Split Coils Rocks The Hookah Lounge
by | Apr 18, 2024 12:19 pm | Comments (0)
After a day of driving heavy machinery, Joe Ballaro plugged in his bass, and the show began.
Music
Charlie Widmer Finds A Need For "Love"
by | Apr 12, 2024 9:13 am | Comments (0)
Charlie Widmer performs on WNHH FM's "Acoustic Thursday @ Studio 51," opening with his new single.
Charlie Widmer didn’t expect people to want to hear “What Do I Need With Love?” Now it’s the first of his songs some people will ever hear.
Orange Street Goes To Hell
by | Apr 11, 2024 12:36 pm | Comments (1)
In the backroom lounge of Mediterranea Cafe, among centuries-old hookah pipes and patterned cushions, a fairy rising from the Underworld sang about darkness — and love, too.
Two Bands Achieve Liftoff
by | Apr 11, 2024 9:51 am | Comments (1)
Brian Slattery Photo
Marco Benevento.
In front of a packed house that was ready to have fun, two touring acts at Space Ballroom — the New York City-based Ghost Funk Orchestra and the Woodstock, N.Y.-based Marco Benevento — brought humor, relaxation, and armfuls of danceable beats to the Hamden club on Wednesday night.
Musicians Honor The Elders
by | Apr 8, 2024 12:45 pm | Comments (0)
Brian Slattery Photo
Blick Bassy.
A triple bill at Cafe Nine on Saturday Night headlined by Cameroonian touring artist Blick Bassy featured two younger New Haven acts who tipped their hats to those older than they were, even as they showed everyone in the room that the future of music in the Elm City is in safe hands.
Choir Sings The Fragility Of Refuge
by | Apr 8, 2024 9:06 am | Comments (1)
Brian Slattery photo
Voices filled the space of Bethesda Lutheran Church on Sunday afternoon, raised in song. But the harmonies weren’t what many may have been used to in a church; they were sharper, more angular, provoking of thought. Nor was the text from the Bible; it was a dispatch from halfway around the world, from the present day.
“We sense something grave is happening around us. We don’t know what the future holds,” the choir sang. “The land we tilled for generations is shrinking; salt water poisons what’s left of our fields. Many people have gone, displacement and death everywhere.”
Johnathan Moore Doesn't Miss A Beat
by | Apr 5, 2024 12:00 pm | Comments (1)
Paul Bass Photo
Johnathan Moore at WNHH FM. Below: Performing.
Johnathan Moore was ready to add a layer of sound. He reached for the Boss RC 600 loop station pedal and … nothing.
Moore said nothing. He made no excuses. He kept the beat going. He pivoted to a new plan — and the music played on.
Yale Film Archive Adds Sound to Silents
by | Apr 5, 2024 11:25 am | Comments (1)
Still from Within Our Gates.
As Yale Film Archive launches into the last quarter of its 2024 spring semester programming, it offered something a little different on Thursday evening: silent films that each had a special distinction.
The first, presented in conjunction with the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, was a selection of Solomon Sir Jones Films from 1924 to 1928 that are currently a part of the library’s holdings. The second was a showing of Within Our Gates, a 1920 film written, produced, and directed by Oscar Micheaux; it’s the oldest known surviving film with a Black director. One more bonus: both films on this evening were accompanied by live music, played by pianist Donald Sosin.
New Album Reaches Across The World
by | Apr 5, 2024 9:15 am | Comments (1)
Mistina Hanscomb Photo
Klein.
“Shapes of the Things to Come,” from The Quiver — the new album from In These Trees (a.k.a. New Haven-based musician Binnie Klein) and Australian musician Tartie — begins with a searching guitar, heading somewhere, building atmosphere as it goes.
Bass tones ground it, setting Tartie’s direct, emotive voice free. “Life’s not a road, it’s an alley / We try to fit inside,” Tartie sings. “Every day we set the ground / Stretched end to end / But we can bend / Move with me / Through the new shapes / Of the things to come.” The words are by Klein; the music by Tartie, and The Quiver is the result of years of work, 10,000 miles apart.
Chappell Roan Rides The Next Wave
by | Apr 4, 2024 9:10 am | Comments (0)
Brian Slattery photo
Chappell Roan on Wednesday at College St.
