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 Dave Vann for Phish |
2009 in Berkshire arts: Pop Music
Published in Berkshire Eagle, 1/1/10
By Jeremy D. Goodwin
The key event in 2009 as far as the local pop music scene has to do with the end of an era rather than the beginning of one. Club Helsinki closed this year, after setting the standard for live music in the region for 15 years. It was our only true club venue in the Berkshires, and now it is gone.
So the call goes out: who will fill the void?
Mission Bar and Tapas has done a more than admirable job booking the sort of talent (and in several cases, indeed the same talent) that typically played Helsinki. The Dream Away Lodge recently hosted Erin McKeown, whose show at Helsinki earlier in the year was a one-woman marvel. But neither venue, as currently configured, really has the seating capacity to deal regularly with artists who would have sold out Helsinki.
Mission's Jim Benson has promoted larger shows at Barrington Stage Company's second stage, and Shakespeare & Company recently hosted a one-off show by Arlo Guthrie, but concerts are of course not the top priority in either of those performance spaces. The expansive event space in the EconoLodge complex on Route 7 provided a surprisingly ample venue for local jam band shows like the multi-stage Winter Dog Music Festival for two years, but since Flavours Restaurant migrated from there to Pittsfield there's been nothing of the sort at the erstwhile venue. Berkshire Bateria has begun a welcome residency at Jae’s Spice in Pittsfield, but that space is more of a dance floor than concert venue.
In a column in January, I argued there is a “culture gap” wherein the world-class-level fine arts in the region are not frequently matched by similarly relevant popular music talent. Our venues are not often enough “destination” spots for fans more than willing to travel here to see the Wilcos, Indigo Girls and Stephen Malkmuses of the world—as they did in 2008, for instance.
But 2009 was a stellar year in that department. The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, Colonial Theatre, and MASS MoCA have done much-appreciated work bringing higher profile artists to the Berkshires. And so we had the chance to see shows by Rickie Lee Jones, Medeski, Martin and Wood (one of my top shows of the year), Yonder Mountain String Band, Blonde Redhead, Richie Havens, Ani DiFranco, and, notably, some of the artists noted below.
After the watershed success of Wilco's concert in 2008, all the air at Tanglewood this season was taken up by James Taylor's four-day residency (though Tony Bennett and Diana Krall filled out the non-classical schedule). I continue to cross my fingers that an unexpected announcement of a newsmaking pop booking next summer will emerge. One can hope.
With that, let me round up the look back with a list—not of the best shows I saw in 2009, but of the most memorable moments.
The key event in 2009 as far as the local pop music scene has to do with the end of an era rather than the beginning of one. Club Helsinki closed this year, after setting the standard for live music in the region for 15 years. It was our only true club venue in the Berkshires, and now it is gone.
So the call goes out: who will fill the void?
Mission Bar and Tapas has done a more than admirable job booking the sort of talent (and in several cases, indeed the same talent) that typically played Helsinki. The Dream Away Lodge recently hosted Erin McKeown, whose show at Helsinki earlier in the year was a one-woman marvel. But neither venue, as currently configured, really has the seating capacity to deal regularly with artists who would have sold out Helsinki.
Mission's Jim Benson has promoted larger shows at Barrington Stage Company's second stage, and Shakespeare & Company recently hosted a one-off show by Arlo Guthrie, but concerts are of course not the top priority in either of those performance spaces. The expansive event space in the EconoLodge complex on Route 7 provided a surprisingly ample venue for local jam band shows like the multi-stage Winter Dog Music Festival for two years, but since Flavours Restaurant migrated from there to Pittsfield there's been nothing of the sort at the erstwhile venue. Berkshire Bateria has begun a welcome residency at Jae’s Spice in Pittsfield, but that space is more of a dance floor than concert venue.
In a column in January, I argued there is a “culture gap” wherein the world-class-level fine arts in the region are not frequently matched by similarly relevant popular music talent. Our venues are not often enough “destination” spots for fans more than willing to travel here to see the Wilcos, Indigo Girls and Stephen Malkmuses of the world—as they did in 2008, for instance.
But 2009 was a stellar year in that department. The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, Colonial Theatre, and MASS MoCA have done much-appreciated work bringing higher profile artists to the Berkshires. And so we had the chance to see shows by Rickie Lee Jones, Medeski, Martin and Wood (one of my top shows of the year), Yonder Mountain String Band, Blonde Redhead, Richie Havens, Ani DiFranco, and, notably, some of the artists noted below.
After the watershed success of Wilco's concert in 2008, all the air at Tanglewood this season was taken up by James Taylor's four-day residency (though Tony Bennett and Diana Krall filled out the non-classical schedule). I continue to cross my fingers that an unexpected announcement of a newsmaking pop booking next summer will emerge. One can hope.
With that, let me round up the look back with a list—not of the best shows I saw in 2009, but of the most memorable moments.
Photo by Jazu Stine
5.) The Low Anthem places a local call. This Providence-based trio brought its hundred-year-old sound cloaked in Americana mysticism to Pittsfield twice this year, with shows at Mission and as part of the Word X Word Festival. In the former show, frontman Ben Knox Miller capped the deliciously melancholy “This Godamn House” by teasing feedback from two mobile phones while his band mates provided sepia-toned accompaniment. Wild.
Read the advance feature.
4). Bruce Hornsby takes a request. One of my concert highlights of the year was the chance to see Bruce Hornsby at the Mahaiwe, where he delivered one of my favorite performances I’ve seen at that venue. The former hitmaker encourages audiences to leave written song requests in a heap at the foot of the stage. I complied with a simple request for “Harbor Lights,” the not-frequently-played title track of the 1993 album which marked his declaration of pop independence. The song came second in the evening, in a gorgeous acoustic delivery. Bliss.
