Events

Open Mic Night

Hosting this Thursday will be Kyle Swartzwelder.

Please review the house rules here.

Fiddledelphia

Fiddledelphia is a new student string ensemble led by multi-instrumentalist, teacher and arranger Shelley Weiss. Based in the Philadelphia area, current teaching locations are in Bryn Mawr and Lansdale, PA. Shelley created Fiddledelphia to give kids a fun outlet for their playing. Many kids reach a plateau in their playing and practicing becomes a chore. They also long for a more personal way to express themselves. My goal is to make music so fun that kids practice because they want to, not because they have to. The result is, they progress in leaps and bounds, which makes everyone happy!

"The ensemble is open to violin, viola, cello, bass, mandolin & guitar students. We sing sometimes too, but everyone in the group plays an instrument. If they play an additional instrument (flute, clarinet, etc.) and want to play it in the ensemble, I will incorporate it into a song's arrangement. Fiddledelphia is about each individual student & what they bring to the table. "Bluegrass & fiddle tunes are the foundation of our repertoire, but in our most recent performance, we played a Russian folk tune, an Irish Jig set, and an American fiddle tune (with multiple soloists) by the late, great Buck Owens."

Free Event

Doors Open at 6:30pm

Ellis with Nicole Reynolds

If you haven’t yet caught her engaging and disarming live show, take a chance on Ellis and you’ll become a lifelong fan. Her fans describe her as not only a talented folk musician, but also as a supportive friend who offers encouraging words and humor alongside her compelling songs. She leaves audiences better than she finds them, with softened edges & opened hearts. With songs that capture deep wisdom as well as a childlike playfulness and joy, Ellis’ music is being spread across the globe by fans who are so moved that they have to share it others.

A native of Texas, Ellis moved to Minneapolis at the age of 16, where she quickly built a local following that blossomed into a nationwide presence, with extensive touring and seven albums released in the last sixteen years. In addition to selling more than 40,000 copies of her CDs independently, Ellis has accrued a wealth of accomplishments including winning the 2011 Midwest Regional Round of the Mountain Stage New Song contest, and the 2009 Just Plain Folks Best Female Singer Songwriter Award. She also received Top 5 recognition in the Telluride Troubadour Song Contest and the Rocky Mountain Folks Fest Song Contest was voted "Most Wanted To Return" at both the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival and Sisters Folk Festival.

-- Opening will be special guest Nicole Reynolds

$10 Adv / $12 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Vandaveer with Joshua Park

VANDAVEER is the song-singing, record-making, globetrotting project penned and put forth by alt-folk tunesmith Mark Charles Heidinger. Born in Ohio, raised in Kentucky, and currently camped out in the nation’s capital, Vandaveer offers up melodic Americana that is both haunting and easy, forlorn and welcoming, with stories as universal as the songs they inhabit. Vandaveer shapeshifts from studio to stage and back with a revolving cast of characters, most prominent among them Rose Guerin, offering up the loveliest harmonies heard this side of Eden.

What started as a solo side project for Heidinger in 2007 blossomed into something more dimensional a year later, with Guerin adding new depth and color to Vandaveer’s sound. The two were integral members of DC’s Federal Reserve collective, a ramshackle group of folk and not-so-folk types alike curating monthly musical happenings throughout the DC area. Informal collaborations in that environment soon galvanized, with Guerin’s voice becoming a reliable fixture in Vandaveer. The band has toured regularly on both sides of the Atlantic since, playing nearly 500 shows, steadily building a diverse fan base from the ground up.

Vandaveer’s third full length, Dig Down Deep, offers a collage of churning rhythms, steady guitar and ringing piano beneath tales of war and impermanence, loss and love. The music serves as both mirror and platform for Vandaveer’s stories—booming bass drum during moments of turmoil and conquest, throaty cello in moments of peace and predation, trembling keys in moments of uncertainty and hope. Out of the mosaic rise two voices in perfect harmony narrating and navigating the lives of Vandaveer’s characters with confidence and grace. With rich lyrical imagery and lush, spectral production courtesy of long-time collaborator Duane Lundy, Dig Down Deep is Vandaveer’s finest effort to date — a record both dense and direct, for and from the heart

-- Opening will be special guest Joshua Park

$10 Adv / $12 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Children's Poetry Event

David will be hosting an evening of children's poetry
from 6:30 - 8:00pm. All children in grades k-6 are encouraged to attend or bring a poem to share with the group.