The jury is still out on whether American culture, or the music industry, can create another superstar, like Michael Jackson or Prince, like Madonna or Bruce Springsteen. Maybe Beyoncé, now 42 years old, and Taylor Swift, 34, are the last of their kind. But if future superstars are still possible, one of its more likely candidates — Chappell Roan — played at College Street Music Hall on Wednesday night to an ecstatic, sold-out crowd that couldn’t get enough.
New Songwriter Series Comes To Cafe Nine
by | Apr 3, 2024 9:38 am | Comments (1)
Brian Slattery Photos
Greco.
Pete Greco had a series of requests for the audience at Cafe Nine on Tuesday night. Did anyone know how to tune a guitar? Did anyone have any tattoos? The questions were all good-natured jokes in the service of serious music, as Greco and his band took the last slot on the inaugural night of First Tuesdays at Cafe Nine, billed as “a songwriter’s showcase featuring live bands, focused on shining a light into New Haven’s tremendously talented songwriting circuit.”
MJ Bones Goes Live, Unplugged
by | Mar 29, 2024 11:07 am | Comments (0)
Paul Bass Photo
MJ Bones in the WNHH FM studio.
“If love is like an ocean,” MJ Bones was singing, “I’m lost at sea.”
Meanwhile, they sounded right at home, right where they belonged: Performing revelatory original songs on the ukulele, in New Haven.
A&I Gives Sneak Peek At 2024 Festival
by | Mar 29, 2024 9:18 am | Comments (5)
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Jazz vocalist Samara Joy, an A&I headliner this year.
Shakespeare in circus, choral fusion, climate activism and optimism talks, making your own empanadas: this eclectic mix of events and more is part of this summer’s International Festival of Arts and Ideas, which is returning with a full schedule of programming that covers just about anything an arts and culture lover would have a taste for — and maybe something they have never tasted before.
Bands Spread Out And Focus In
by | Mar 28, 2024 9:52 am | Comments (0)
Videodome.
Two releases by two of New Haven’s currently active bands — Videodome and Wally — show how bands can reap musical success in two very different ways.
Shandy Lawson Sings Stories at Best Video
by | Mar 25, 2024 9:14 am | Comments (0)
Karen Ponzio Photos
Shandy Lawson.
A chair and a guitar. A table holding an old-fashioned radio. A vase full of purple flowers. A teacup and saucer. Was this a scene from an oft-told tale or real life? At Best Video on Saturday, it was the setting for “Stories: An Evening with Shandy Lawson,” in which the New Haven-based singer-songwriter shared a collection of songs that offered a bit of fiction, a bite of truth, and a tasty twist on each.
Continue reading ‘Shandy Lawson Sings Stories at Best Video’
Punks Rock For Choice
by | Mar 20, 2024 9:27 am | Comments (0)
Brian Slattery Photos
Addie and Jacey of the Connecticut Democratic Socialists of America declared themselves “thrilled” to be on Cafe Nine’s stage Tuesday night. The DSA is involved in a number of political efforts, but this night it was focusing on raising funds for a cause: The REACH Fund, which, as its website states, “is a nonprofit organization that provides financial assistance for abortion care in Connecticut.”
Ball & Socket Arts Turns Factory Into Gallery
by | Mar 19, 2024 10:18 am | Comments (4)
John McDonald Photo
Ball & Socket Arts front view.
When asked to name the cultural hubs of the Northeast, most people would not consider Cheshire, Connecticut a part of that list. A group of enthusiastic artists and supporters of the arts are hoping to change that over the next few years, as Ball & Socket Arts, a complex located on West Main Street right along the Farmington Canal Linear Path, continues its efforts to create a central location aimed at encouraging ongoing creativity and attracting New Haven County residents and beyond to its galleries, performance venue, art education center, and more.
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Firehouse Ignites New Jazz Season
by | Mar 18, 2024 9:50 am | Comments (1)
Kenneth Jimenez Photo
Lilith.
Ingrid Laubrock’s Lilith opened Firehouse 12’s spring season of shows at its concert space, recording studio, and bar on Crown Street with a fiery set of Laubrock’s compositions that paid homage to female energy and to the venue itself, which continues to be a hub for experimental music in New Haven, on the East Coast, and beyond.
Filthy Riffs, Fists Fly At Death Fest
by | Mar 12, 2024 10:13 am | Comments (1)
Jasmine Wright Photos
Roots of Deception lays it down at Connecticut Death Fest.