Read the advance feature or the review of the show.
3.) James Taylor and friends make a memory. There’s only so many times you can see James Taylor perform “Shower The People,” or tell the story about first hearing Carole King sing “You’ve Got A Friend” through a backstage door. So the multi-night residency at Tanglewood featuring different concert formats and surprises was a great idea. The “special friends” night with Sheryl Crow and Yo Yo Ma was a bit underwhelming, as it was basically a standard JT show plus Crow singing a few greatest hits like “All I Wanna Do” with Taylor’s band as backing. But a mid-set sequence featuring just the trio was spellbinding, particularly a haunting evocation of “Fire And Rain.” As Ma offered gorgeous cello work and the two pop stars traded verses, I was distinctly aware this was one of those precious Berkshire moments around which one shapes anecdotes for years to come. Stunning.
2.) Béla Fleck goes global. In perhaps the concert coup of the year, the Colonial Theatre hosted the world premiere of Bela Fleck’s The Africa Project. Fleck, a musical polyglot who’s won international renown (and a shelf of Grammy’s) for sticking the banjo in places it supposedly doesn’t belong, brought it all back home with a trip through Africa inin small combos with an all-star list of African musicians. Late in the show, Toumani Diabate began a piece on the kora, a sort of 21-string harp. When Fleck turned it into a duo, there was a loud, unconscious gasp from the audience at the incongruous but utterly mellifluous combination of sounds, as if it was familiar from some epic concert in a heretofore forgotten dream. Breathtaking.
Read the advance feature on the show.
1.) Phish takes a victory lap. Remarkably, in a year when one of the top-grossing concert draws of its generation returned from a four-and-a-half-year “breakup,” three of the most memorable Phish concerts the year happened within a short drive of the Berkshires. Summer stops at Hartford’s Comcast Center (“Colonel Forbin’s Ascent,” “Icculus”) and Saratoga Performing Arts Center (“Harpua”) boasted, in combo, a full helping of the very rarely performed story-songs that are a sort of Holy Grail for the Phish fan. But the second of two nights at Albany’s Times-Union Center this fall offered a sequence that may have been the jam highlight of the year. Deep into a jam out of “Seven Below,” the song that best recalls the joyous, anything-can-happen spirit permeating Phish’s original “comeback,” when it toured in 2003 following a two years-plus hiatus, guitarist Trey Anastasio summoned a tornado of energy as he led the band into a thunderous peak of swirling rock power. Fans who were impressed by the band’s good-natured comeback but left a bit wanting for the improvisational glories of old learned in Albany the boys are truly back. Joy.
Read the review of the show
Read the advance feature.
4). Bruce Hornsby takes a request. One of my concert highlights of the year was the chance to see Bruce Hornsby at the Mahaiwe, where he delivered one of my favorite performances I’ve seen at that venue. The former hitmaker encourages audiences to leave written song requests in a heap at the foot of the stage. I complied with a simple request for “Harbor Lights,” the not-frequently-played title track of the 1993 album which marked his declaration of pop independence. The song came second in the evening, in a gorgeous acoustic delivery. Bliss.
Read the advance feature or the review of the show.
3.) James Taylor and friends make a memory. There’s only so many times you can see James Taylor perform “Shower The People,” or tell the story about first hearing Carole King sing “You’ve Got A Friend” through a backstage door. So the multi-night residency at Tanglewood featuring different concert formats and surprises was a great idea. The “special friends” night with Sheryl Crow and Yo Yo Ma was a bit underwhelming, as it was basically a standard JT show plus Crow singing a few greatest hits like “All I Wanna Do” with Taylor’s band as backing. But a mid-set sequence featuring just the trio was spellbinding, particularly a haunting evocation of “Fire And Rain.” As Ma offered gorgeous cello work and the two pop stars traded verses, I was distinctly aware this was one of those precious Berkshire moments around which one shapes anecdotes for years to come. Stunning.
2.) Béla Fleck goes global. In perhaps the concert coup of the year, the Colonial Theatre hosted the world premiere of Bela Fleck’s The Africa Project. Fleck, a musical polyglot who’s won international renown (and a shelf of Grammy’s) for sticking the banjo in places it supposedly doesn’t belong, brought it all back home with a trip through Africa inin small combos with an all-star list of African musicians. Late in the show, Toumani Diabate began a piece on the kora, a sort of 21-string harp. When Fleck turned it into a duo, there was a loud, unconscious gasp from the audience at the incongruous but utterly mellifluous combination of sounds, as if it was familiar from some epic concert in a heretofore forgotten dream. Breathtaking.
Read the advance feature on the show.
1.) Phish takes a victory lap. Remarkably, in a year when one of the top-grossing concert draws of its generation returned from a four-and-a-half-year “breakup,” three of the most memorable Phish concerts the year happened within a short drive of the Berkshires. Summer stops at Hartford’s Comcast Center (“Colonel Forbin’s Ascent,” “Icculus”) and Saratoga Performing Arts Center (“Harpua”) boasted, in combo, a full helping of the very rarely performed story-songs that are a sort of Holy Grail for the Phish fan. But the second of two nights at Albany’s Times-Union Center this fall offered a sequence that may have been the jam highlight of the year. Deep into a jam out of “Seven Below,” the song that best recalls the joyous, anything-can-happen spirit permeating Phish’s original “comeback,” when it toured in 2003 following a two years-plus hiatus, guitarist Trey Anastasio summoned a tornado of energy as he led the band into a thunderous peak of swirling rock power. Fans who were impressed by the band’s good-natured comeback but left a bit wanting for the improvisational glories of old learned in Albany the boys are truly back. Joy.
Read the review of the show
Stephen J. Donaldson Photography
