Grateful Retreats has announced a get away event featuring The Dire Wolves, set to take place from January 11 – 16, 2022 in Tulum, Mexico.
The event will celebrate the Grateful Dead community in the jungle paradise of Tulum. It will feature music with intimate live jam sessions by well known artists. People attending can explore wellness practices like meditation and yoga in the company of like-minded people. Learn from renowned healers, groove with talented musicians and hang at the beach at sunset with new friends. The retreat will supply catered gourmet meals and beautiful scenery while participants celebrate the “Ripple” of wellness, music and kindness in our lives over a peaceful week in a joyful community!
The retreat will be taking place at the Paledora Eco-resort which is located 15 minutes outside of Tulum, just minutes from the last protected beach of the Riviera. It has a private cenote on site and a hidden cave at the nearby sister campus, this magical jungle paradise creates the perfect place to disconnect and reconnect through music and wellness practices. It will feature 10 bedrooms, spread across 3 unique jungle homes, delicious local cuisine prepared by in-house chefs, a large yoga studio and event palapa on site, and a beautiful natural pool to soak in or lounge by during the heat of the day.
View this and more Grateful Dead shows from across the years in New York State with our interactive map below!
The amenities include a five night stay at beautiful Paledora Eco-Resort in Chemuyil, Tulum, Mexico. An all-inclusive catered gourmet meals with vegan options available. Workshops and lectures by renowned wellness experts and intimate jam sessions with The Dire Wolves. Private concert at the retreat venue and daily yoga and meditation classes.
The retreat will feature performances from The Dire Wolves Play DEAD: Al Schnier and Vinnie Amico of moe,, Jason Hann of String Cheese Incident, and Mark Joseph of The Big Wu.
For tickets and more information visit Grateful Retreats website.
Happy Holidays from the team at NYS Music! We hope you enjoy the time with family, friends and colleagues, and stay safe throughout the season.
photo by Steve Malinski
The curveball of the past few weeks has led to music plans being scuttled for the safety of small gatherings.
photo by Zach Culver
Even though shows and events have been cancelled across the Empire State and eastern half of the country, we hope this season brings joy and merriment to those closest to you, as we prepare for a winter thaw in 2022.
photo by Steve Malinski
Our gift to you is a selection of Christmas songs from musicians across the Empire State, and over the years. No matter where or how you celebrate, Happy Holidays from the team at NYS Music!
And of course, the classic performances of Darlene Love on Late Show with David Letterman
Inspiring Capital Region musician Athena Burke has recently released her new album, God is Here, on November 19. Produced by Devon Seegers, the album features eleven songs that address healing amid heartbreak and loss, and finding faith in something greater than what your eyes can see.
With a message celebrating the humble joys in life each day, Athena’s tender yet powerful vocals pair with deeply honest lyrics on an earthy and vulnerable electropop soundscape. Burke is honest about the human experience, saying:
No matter what you’ve done or what you believe, you are held in a love that is eternal, universal, and inclusive. God loves the oddballs and God wants to unite us, not divide us. A new era is dawning and although it is chaotic now, there’s a groundswell of unity pulsing in our world.
Athena Burke
Growing up, Athena was abused as a child, and found the piano as a bastion of harmony as a toddler. This led to her studies at Berklee College of Music, followed by street performing and concerts across the country. Inspired to heal her trauma, Athena trained in meditation, breathwork, and personal growth practices, and in wanting to give back, Athena has given thousands of spiritual guidance and healing sessions and performances worldwide.
Athena Burke sings honestly about the human experience of a devotional person. God is Here is not specifically Christian or derived from any specific religion, but rather about finding the divinity and love in everything, everywhere, in everyone, and every situation.
Athena has been featured on the PBS/WMHT AHA! A House of Arts TV show, as well as receiving extensive airplay on WEXT AND WEQX. She is a frequent performer at her local listening room in Cambridge, NY, The Depot.
Bearsville Theater in Woodstock played host to Mihali, singer and songwriter known best for his work with Vermont’s Twiddle, on December 11, part of NYS Music’s Jam for Tots series. An enthralled and captive crowd filled the space in Bearsville, eager to celebrate the Mihalidaze.
Mihali’s solo project incorporates loops and layers connecting with lyrics in a mysterious, yet energetically powerful way. The use of everything from beatbox to bass juxtapose with the pure vulnerability of simply a voice and a guitar. The result is a soothing connection between crowd members among themselves, with the stage, the environment in which one experiences this music.
