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FOOTMAD's 39th Season
Sponsoring the World's Best in Traditional Music and Dance
Sponsoring the World's Best in Traditional Music and Dance
2019-2020 Concert Season Artists
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2019 September 28 - 7:30 pm
WV Culture Center State Capitol Complex, Charleston Concert Tickets
Adults - $25 Seniors - $20 Students - $10 Under 13 – Free All AmeriCorps Members Free |
Jones, Savoy & Simon Cajun Band
Jones, Savoy and Simon combine the talents of 3 of the best musicians to come out of Louisiana in the past 20 years to bring the best of Cajun and Creole to the FOOTMAD stage. Linking the sound of generations with their accomplished musicianship and vocal abilities, their exuberant sound is sure to keep the toes tapping. They are born out of years of friendship and bring the combined sounds of T’Monde and Pine Leaf Boys from Lafayette, Louisiana.
Kelli Jones has been playing fiddle since the age of fifteen and started out playing old time music in North Carolina, where she is from. In 2006 she moved to Lafayette, Louisiana to study dance at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and learn Cajun fiddle as well. She has been living in Lafayette since, soaking up the culture and touring the world with Lafayette’s own powerhouse psychedelic Cajun band, Feufollet and T’Monde. She has also traveled beyond Louisiana to perform and teach at festivals throughout the United States and Canada, including Ashokan Fiddle & Dance Camp, Augusta Heritage Center Cajun & Creole week, the Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, and Centrum’s Voiceworks. Wilson Savoy, Cajun accordion, fiddle, piano & vocals, GRAMMY WINNER 2012 for Best Regional Roots, has played accordion for most of his life, having been given as a child a hand-built accordion by his renown father, Marc Savoy. Wilson has taught Cajun Music Ensemble at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette for 3 years, and continues to teach one-on-one lessons through the University, all through the Tommy Comeaux Endowment. Wilson was awarded the key to the city of Lafayette in April 2013 by Mayor Joey Durel. Wilson has appeared on HBO's "Treme" playing the role of himself in three episodes, as well as the film "All the King's Men" with Sean Penn and John Goodman. Wilson continues to travel with the Savoy Family Band (mom, dad, and brother Joel), the Grammy award-winning group Courtbouillon and the Pine Leaf Boys. Drew Simon was born and raised in Lafayette, Louisiana and developed an interest in Cajun music in his late teens. At 20, he began playing the accordion and started learning the words to many of the songs in his huge Cajun music repertoire. For more than 15 years, Drew has been regarded as one of the best of the “New Generation” of Cajun dancehall musicians being heavily influenced by legends Belton Richard, Aldus Roger, Walter Mouton, Jesse Lége, and Lawrence Walker just to name a few. With bands the Pine Leaf Boys (4x Grammy Nominated) and T’Monde, he has brought Cajun music and Cajun culture to 24 countries and all but of a few states. |
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Concert Tickets
Adults - $25 Seniors - $20 Students - $10 Under 13 – Free All AmeriCorps Members Free Call 304-729-4382 to register for their same-day workshop.
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Molsky's Mountain Drifters
Molsky's Mountain Drifters packs a punch with three of the most captivating performers in the most recent generation of Old-Time and American Roots music.
The band features Bruce Molsky, (Grammy nominated, revered Old-Time music ambassador and Berklee College of Music Visiting Scholar) along with guitar genre bender Stash Wyslouch (of the Deadly Gentlemen) on guitar and vocals and Allison de Groot (of The Goodbye Girls), a master of the clawhammer banjo. These striking musicians have come together for a new sound within the traditional music genre through their audacious approach. “I was looking for a new voice,” says Molsky, “a new avenue of expression using old time mountain music as the jumping-off point, but not being constrained by hard core traditionalism. Allison and Stash are showing me the way, just where the music is headed, in directions I never would have imagined when I started my own journey into the mountains a long time ago.” |
Website: mountaindrifters.com
Videos: mountaindrifters.com/music
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This engagement of Molsky's Mountain Drifters is made possible through the Special Presenters Initiative program of Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation with support from the National Endowment for the Arts and the WV Department of Arts, Culture and History.
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2020 January 4 - 7:30 PM
The Clay Center (Use the Walker Theater entrance on Brooks St) 
Concert Tickets
General admission, all ages - $25 This show is part of the FOOTMAD season ticket package. Additional tickets are sold through the Clay Center website.
