dulcimer instruction and helped numerous festivals pivot to online events during the Covid-19 pandemic. Additionally, Erin Mae teaches kids folk music workshops at schools and libraries, and organizes kids camps at bluegrass and folk festivals. 

Vi Wickam

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From bluegrass and jazz to rock & roll and old-time fiddle, Vi the Fiddler exudes energy, passion, humor, and musical mastery in every performance.

Vi Wickam is an accomplished solo performer and also fronts his own band, cleverly named Vi Wickam and The Band. In addition, he’s a member of Fritto Misto, and Fiddle Whamdiddle. The latter’s albums Old School Old Time and Not My Monkey were honored by inclusion on the Grammy Ballot in 2014 and 2016 respectively.

In 2018, Vi had 2 albums chart in the top 5 of Folk DJ Radio. His album Armadillo on a Hot Tin Roof hit #4 in April and ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas hit #5 in December. He’s a 4-time Colorado State Fiddling Champion, a finalist at the Grand Masters’ Fiddler Championship, and Runner Up in the National Fiddle Contest.

In addition to performing, Vi is a highly regarded music instructor. He’s a founder of the online music school myTalentForge.com, and is much in demand as a teacher at music workshops and camps around the US.