Hubert Smith took to the stage for the second time in two nights. The night before, he was playing drums for Necrocunt, something of a supergroup within Connecticut’s death metal scene. Now, he was laying down distorted guitar grooves for brutal death five-piece Roots of Deception. Photographers — myself included — wormed between audience members, who stood so close to the stage that their hair lashed its surface with each headbang. Behind us, the crowd was arranged in a circle of potential energy, the center of the Beeracks’ cavernous garage, waiting for the next mosh pit to break out.
All-Ages Folk Punk Show Celebrates Community
by | Mar 11, 2024 10:25 am | Comments (1)
Leo Slattery Photo
A lone child in a Rubik’s Cube hoodie stood in the middle of the small black box space at Witch Bitch Thrift on Saturday night, trying and failing with a kendama, a Japanese wooden ball and stick toy. Around him, people trickled in in groups of two or three, ready to see folk-punk acts Apes of the State, Myles Bullen, and Lars and their Lilac Ukulele.
The band members socialized, waving to the people they recognized and smiling and introducing themselves to those they didn’t. Everyone was dressed for the occasion: a sea of Doc Martens, work boots, and old sneakers. Pants, mostly black, usually dotted in patches of the wearer’s favorite bands. The magnum opus, an Apes t‑shirt from a previous tour. April, lead singer of Apes of the State, seemed equal parts flattered and fascinated by the appearance of her decade-old merch. The most diehard of fans wore battle jackets, a punk tradition of sewing handmade patches of bands onto a denim coat. The battle jackets at this particular show almost all had Apes of the State on them. It was standing room only, save for a chair left in the corner that people piled coats under. The chair itself remained empty, as if for Elijah the prophet.
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Paradegoers Take A Drop Of The Pure
by | Mar 11, 2024 10:24 am | Comments (1)
Brian Slattery Photos
A Drop of the Pure.
State Street on Sunday afternoon was filled with signs of the end of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade, whether it was the lines of people in green shirts outside Modern, the full marching bands gathered on street corners, the policemen guarding the barricades for closed streets, or the long rows of parked cars. The parade has changed a lot over the years and continues to, reflecting New Haven as it is, a diverse place in which successive waves of recent immigrants find a home. And in Cafe Nine, a steadily growing crowd came to hear A Drop of the Pure, a quartet purveying traditional Irish music and pulling at the long cultural thread that connects the present to the past.
Love N' Co Premiere Film At Best Video
by | Mar 11, 2024 10:23 am | Comments (0)
Karen Ponzio Photos
Love N' Co performing at Best Video as part of Spoken film.
On Saturday night Best Video presented an event that married two of its main enterprises: film and music. Local favorites Love N’ Co were there to premiere their movie Spoken: The Story of Unspoken and share a few tunes beforehand. The film, produced by Free Artist Productions, documents the making of their EP Unspoken, produced by Cliff Robbins-Sennewald, which they plan to release in May. The film documents their hopes, dreams, and desires as well as the struggles they went through both personally and professionally to get it just right, proving that the band accepts a challenge and rides it through with joy and grace.
Cafe Nine Rocks For Today
by | Mar 7, 2024 9:18 am | Comments (0)
Brian Slattery Photos
Wow, Okay, Cool.
As a heavy rainstorm pounded the pavement outside on State and Crown, drummers pounded skins inside Cafe Nine, propelling a night of raucous guitar, muscular bass, and vocals that pushed the throats of their singers to the limit, as three bands filled the Ninth Square club with the sound of the latest iteration of a now-venerable music form: The rock band.
"R-E-S-P-E-C-T" Kicks Off Women's, Music Month
by | Mar 4, 2024 2:18 pm | Comments (0)
Maya McFadden Photos
Ellen Maust reads aloud to Mauro Sheridan second-grade class.
In a second-grade classroom at Mauro-Sheridan Interdistrict Magnet School students danced along to Aretha Franklin’s “Respect” after learning about the “Queen of Soul.”
Continue reading ‘"R-E-S-P-E-C-T" Kicks Off Women's, Music Month’
City Hall Honors 50 Years Of Hip Hop
by | Mar 1, 2024 10:23 am | Comments (0)
Brian Slattery Photo
DJ P-Zo name-checks the crowd in the alder chambers.
New Haven hip hop pioneer DJ Terrible T had some pointed questions for his audience at the Hall of Records at 200 Orange St.
“What are we going to leave behind? What is hip hop going to mean to this little girl right here?” he asked, gesturing toward an audience member. “We can sit up here and talk about who we’ve been and who we DJed and how long we did it. But if we don’t leave a permanent, positive impression on our future — our children — what have we really accomplished?”