Free Event

James Maddock with John Shannon

British born James Maddock was first recognized in the U.S as leader of the band Wood (Songs From Stamford Hill - Columbia Records). Songs From Stamford Hill, which remains a fan favorite 10 years later, produced a Top 5 Triple A hit (Stay You) and was included in the first Dawson's Creek compilation. In 2009 Maddock released the exquisite collection of songs, Sunrise On Avenue C, for which he won the 2010-11 NY Music Award for Best Americana Album.

Maddock followed Sunrise in 2011 with Wake Up and Dream. NYC’s WFUV 2011 Listener's Poll named Wake Up and Dream (#13) as one of the top albums of 2011. The Mike Scott (Waterboys)co-written single "Beautiful Now" was named the #9 Song of the Year in the same poll. Maddock has become a mainstay on non-comm and satellite radio and continues to tour extensively in the U.S and Europe. His new single, "My Old Neighborhood" is available on iTunes.

-- Opening will be special guest John Shannon

$18 Cover

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Burlap and Bean is Closing Early

CLOSING EARLY

Normal opening at 6:30am.  Closing at 5:00pm.

Burlap and Bean is Closed

CLOSED

Charlie Phillips with Mike Holliday

 First Friday hosted by Charlie.
Sober Night  - - - - - No BYOB

Listeners agree that Charlie Phillips’ songs cannot be categorized into genre. His musical influences – rooted primarily in rock, soul, folk, and blues – have been blended and distilled to create his eclectic style and fresh sound. From the blues-rock and reggae flavored “Preacherman”, to the Asbury Park blare of “Natural”, to the campfire folksiness of “Donny T” and “Wealth of Friends”, his melody-driven songs leave the listener singing after the song is over.

Songs from Charlie’s CDs “All Roads Lead To Home” and “JustLove!” have received airplay locally on WXPN 88.5 in Philadelphia and WSTW 93.7 in Wilmington, DE. His third CD, “What It Is” is due to be released in December 2011. Visit www.charliephillips.com for more information about Charlie and to enjoy videos of his live performances.

-- Opening will be special guest Mike Holliday

Free Event

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Alfred James Band with Beggar's Ride

Alfred is the only cellist in the world playing a 5-string carbon fiber cello -- standing up! He started playing the cello as a young boy after his father (a surgeon and amateur cellist) suffered a stroke that ended both his surgical and musical careers. Alfred picked up his dad's cello where he left off and the rest as they say is history.

His influences range from Pablo Casals, Ralph Kirshbaum, Yo Yo Ma, Sting, Dave Matthews, etc. etc. etc. Welcome to the high energy sounds of the Alfred James Band and remember, the cello isn't just for classical music anymore.

We have been featured on NPR's All Songs Considered, opened at the Kimmel Center for Bruce Hornsby, and have performed on NBC's morning show 4 times. Alfred recently played cello for the AMC trailer for Tom Cruise's The Last Samurai.

-- Opening will be special guest Beggar's Ride

$10 Cover

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Jesse Terry, Lizanne Knott & Michael Logen

With his down-to-earth appeal and deceptively sharp writing, Jesse Terry plants himself firmly among the most promising singer-songwriters of his generation. His 2009 debut, The Runner, which was licensed to popular MTV shows The Hills and The City, introduced him as an inspired prodigy with the potential to score big on the Americana scene. Michael McCall of the Nashville Scene lauded Terry for offering "a sophisticated melodic touch to his tender musings about love and finding his place in the world." While the sounds of popular music become increasingly inflated, he wades into the fray with graceful, understated arrangements that embrace his ambitious songs. To listen to samples, visit www.jesseterrymusic.com

A long standing member of the singer-songwriter scene in Philadelphia, Lizanne Knott has been captivating audiences throughout the Northeast and garnering attention from radio listeners across the globe. Well known locally for her floating vocals and lyrical juxtapositions, her apparent depth and transcending warmth make for an inviting mix of music which moves easily through dark poetic ballads to folk driven rock. To listen to samples, visit www.lizanneknott.com