Experiencing Mihali at Bearsville Theater felt different than watching the home streams over the past year. The beautiful wooden circular backdrop bearing a logo with a mushroom not dissimilar in shape to the artist’s Santa hat glowed and pulsed with different colors throughout the show. The impression the backdrop gave was something like “all natural organic forest” but with some magic. The good kind. The kind with cute woodland creatures and the occasional talking fern.
The hardwood of the Bearsville theater is said to hide over 100 speakers in the ceiling of the old listening room. The way the music balanced so perfectly from every corner of the venue continued to reinforce the idea of some type of presence of a universal connection and wordless communication going on that night. Encapsulated in both wood, light and sound, there was an unspoken transfer of energy happening reflecting some type of phenomenon.
The transfer of energy between the green glow-worm-eque necklaces worn by many attendees seemed to balance out the warm salmony-pink glow of the somehow perfect number of chandeliers smiling down from above.
The spinning of Emily’s LED Poi looked to have a more dominant pastel tone as opposed to the vivd colors prevalent at many “up all night” type of festivals. The string light necklaces even looked muted when blended with the color bounding off the hard wood musical cocoon of a venue.
The complimentary nature seemed to continue right down to the colors of the clothing. The particular tint and tone of choice among fans had this young reindeer, almost fawn-like look to it. Whether boots or shirts, jackets or skirts… there was no denying the amount of earth tones out to dance that night.
It felt like an honor to be let into anyone’s home or studio during a time of universal struggle the recognize something familiar. Mihali’s intimacy in the way he communicates his music did not change from home to office and provided the perfect celebration during the holiday season.
Less than a week before they were slated to take the stage at Madison Square Garden, Phish announced today that due to the concerns over the wave of COVID-10 Omicron variant that is sweeping through New York City and elsewhere, the MSG shows will postpone to April, rather than being outright cancelled.
Phish will honor all tickets for the December 29-January 1 shows at MSG on the rescheduled dates of April 20-23, marking the first time Phish has played New York City in April since 1994 at the Beacon Theatre. Get the Webcast here.
The band said in a statement:
With the Omicron variant of Covid-19 surging in New York City, we have made the very difficult decision to reschedule next week’s run of shows at Madison Square Garden.
The health and safety of Phish fans, our crew, and venue staff is paramount in our minds. While Phish has played shows this year as the pandemic has continued, this variant’s ability for rapid transmission is unprecedented.
We are also mindful that a significant number of people travel for these shows and then return to their communities, and we want to avoid accelerating transmission of the virus.
Finally, even with the strictest of tour Covid protocols, the prolonged exposure of a four-night indoor run (plus the days of preparation and travel) to critical crew and staff considerably increases the possibility of having to shut the shows down once they’ve started.
We’re fortunate to have found a four-night window in The Garden’s schedule, and the shows will now take place April 20-23, 2022, including a three-set show (as originally planned for New Year’s Eve) on April 22.
Ticket holders can request a refund anytime over the next 30 days, beginning today, if they cannot commit to the rescheduled show date. If a refund is not requested during the allotted time, tickets will be valid for the new show date. Please note: If you purchased from an authorized ticket sales channel (Ticketmaster, Phish Tickets, CID or venue website) these ticketing partners will be contacting all buyers shortly with further instructions.
Thank you all for your understanding. Stay healthy and safe, take care of each other out there and please get vaccinated and boosted if you haven’t already.
No word yet if Phish will stream archival shows in place of the anticipated New Years run at Madison Square Garden.
The April shows would mark the second ever ‘Island Run’ of shows, although unofficially so.
The rescheduled shows also mean that Phish will start the rescheduled dates on 4/20/22. Phish has not played on April 20 since 1994, so there’s that.
On December 10th and 11th Buffalo was host to TID The Season 2021, one of the craziest shows put on by the hometown band, Every Time I Die. This two day show took place this year at the Buffalo River Works, a venue with two stories, ice skating rinks, ferris wheel, and more. Previous years, this had been held at other venues, such as The Rec Room. This has been a popular event for many years in Buffalo, so much so that when the weekend passes went on sale, they would immediately sell out, so you would have to get your hands on them quickly.
