Sweet Spring Songwriter Showcase
with The Annie Stokes Band, Rebecca Porter, and Kat Somers
Saturday, May 4th - seating 7pm, show 8pm
Tickets: $12 advance found here
At the door: $12/cash & $15/card
kids 14under or 80&better get in free
Annie and Rebecca have been traveling around together with their guitars this spring - on The Coming Up Roses Tour - and are swinging through Nelson County with local hometown hero Kat Somers joining for our show in Lovingston! This is also Katherine Turner’s (conductor of Rapunzel’s) birthday weekend so come on out and help us celebrate with some great music and great friends. Honey Bee Fed catering company will be dropping off some very delicious desserts that will be available too.
The Annie Stokes Band: Annie's music is the result of surrendering your garden to weeds and wildflowers. And after a decade of honing her creative crafts, she's learned a thing or two about cultivation and surrender.
Raised on the seam of urban and rural living in the foothills of the eastern Blue Ridge Mountains, Annie grew up performing for others. It wasn't until she taught herself guitar at age 21 that she finally blended her loves of storytelling and singing. From there, her budding notion that she was born to share her art with others led her on a meandering journey through the Shenandoah Valley, the evangelical towns of central Virginia, the labyrinth of damp green rooms in DC, sunbaked music festivals, and dozens of rental cars and hotels on the state highways that vein from the Carolinas to Boston. After spending her twenties trying to fit into various boxes and please certain gatekeepers, the experience of motherhood taught her how to surrender to the songs that had been inside of her all along.
Her mesmerizing lyrics and crystalline voice (described by one fan as "Alison Krauss meets Nick Cave") eventually culminated in an EP (2014) and three albums (2015, 2017, and 2021). Her most recent LP, "The One That Gets Away", was awarded "Best Americana/Country Album" at the 2022 Wammies, Washington DC's prestigious music awards ceremony. Annie's music combines traditional country and folk song structure with modern lyrical sensibilities, and her live shows invite audiences into a front-porch conversation about life with biting commentaries about parenthood, heartbreak, and hope.
Her fifth studio project, "Wild Rose EP" -- cowritten and produced with Grammy member Austin Bello -- was released in March 2023. It has been highlighted in numerous publications (see press highlights) and will be featured on season six of The Martha Bassett Show.
She co-writes with her husband, bass player Will Berger. When they aren't making music, they are raising two girls and lots of hell in Virginia.
You can find more from The Annie Stokes Band from her website and on social media:
HERE & HERE
Rebecca Porter embodies the soulful, lonesome sound of the Shenandoah Valley. After a decade of honing her craft as the frontwoman of local cover bands, she taught herself guitar and transformed pandemic loneliness into two EPs - “Prime Rainbow Conditions” and “Queen of the Local”, the latter of which was successfully crowdfunded in March 2023. Porter tours extensively around her home state of Virginia, spotlighting other overlooked voices in the state, as well as curating a monthly Americana showcase at The Golden Pony in Harrisonburg, Virginia called "Honky Tonk Nights." With completely independent legwork, Porter's music is making rounds nationally and internationally. Audiences react wonderfully to Porter's fusion of honky tonk and singer-songwriter sounds. Porter tours with a tight, professional band, The Rhinestone Roses, but can command an audience solo if necessary. Most recently, Porter was inducted into Rissi Palmer's Color Me Country Class of 2024 and added to Good Country's editor Ed Helm's playlist - Ed's Picks.
Find more from Rebecca on her website and follow on the social media,
HERE and HERE
Kat Somers is a dreamy, acoustic, indie-pop, singer-songwriter, Nelson County native who lives and breathes through her lyrics that are fueled by her desire to connect with others in hopes that listeners will feel less alone.
“In 2023, after a very hard few years where I completely stopped creating, I came back to music where it all started; the Rapunzel’s stage. It feels so special to continue creating and growing in the space that fed and sheltered my dreams from a young age. This place is magic and I just want to keep bringing people together under this roof.”
Find more from Kat here and here
Sweet Spring Songwriter Showcase with The Annie Stokes Band, Rebecca Porter, and Kat Somers
$15.00
See You There