1 April 2016

David Mallett

Kyle Morgan opens

On Friday, April 1, we welcome David Mallett, one of the “most memorable Mainers” of all time to its stage. According to folk music critic, Scott Alarik, Mallett is “always compelling, always musical . . . there is something about his phrasing that lends an urgency and boldness to his song. His deep, clear voice has a storyteller’s naturalness to it, a poet’s intelligence.” ¶ Kyle Morgan, another talented Mainer, opens the show for Mallett.

Concert starts at 8:00 pm

David Mallett

The cool breezes of Maine’s northlands have flowed through the songs of David Mallett for over four decades. In addition to being featured on his fourteen albums, Mallett’s pen has provided material for an eclectic list of artists that includes Pete Seeger, Alison Kraus, Emmylou Harris, Kathy Mattea, John Denver and the Muppets. His tune, “The Garden Song,” is one of America’s most popular folk songs, having been recorded more than 150 times and sung around the world. He has toured consistently in folk clubs, concert halls and festivals for thirty years.

A turning point in Mallett’s career came in 1975, after he discovered that Noel Paul Stookey, of Peter, Paul and Mary, had moved to Blue Hill, Maine and was opening a recording studio. Within six months of their initial meeting, Mallett found a true mentor in Stookey. In addition to producing Mallett’s first three albums, Stookey helped to bring his songs to a national audience. Moving to Nashville in the early 1990s, Mallett continued to record and write new songs. “I did a little bit of everything,” he said, “wrote a lot of tunes, made some good records, got to know a lot of singers and played with some wonderful musicians like Roy Huskey, probably the most respected acoustic bass player in America, and drummer Kenny Malone. All in all, I think I learned how to make records better.”

Since returning to Maine in 1997, Mallett has continued to tour nationally and has written and recorded six CDs in 12 years. He also successfully explored the spoken word realm with his 2007 release, The Fable True, a collection of Henry David Thoreau’s stories about his visits to Maine in the mid 1800s, with instrumental soundtrack. Mallett’s latest, Greenin Up, is a compilation of some re-recordings of his finest work. Released in conjunction with Maine Farmland, Trust, it is a celebration of rural life. When he is not touring, the place where he makes his songs is in his writing room in an old farmhouse with a view across the field and a tintype of his great-great grandfather on the wall. “I like to keep reaching out to touch the past,” he says, “to connect it with what’s going on now. To me music is one of the few things that is timeless . . . human emotion is one continual chain.”

Photo by Dale Moreau

. . .

Kyle Morgan

Kyle Morgan is a nomad artist of word and melody, a philosophizing songster whose dynamic style resists simple categorization. Though his writing draws heavily on the tradition of American song and its roots in old-time balladry and country blues, there’s too much Beatles and Kinks mixed in to accurately label it ‘Americana’. As evidenced by his debut 2013 release, Starcrossed Losers, Morgan has the uncanny ability to shift musical moods on a dime from rock’n’roll fueled angst to intimate nylon stringed love songs. Currently residing in Portland, Maine and originally from the Appalachian foothills of central Pennsylvania, Morgan sings his way across America, sometimes with his band, the Starcrossed Losers, and sometimes alone.

Kyle was formerly one-third of Portland roots trio, Tumbling Bones. Since early 2013, they traveled up and down the east coast and across the Atlantic to Ireland, England, and Germany. In June of 2014, they released their first full-length album, Loving a Fool, which included four of Morgan’s original songs and reached #5 on the Folk DJ charts. The band was selected for the American Music Abroad program: a U.S. State Department-backed cultural ambassadorship and they traveled to Romania, Bulgaria, Ukraine, and Georgia to teach, perform, and collaborate with local musicians.

Photo by Bryce Flurie

  • David Mallett is a first-rate folk singer and writer. His portraits and townscapes are camera sharp, and his knowledge of his subjects is profound. Billboard
  • David Mallett is the best folk singer alive in America today. Cape Cod Times
  • Few people could be called the living embodiment of the state where they live. But what Garrison Keillor is to Minnesota, Mallett is to Maine. Orlando Sentinel
  • David Mallett is that rare artist who loves both nature and people. With enormous clarity and humor he gives a voice to the life of contemporary Maine — as it is really lived. Kate Barnes, Maine’s Poet Laureate
  • Dave Mallett has the warmth of a flannel shirt, the comfort of a quilt, and the heart of a poet. Music Row

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