Every Time I Die
Upon arriving Friday evening, the first thing you see is the long, long line of anxious show goers waiting to get it and with the show always being in December and in Buffalo, you just never know what to expect but thankfully the weather was decent. Since the show has a Christmas theme, many showed up in fashion, with their santa hats, matching Christmas PJs, or holiday themed suits. First nights line up was 68’, which if you’ve seen their performance, it’s a sight to see. Then Kublai Khan really got the show and got the crowd going with their hardcore sound.
View from the second floor showing the packed house
A tradition of TID The Season is to mix up the sound and they did that with a band called Mariachi El Bronx, who brought some spicy tunes and the crowd was digging so much that a congo line was started! There was a slight band change as Poison The Well was listed to play but sadly had to drop out so another hometown favorite joined in on the bill, which was Buried Alive and they took things up quite a few notches. In between sets, there were other things to enjoy, food onsite, multiple bars, they even had an ice skating rink and curling available.
Mariachi El Bronx
Also, if you looked around enough, you would catch a Christmas lighted Every Time I Die sign which many throughout the night took photos and selfies with, and even Santa would appear from time to time. Next to take the stage was Circa Survive, which toned things down a bit just before the main event and as Circa’s set ends, a curtain drops, which a yule log burning was projected. The anticipation builds as the band sets up and in all in one motion, the curtain drops and Every Time I Die kicks off and the crowd explodes.
Wrestling kicking off the second day of TID The Season
Saturday started earlier in the day and with something unique to the show. One of the members Andy Williams, the guitarist, has been a long time wrestler and with every TID The Season show, the second day kicks off with a few matches and it’s truly a spectacle to witness, you may catch Santa flying around in the ring.
Every Time I Die performing on their final night of TID The Season
Once the wrestling was over, it was time to get to the music and kick things off was End and then followed by The Dirty NIL. If you ended up being bored in between sets or at the end of one, one of the other activities you could do was a bull riding machine, which was fun to see people doing their best to hold on but ultimately flown to the side.
Ice T
Continuing the music is Spiritbox with their beautiful clean vocals and gut wrenching screams, and by now, countless crowd surfers have made their way to the front. Following Spiritbox is The Bronx, which the previous night, Mariachi El Bronx which consist of some of the same members but The Bronx has a totally different sound that got the crowd to really move, especially when the singer dived into the crowd and sang two songs as a circle pit formed around him.
Knocked Loose with the unique metalcore sound, got the circle pits really going. Now, after them, was another change up from the metal, hard rock with Ice T who is well known on the stage and tv but the energy and vibe was strong nonetheless. Finally, for the conclusion of this entire two day show, we have Every Time I Die closing out again, who this time while setting up, decided the night needed to feel more like Christmas, so let it snow! The night came to an end with Every Time I Die playing their heart out for the second night and fans singing along to every song. This show has been around for awhile and has created so many memories and so many look forward to it, it almost feels like a tradition and hopefully it will continue.
The sound of New Orleans will make its way across New York State in Spring 2022 as The Soul Rebels embark on “Epic Vibes Tour” with stops in Buffalo, Waterloo, Albany, Brooklyn and Westhampton Beach.
The Soul Rebels recently announced they will be taking part in fellow New Orleanian Trombone Shorty on his Summer 2022 Threauxdown Tour. Their Epic Vibes Tour runs from December 2021 through April 2023, with shows on the West Coast, the Northeast, a monthly residency in Memphis and a healthy amount of shows in New Orleans.
The brass band continue to ride high off the release of their latest album Poetry In Motion. The eight-member collective appeared on Def Jam artist Dave East and Nas’ “Godfather 4” single, Big Freedia and Icona Pop’s “Pipe That”, and reached fans with original singles “Greatness” which was featured as ESPN’s official College Hoops theme anthem, and “Good Time” featured on Netflix’s #BlackAF and Dad Stop Embarrassing Me!
The Soul Rebels have impressed viewers with two recent appearances on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, featured on NPR’s Tiny Desk series with Wu Tang Clan frontman GZA, headlined the global TED Conference, and appeared on the official soundtrack for Universal Pictures’ hit comedy Girls Trip.