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Hank Williams "Lost Show" Tribute Concert
The Lost Show
The legacy of renowned country music artist Hank Williams is celebrated by an all-star group of singers and musicians. John Lilly and Rob McNurlin lead a stellar line up of performers.
John Lilly is an award-winning songwriter and performer from Charleston, West Virginia. He is former editor of West Virginia’s GOLDENSEAL magazine and a former tour guide at the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in Nashville. John performs widely as a solo artist and with the band Blue Yonder. Rob McNurlin is from Ashland, Kentucky. An accomplished songwriter and performer, he hosted the weekly television program The Rob McNurlin Ranch Party for several years. Rob has recorded several albums of original material that reflect his roots in traditional country music. Other artists in the cast TBA. |
Webpage: johnlillymusic.com/HWT/
Video: youtube.com
The Hank Williams Tribute Concert is presented by the Woody Hawley Concert Series and FOOTMAD with support from Unity of Kanawha Valley.
WoodHawleyConcerts.com
WoodHawleyConcerts.com
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Concert Tickets
Adults - $25 Seniors - $20 Students - $10 Under 13 – Free All AmeriCorps Members Free 
This concert is the centerpiece of the 5th Celtic Calling Festival in downtown Charleston March 6, 7, 8
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The Jeremiahs
The Jeremiahs combine traditional and contemporary sounds to create their own brand of Urban Folk music. Since founding in 2013 they have trail blazed across Ireland, Europe and the USA, playing top venues and festivals.
A talented Dublin born singer with a melting pot of influences, Joe Gibney offers a diverse repertoire, from rousing sea shanties to emotional traditional songs of hardship, love and loss. His obvious passion and love for these songs is plain to see and hear and will warm the heart of any music lover. Joe was named Male Vocalist of the Year by the Chicago Irish American News in 2015. Dublinese accompanist James Ryan has amassed a wealth of experience, having already performed in over 14 different countries. James draws on a wide range of influences from different genres and traditions, evident in his unique percussive backing style. James is also an established teacher and sound engineer and was the winner of The Christy Moore Songwriter Showcase 2015. Jean-Christophe "JC" Morel - born in Bordeaux, France - has been playing classical music from the age of four. His love affair with Irish traditional music began after he sat in at a session during his studies at the Conservatoire de Bordeaux. A few years later, he studied Irish traditional music in Dublin and met the Jeremiahs. He has since completed a Masters at the Conservatoire National Supérieur Musique et Danse de Lyon. Julien Bruneteau hails from Bordeaux, France, and has been playing the flute since he was eleven. He studied jazz music at the Conservatoire Musique et Danse in Agen, France and the prestigious Centre des Musiques Didier Lockwood in Paris. Combined with his unabating love of Irish music, this education has shaped Julien into a flute player of great sensitivity with an amazing ability to improvise. |
Website: thejeremiahs.ie
Videos: thejeremiahs.ie/music
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Concert Tickets
Adults - $25 Seniors - $20 Students - $10 Under 13 – Free All AmeriCorps Members Free |
Chaise Lounge
Chaise Lounge performs a blend of music that sounds like it was recorded at Capitol Recording Studios in 1962 and somehow found its way to today’s pop charts. You might call it “Early Stereo.” Or perhaps Lounge with a capital “L.” Or maybe just plain enjoyable. It is the combination of five of the Washington area’s top jazz musicians playing sparkling arrangements of standards and original tunes, featuring the soft, luminous vocals of Marilyn Older.
