Patty Carpenter & Verandah Porche, lifelong friends and collaborators who are no strangers to Brattleboro, will be playing a listening event at Stage 33 live in Bellows Falls with special guests Jon Weeks and Wheeler Laird on Sunday, May 19.
They’ll be playing some of the songs they’ve written since the Dysfunctional Family Jazz Band’s “Come Over” CD, which they also co-composed.
Patty studied with Archie Shepp and Max Roach, but wears influences ranging from Joan Baez to Billie Holiday on her sleeve. In addition to the Brooklyn-based Jazz/Americana/Soul/Folk collective Dysfunctional Family Jazz Band, she plays in Patty and the Cakes and The Patty Carpenter Jazz Band.
Verandah is a poet and an alt-lit creative collaborator. The Vermont Arts Council presented her with its Award of Merit; she received the first Ellen McCulloch-Lovell Award in Arts Education; and Marlboro College honored her with a Doctor of Humane Letters. Her poetry volumes include Sudden Eden (Verdant Books), The Body’s Symmetry (Harper and Row), and Glancing Off (See Through Books).
Verandah, who was featured with Patty in Freedom and Unity: The Vermont Movie, writes about their work together: “In the late ’60s, we landed in the sticks a stone’s throw from each other. Dreams, troubles, changes, crops, communards, kids and lovers: music and language saw us through our duet of abundance and loss. We took a guitar, the kids, and a pencil with an eraser down to the river. We’ve carved these songs out of our long friendship.”
Multi-instrumentalist Jon Weeks, joining them on flute, sax, and percussion, studied at Berklee and is a longtime East Coast player with acts like Sol Y Canto, Orquesta Unidad, The Temptations, Cayenne, Viva Quetzal, Joe Velez & Creación, Northside Saxophone Quartet, and many more.
Wheeler Laird is an enigma.
Doors at 3, music at 4 at 33 Bridge Street in Bellows Falls. Only 40 chairs are available; prepaid entry donations double as chair reservations, and reservations can be made online at stage33live.com. Day-of-show entry will be available, but a chair isn’t guaranteed; you can bring your own seating to be safe if you wish. The suggested donation for this show is $10 — more if you can, 100% of all door receipts go to the performers. No one will be turned away for lack of money.
Stage 33 Live is a volunteer-run nonprofit that hosts listening events in an old factory building at 33 Bridge Street in Bellows Falls, Vermont. Seating is limited to 40. The performances are recorded and filmed for radio, TV, and the internet. 33 Bridge Street is an accessible space. Stage 33 Live isn’t a bar, club, restaurant, theater, or state-of-the-art facility… just good folks doing a fine thing. Stage 33 Live allows only original material. More information online at www.stage33live.com