Soul Rebels Epic Vibes 2022 Tour
12/17 Memphis, TN RAILGARTEN 12/22 New Orleans HOUSE OF BLUES 12/31 New Orleans MAISON 1/14 Memphis, TN RAILGARTEN 1/15 Baton Rouge, LA CHELSEA’S 1/22 New Orleans BLUE NILE 2/11 New Orleans DBA 2/16 San Diego, CA MUSIC BOX 2/17 Los Angeles, CA TERAGRAM BALLROOM 2/18 San Francisco, CA THE INDEPENDENT 2/19 Oakland, CA THE NEW PARISH 2/20 Felton, CA FELTON MUSIC HALL 2/23 Seattle, WA NECTAR LOUNGE 2/24 Olympia, WA CAPITOL THEATER 2/25 Portland, OR PDX JAZZ FESTIVAL 2/26 Bellingham, WA WILD BUFFALO 2/27 Victoria, BC UPSTAIRS CABARET 3/24 Waterloo, NY THE VINE @ DELLAGO CASINO RESORT 3/25 Philadelphia, PA BROOKLYN BOWL 3/26 Washington, DC 930 CLUB 3/27 Pittsburg, PA THUNDERBIRD CAFE 3/29 Buffalo, NY BUFFALO IRON WORKS 3/30 Albany, NY LARK HALL 3/31 Boston, MA BIG NIGHT LIVE *w/ GZA & Talib Kweli 4/1 NYC BROOKLYN BOWL 4/2 NYC BROOKLYN BOWL 4/3 Millersville, PA PHANTOM POWER 4/6 Bridgeport, CT PARK CITY MUSIC HALL 4/7 Fall River, MA NARROWS CENTER FOR THE ARTS 4/8 Greenfield, MA HAWKS AND REED 4/9 Westhampton Beach, NY WESTHAMPTON BEACH PAC 4/10 Ventura, CA SKULL & BONES 4/23 New Orleans DBA
Ahh, the morning social media tune-in (sigh). It’s increasingly filled with the kind of news you really don’t want to hear and certainly can’t use. On Monday, December 21, it was teeming with word that the NYC music and arts scene had lost one of its boldest and most congenial promoters, Steven Paul Trimboli, on the night before Thanksgiving due to a massive stroke.
New York actually lost Steve Trimboli a few years back when he decamped from high rents NYC for Detroit with the 2014 closing of his beloved Goodbye Blue Monday. Opened in 2005, Goodbye Blue Monday was one of the first clubs established in Bushwick with the gentrification of the Lower East Side. The West Village was where Trimboli ran another popular institution, the metal music-centric Scrap Bar from 1986 – 1995. All totaled, Trimboli spent over 40+years in the scene, as club owner, booker, bartender and ceaseless creative pot stirrer.
According to an article by former Observer culture writer Drew Grant, Trimboli’s Scrap Bar was “the place where punk went to die and hair metal held the wake.” It was the metal sculpture-adorned venue, a dive bar as done by H.R. Giger of Alien film fame, where MTV held some of its most raucous Christmas parties during the hair band era. It was where Johnny Thunder would go on the nod and Slash would be “serviced” under the table by porn star Savannah.
To avoid noise issues, Trimboli created one of the weirdest sound systems I ever encountered in my life as a musician. Guitars, bass, keys, vocals, etc. would all essentially be plugged into a giant stereo, including the drummers, who had to bash away on electronic kits (not always happily). This was all feed into a seemingly endless array of tiny speakers placed throughout the Goth-like venue. Bands not only got to play, but to walk away with a video of their performance provided on VHS by Trimboli’s sound guy for a few bucks. It had a liberal booking policy, mostly metal in its early days. But it woud later evolve into nightly lineups showcasing emerging indie, folk, punk, poets and even no wave-ish and experimental jazzbos.
Trimboli himself departed Manhattan for Bushwick in 1999, and spent the next five years trying to get his newest venture off the ground.
Situated under the elevated J Subway line on a seriously darkened stretch of Broadway, Goodbye Blue Monday was another wholly unique institution. It matched the carnivalesque vibe of a junk shop with a dive bar/performance venue. There was never a cover and a booking policy that would grant pretty much anyone a bit of stage time – from musicians to comics, from poets to mimes. The stubbornly seedy joint seemed to cook 365 days a year and helped launch the careers of notables like Vampire Weekend and events like the quirky songwriting conclave, The Bushwick Book Club.