Charlie Barnett serves as bandleader, composer, guitarist and pianist for Chaise Lounge. He has arranged and produced pop and jazz records for countless artists. As a film composer, he has scored more than nine hundred television and theatrical films. His orchestral and chamber works have been performed internationally. As a playwright, he has written musicals, drama and comedy. Marilyn Older has been singing professionally since her graduation as a music technology major from American University. A native of North Carolina, she has written songs and performed with a variety of bands. She has written songs for Chaise Lounge and for a number of independent films. Her voice is truly an American Original. An evening spent with her is an evening spent in the warm, inviting glow of one of the most wonderful voices singing in America right now. Tommy Barrick can be heard with a variety of acts ranging from swing & jazz to latin, funk and punk around the DC area. He has performed throughout Europe and throughout the United States at The Rainbow Room, The Copacabana, The Kennedy Center Concert Hall, The Birchmere, Blues Alley and many more. He recently published his first percussion method, The Paradiddle Workbook. He can also be heard on many television and film scores. Gary Gregg performs with many DC ensembles, including The Cutaways, The Tuxedo Park Orchestra and his own sextet. Perhaps the area’s leading exponent of swing clarinet, hot tenor and cool flute, his playing provides local big bands with both the soaring clarinet and “down home” tenor playing reminiscent of the swing era. Gary grew up in Las Vegas and began his musical training there at an early age. Joe Jackson began playing trombone at the age of twelve. At the University of North Texas, he was named the 1985 National Association of Jazz Educators College Musician of the Year. Joe has since played with the Maynard Ferguson Band, U.S. Air Force Airmen of Note, the U.S. Air Force Ceremonial Brass, the Woody Herman Orchestra and David Liebman Big Band prior to joining Chaise Lounge in 2012. Pete Ostle is a versatile bass player, band leader and tuba player who served with the U.S. Army Band “Pershing’s Own” based at Fort Myer, Virginia, as well as several other army bands and chorales. Pete formed A La Cart Brass & Percussion, currently leads the Tuxedo Park Orchestra and plays with Avanti Orchestra of the Friday Morning Music Club, the McLean Orchestra and the Pan American Symphony Orchestra. Pete received a degree in Arranging and Composition from Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA. |
Website: chaiseloungenation.com
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Concert Tickets
Adults - $25 Seniors - $20 Students - $10 Under 13 – Free All AmeriCorps Members Free |
Dance of Hope
Dance of Hope is a cultural music and dance touring program produced through the collaboration of M-Lisada and Heartbeat Children. M-Lisada stands for Music, Life Skills, And Destitution Alleviation. It is a non-profit center providing a safe haven for street children in Kambala, Uganda.
The M-Lisada Children’s Home has reclaimed over 400 children from the streets. The organization houses 50 children and another 80 children come in from the streets every day, for showers, food, counseling, music lessons, a safe place to play, and unqualified support. More recently, in February 2019, using proceeds from the Dance of Hope tours, the M-Lisada Passion School was opened where education is provided in an environment that integrates students from extreme poverty with students from more stable homes. This troupe of 12 children, now ages 11-19, connect their audiences to the primal transforming power of arts, inspire young people globally to appreciate their own traditional music and dance and provide a message of hope for the destitute. The children of Dance of Hope bring triumphant turnaround stories, showcasing how resilience and determination can be enhanced by creativity. In 2010, Herbert Kinobe was introduced to the children of the M-Lisada children’s home compound, many of who were then ages 5-8. The compound was filled with brass music; acrobats and cultural drumming. A conversation between Kinobe and Bosco Segawa, founder and then-director of M-Lisada, focused on ways for vulnerable children to develop life skills that could help them become self-sufficient, raise money for education and improve life quality. Within a short time, Dance of Hope had become well known in the country, and received invitations to perform nearly every weekend. This program has provided a deep cultural awareness to many of M-Lisada’s children and positively impacted many other children in Ugandan schools and communities. Herbert Kinobe, Dance of Hope producer, was born in Uganda to an impoverished family during a period when many lives were lost to HIV/AIDS and the war in Northern Uganda. As a music professional, Kinobe has toured extensively throughout Africa, Europe and North America performing, teaching and working with young people. Since being invited to UNICEF by H.E. Michel Sidibe in 2001, Kinobe has become a UNICEF advocate for children on topics of child labor, HIV and education for girls. In 2012 he was appointed World Ambassador for the Harmony Foundation (Canada) and was very recently accepted to work on a three-year endeavor with the LEAF festival in Asheville, NC to create a program like Dance of Hope linking that community to young musicians around the world. Segawa Bosco has risen from being a 12-year-old orphan living on the Kampala streets with his three younger sisters to founding the M-Lisada Children’s Home. His work has led and inspired adults and children alike. As a child he and his friends begged a teacher at a private school to teach them to play brass band music. Repeatedly told “no,” he persevered until they relented. He and eight street boys learned to play music and within a few months played well enough to support themselves. They found a sponsor to pay the rent on two rooms where they stored their instruments and slept, a shelter that grew to offer safety and comfort to other disparate children. Bosco’s single-minded focus galvanized these children as the they pulled their lives together. |
Website: danceofhope.com
FOOTMAD
PO Box 1684
Charleston, WV 25326
304-729-4382
kvfootmad@gmail.com
www.footmad.org
PO Box 1684
Charleston, WV 25326
304-729-4382
kvfootmad@gmail.com
www.footmad.org
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This concert series is presented with financial assistance from the West Virginia Department of Arts, Culture and History, and the National Endowment for the Arts, with approval from the West Virginia Commission on the Arts.
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Update: 2019-08-17