Michael Logen is an international pop/folk artist, currently touring opening in 2009 for John Legend, Jonny Lang and Sister Hazel in the U.S. Including at The Ryman Auditorium, House of Blues/ New Orleans and Chastain Park Amphitheater in Atlanta. In 2008, songs from Michael's album “Things I Failed To Mention” were featured on MTV's “Real World” and ABC's “Kyle XY” and songs from the album won multiple awards including International Songwriting Competition's 09 Song of the Year Award in Folk/Singer-Songwriter Category and Unisong International Songwriting Competition 09 Song of the Year in Americana Category. To listen to samples, visit www.michaellogen.com

$10 Adv / $12 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Meg Hutchinson with Andrew Gray

Meg Hutchinson is an award-winning songwriter who artfully documents the human condition. With a poet’s ease, she makes the personal universal, allowing people’s stories to come alive through her unique vocals and haunting melodies. Since the release of her Red House Records debut COME UP FULL, she has won high praise for her songwriting and has been featured nationally on NPR Music, XM/Sirius Radio and several times on the syndicated show Mountain Stage. Publications like The Winnipeg Free Press have compared her songwriting with that of veterans Dar Williams, Mary Chapin Carpenter and Joni Mitchell.

Lyric-based, contemporary acoustic songwriter. Influences include poet Mary Oliver, songwriter Shawn Colvin, and mood maker David Gray. Originally from rural western-most Massachusetts, Hutchinson is now based in the Boston area. She has won numerous songwriting awards in the US, Ireland and UK, including recognition from John Lennon Songwriting Competition, Billboard Song Contest and prestigious competitions at Merlefest, NewSong, Kerrville, Falcon Ridge, Telluride and Rocky Mountain Folks Festivals.

She released “Come Up Full” on Red House Records in 2008, and is now celebrating the release of her new album “The Living Side” February 9th, 2010.

-- Opening will be special guest Andrew Gray

$12 Adv / $15 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm

The Sea, The Sea with Jon Paul

Borrowing their name from the cry of joy made by ancient Greek Soldiers upon their post-war homecoming, The Sea, The Sea is Mira Stanley from West Virginia and Chuck E. Costa from Connecticut. They meet in the middle with acoustic guitars.

Standing next to other contemporary duos like The Weepies, The Civil Wars, The Swell Season, The Sea, The Sea is spare beauty, bravely unadorned.

Two voices that blend like smoke and air. Like night and a whisper. Two distinct award-winning songwriters that meet in the mercury, collide and create emotionally spare music. Simple and true.

-- Opening will be special guest Jon Paul

$8 Adv / $10 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Craig Bickhardt with Jesse Terry

Craig has recently returned home to the Media area after 25 years in Nashville. His songs have been recorded by over 100 artists including B. B. King, Alison Krauss, Ray Charles, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Diane Schuur, Tony Rice, Martina McBride, The Judds, Art Garfunkle, Vince Gill, Kathy Mattea.

Craig's reintroduction to the Philadelphia area showcase club market has been truly magical, and his recent live interview and "mini-concert" on WXPN was met with unbridled enthusiasm. WUMB's Juli Clarke just has put two songs from Craig's Easy Fires CD in rotation, and XMRadio's Mike Marrone has added it to his show, The Loft.

-- Opening will be special guest Jesse Terry

$15 Cover

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Jason Myles Goss CD Release Show!
with Dietrich Strause

A Hopedale, MA native, Jason has been writing and recording since 2003 when he released his first full length album "Long Way Down." Since then, he's spent his time touring and releasing subsequent albums before settling down long enough to make "Radio Dial," in which he enlisted the help of friends Austin Nevins (guitars) and Sam Kassirer (keys), both members of Josh Ritter's Royal City Band, as well as David Dawda (bass) and Joel Arnow (drums).

Self-produced at Vanity Sound in Brooklyn, NY, Jason and engineer Myles Turney began by recording live to analog tape, giving the foundation of the album a scrappy, raw quality, evocative of roots-based albums like Lucinda Williams' "Car Wheels On A Gravel Road," or, the more modern day, Wilco’s “Sky Blue Sky.” Yet, the songs also contained big, melody-driven, pop ambitions in the vein of records like Counting Crows’ “August and Everything After,” or The Wallflowers’ “Bringing Down The Horse”— song-centric 90’s rock records that occupied Jason’s world when he was a teenager growing up in a small mill town. However, rather than grapple with these two divergent influences, Jason strove at the outset to make a record where they both could sit side by side at the same musical table. It was in that spirit that “Radio Dial,” Jason’s fourth album, was born

-- Opening will be special guest Dietrich Strause

$8 Adv / $10 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm

US Rails with Pete Donnelly

Echoing some of the great folk, pop and rock unions of the 60's and 70's as well as the newest super-groups and dream bands spanning the globe these days, US Rails emerges as the underdog collective of songwriters, singers and musicians who deliver not just a night of cool songs and great harmony. US Rails leaves you with the kind of lingering memory that you may have experienced hearing some of these bands live for the very first time. It's in the sum of the parts, not the star of the show.

