4th Annual Washington Square Park Folk Festival

Hello everybody – come on out to the Washington Square Park Folk Festival that I’ve been putting together the last few years, if ya can!  – Eli

Schedule:

1pm – The Down Hill Strugglers
1:45pm – Jerron “Blind Boy” Paxton
2:30pm – Lightning in the East
3:15pm – Radio Jarocho
4pm – Square Dance!  with David Harvey of NYC Barn Dance

Organizers are happy to announce the upcoming 4th Annual Washington Square Park Folk Festival.  This festival is free and open to the public and is set for Sunday Sept. 14th, from 1-5pm.  The festival stage is located by the Garibaldi statue on the East side of Washington Square Park, seating will be provided.

This year the festival will feature blues music from Jerron “Blindboy” Paxton, two old time string bands; the Down Hill Strugglers, recently featured on the soundtrack to the Coen Brothers’ “Inside Llewyn Davis,” and Lightning in the East, featuring banjoist Steve Arkin, and Radio Jarocho playing Son Jarocho style music from the Veracruz region of Mexico.  The festival will close with a community square dance!  The dance is always great fun, and will be called by David Harvey of NYC Barn Dance.

The festival celebrates and continues the long tradition of folk music performance in Washington Square Park. This tradition goes all the way back to the 1940’s and the birth of Folk music in New York City, with the likes of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger coming together on Sunday afternoons to play music and socialize in the park.  This tradition continued up through the 1960’s where the park welcomed a young Bob Dylan to the folk music scene in the city, and it continues up until today.  The Washington Square Park Folk Festival is the first formal festival presentation of Folk music in Washington Square Park’s history and we are proud to see the festival enter its 4th successful year.

The Harry Smith Festival

Hello everybody,
  Look out for the 6th annual Harry Smith Festival, coming up this weekend in Milheim, PA!  Should be a great event, I’ll be there with the Down Hill Strugglers and John Cohen…  For more information take a look at their facebook page.

The Down Hill Strugglers Take to the Road


Hello everybody,

The Down Hill Strugglers are taking to the road again this Fall. Look out for us in the Eastern half of the United States!  We have 10 shows across 7 states – including several show in New Orleans and an appearance at the St. Louis Folk and Roots Festival!  Hope to see ya somewhere out there…

See our website: www.DownHillStrugglers.com for more information… here are the dates:

Tues. Sept. 24th – Bowling Green, OH
The Happy Badger
331 North Main St.
Show time: 7-9pm
They serve food, but BYOB/Wine.
$10

Thurs. Sept. 26th – Louisville, KY
The Greenhaus
2227 South Preston St.
Showtime: 8pm, opener TBA
$5

Fri. Sept. 27th – Champaign, IL
Techline Studios
307 South Locust St. Champaign, IL 61820
7pm opener – Flatville Ditch, we go on at 7:45pm.
www.folkandroots.org

$10

Sat. Sept. 28th
– St. Louis, MO
St. Louis Folk & Roots Festival
Urban Chestnut Stage 1-2pm
Grandel Theater Square Dance 4-6pm
See: www.folkandrootsfestival.com for tickets. Ralph Stanley headlines.

Sun. Sept. 29th
– Eureka Springs, AR
Chelsea’s Corner Cafe
10 Mountain Street
2 sets 7-10pm
No cover!

Thurs. Oct. 3rd – New Orleans, LA
Ogden Museum of Southern Art
925 Camp St.
6:00 pm – 8:00 pm
Lobby Atrium of The Ogden Museum of Southern Art’s Stephen Goldring Hall
$10
www.ogdenmuseum.org

Sat. Oct. 5th – New Orleans, LA
Allways Lounge
2240 Saint Claude Ave.
with Yes Ma’am and the Drunken Catfish Ramblers
10pm
www.theallwayslounge.com

Wed. Oct. 9th – Athens, GA
The Globe
199 N. Lumpkin St.
Showtime TBA
Opener TBA

Thurs. Oct. 10th – Carrboro, NC
The ArtsCenter
300-G East Main St.
8pm – Hushpuppies open
9pm – we go on
$6 member advance, $10 advance, $14 day of show
www.artscenterlive.org

Sat. Oct. 12th – Baltimore, MD
Creative Alliance – us with John Cohen (of the New Lost City Ramblers).
8pm with opening set by Walker and Jay

“John Cohen joins this talented young band to perform old time music…while excerpting his documentary films on Appalachian music…”
$20, $15 mbrs & stus.
Maryland State Arts Council’s Cliff Murphy hosts a Q & A.
http://www.creativealliance.org

The Union Makes Us Strong

New from Down Home Radio host Eli Smith:

Hello everybody,

My friend Peter K. Siegel and I have just released an album of Union and Labor songs that we’ve been laboring over for some time.  It came out great!  It features a number of old standards of the American labor movement, as well as several that are not well known but are really good and interesting songs.  Many of the songs were penned by old IWW (Wobbly) song writers, including several by Joe Hill.  The songs are rendered in an old time string band sound.

The album features Peter and myself, joined on a number of songs by Andy Statman, Craig Judelman and Walker Shepard.  The album also features really nice liner notes – a 20 page booklet with an essay written by Cliff Conner, lots of pictures, etc.

We really tried to make a high quality album that sounds great and is accessible to people, so that these great old labor songs might live again.  If you are interested the album is available in all the usual ways – Amazon, iTunes, CDBaby, stealing, etc….  We hope you will enjoy!

Solidarity Forever…

– Eli

Washington Square Park Folk Festival 2013

Hello everybody.  Well the 2013 Washington Square Park Folk Festival is coming right up and its gonna be great!  Come out to the stage on the East side of the park on Sunday, Sept. 15th from 1-6pm.  Free admission!

Here’s the schedule:

1pm Baby Soda Jazz Band

1:45pm Peter K. Siegel and Eli Smith

2:15pm Litvakus

3pm Pat Conte

3:45pm Down Hill Strugglers with John Cohen

4:30: Hubby Jenkins (of the Carolina Chocolate Drops)

5:15 pm: Square Dance! with Dave Harvey of NYC Barndance

Thank you so much to our sponsors for making this event possible: The Washington Square Hotel, Matt Umanov Guitars, NYU, the Jalopy Theatre and the NYC Parks Department!

   


 

 


Poster by Bruised Egos.