US Rails is five distinctive personalities who met originally while living in and around Philadelphia, PA but have since scattered all over the map to France, Germany and Austin, TX. Though US Rails has played shows in the United States, they are currently signed to the European label Blue Rose Records. Their first recording, produced in a cottage house just South of Paris, will be released overseas this spring. Most of the members of US Rails were originally part of the Philadelphia group 4 Way Street (Sanctuary Records). Now, reinvented and rejuvenated, they are carrying on the tradition.

-- Opening will be special guest Pete Donnelly

$15 Adv / $18 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Mia Dyson with Hotels and Highways

Mia is a self-managed independent artist from Melbourne and based in Los Angeles. All 3 of her albums were critically-acclaimed and nominated for ARIAs including for Best Female Artist. Her second album 'Parking Lots' won the ARIA for 'best blues and roots album'. After much time spent touring and recording in the States, she is returning to Australia in 2012 with her new album 'The Moment'.

"My newest material looks at our obsession over what other people think. The pursuit of one’s own liberation and freedom is what my music is about." Dyson’s unapologetic outlook is the perfect enhancement for a performer who’s crafted her live show to razor sharp brilliance. Always working from a raw, impassioned perspective, her music puts front and center her thoughts on love, expectations, dispossession and the barriers we construct around ourselves that keep us from personal emancipation.

-- Opening will be special guest Hotels and Highways

$10 Cover

Doors Open at 7:30pm

Caleb Spaulding, Matt Borrello, Jarrod Dickenson

Caleb Spaulding is a singer/songwriter and multi instrumentalist (guitar, harmonica, mandolin and banjo). Along with vocalist Carolyn Tapper, they will be playing in support of Spauldings freshman release This Side Of The Great Divide. The two weave a tapestry of harmonies while singing lyrics with insight beyond their collective years. To listen to samples, visit www.reverbnation.com/calebspaulding

Matt Borrello is a singer-songwriter from Southeastern Massachusetts. For five years Matt has performed regularly in the Boston/Providence area, usually as a solo acoustic act, but also as a sideman for other songwriters and as the leader of his band, the Quality Dogs. His songs draw their structures from folk, country, blues, and rock music. Matt writes from a personal perspective, but his songs are markedly devoid of the boring self-pity that plagues the repertoires of many acoustic balladeers. He has several protest songs and no breakup songs. Matt's insightful lyrics and passionate performances have earned him recognition in various New England talent showcases and songwriting contests, most notably at the Boston Folk Festival Youth Songwriting Contest.
To listen to samples, visit www.mattborrello.com

Texas-born songwriter, Jarrod Dickenson's slightly spooky melodies and lyrics invoke a mid-Western post-war America, when cars ran on leaded gas, television hadn't yet kidnapped the country's imagination, and men wore hats every day. His reflective lyrics, almost like hand-written letters, remind us that human stories of lost love, sudden fortune, and abiding mystery transcend the decades...and nothing is better or worse right now than it's ever been. Jarrod's upcoming 2012 release, "The Lonesome Traveler", was recorded in Los Angeles, CA with 3-time Grammy winner, Ryan Freeland (Ray LaMontagne, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Aimee Mann, Lisa Hannigan, Joe Henry, Aaron Neville, etc.), and features an incredible cast of musicians, including Greg Leisz, David Piltch, Sebastian Aymmans and Jebin Bruni. Jarrod spends most of his time on the road touring throughout the United States and UK, and is quickly, and not-so-quietly taking the folk music world by storm. Stay tuned for more exciting news, and be sure to check the calendar to see when Jarrod is playing near you.
To listen to samples, visit www.jarroddickenson.com

$8 Adv / $10 At the Door

Doors Open at 7:30pm