“Goodbye Blue Monday was an old-school Brooklyn radical art hole both epic and legendary,” remembers Radio Free Brooklyn host Robert Prichard. “GBM was something very rare and very precious; it was a real creative community. It was the kind of place that brought smiles to faces and inspiration into hearts. The world seems a lot smaller today without Steve (Trimboli) in it.”
“When you’re trying to find yourself creatively, there is nothing more helpful than having a space to do it,” writes Christopher Mastumoto, MC C.B on Facebook. “A space free of judgments where you can just go up on stage and see what sticks. Something that nowadays is very, very scarce.
“Steven helped me get to that stage when I needed it the most.” Adds Mastumoto. “He was upfront and honest and gave unlimited opportunities to any person looking to be creative. His venues never held you to a cover or any of that bullshit “you need to bring 15 people at $10 a pop” – a scam many promoters still do. It was something a young kid like me, and so many others, needed to begin to make their mark.”
For more on the life of Steve Trimboli, read Drew Grant’s Observer article.
Carnegie Hall will host two legends in 2022, each celebrating their own milestone from the Perelman Stage in the Stern Auditorium. On April 22, Jorma Kaukonen will celebrate his 80th trip around the sun with an electric performance by Hot Tuna, and on May 10, double-bass jazz legend Ron Carter will be fêted for his 85th birthday celebration.
filled with music and memories at Carnegie Hall’s Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage. NBC newscaster Lester Holt will serve as emcee, with appearances from fellow artists Stanley Clarke and Buster Williams already confirmed, and additional guests to be announced in the coming weeks.
For Kaukonen’s celebration, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member will join his fellow bandmates, bass guitarist Jack Casady and drummer Justin Guip for an electric evening. Casady and Kaukonen, two rock veterans and founding members of Jefferson Airplane, have been performing together as Hot Tuna since 1969, marking their 50th anniversary together as a duo in 2019.
Ron Carter, has been called by NPR as “one of the most influential and widely recorded bassists in jazz history,” and The New York Times who said “Playing with Mr. Carter can be a fearsome experience. Legendary for his professionalism and his rigorousness, he challenges musicians to stretch and improvise, not just piece together rehearsed ideas and phrases.”
Presented by Tzedakah 4 All, the event will feature performances by Carter-led groups in three combinations – Trio, Quartet, and Nonet – exploring material from his illustrious six decade career. NBC newscaster Lester Holt will serve as emcee, with appearances from fellow artists Stanley Clarke and Buster Williams already confirmed, and additional guests to be announced in the coming weeks.
Carter, synonymous with jazz bass, has performed and collaborated with a who’s who of music history, including Miles Davis, Alice Coltrane, Eric Dolphy, Herbie Hancock, Antônio Carlos Jobim, Bette Midler, Gil Scott-Heron, A Tribe Called Quest, Wayne Shorter, Paul Simon, McCoy Tyner, Aretha Franklin, Stan Getz, Roberta Flack, Bill Evans, Chet Baker, and dozens more. Carter is also a distinguished professor emeritus at City College and a faculty member at the Manhattan School of Music.
Tickets for Hot Tuna at Carnegie Hall on the 80th birthday of Jorma Kaukonen, and tickets for the 85th birthday celebration of Ron Carter, are now on sale here.
The city of Plattsburgh, New York has an Icelandic glow on the shores of Lake Champlain. The Strand Center for the Arts in town hosted Leo Kottke & Mike Gordon’s tour closing show on Sunday December 19. Just across the Lake is Mike Gordon’s Gamehendge in the city of Burlington. It seemed as if it was his first time performing in Plattsburgh since Phish’s infamous Clifford Ball festival that drew 60,000 to Clinton County in 1996. However, Gordon was making the trip to Plattsburgh well before 1996.
Photo by Kyle Donoghue
SUNY Plattsburgh alumnus and saxophonist Dave Grippo was voyaging from Burlington to Plattsburgh in the early 90s. Like Nectar’s across the lake, Plattsburgh has The Monopole around the corner from the Strand since the 1800’s. Owner of The Monopole, Cory Rosoff, remembers Mike playing in random band formations with Dave Grippo in Plattsburgh over the years. “I used to actually have his bands come in and play Homecoming Weekend being that he was alumni. He just played sax on a lot of their (Phish) albums.”
Mike Gordon on Drums, Monopole, Plattsburgh
The quiet majesty of the Strand Center allowed for great stories in between songs. Samuel Johnson kept the audio levels just right inside the old 1924 vaudeville room. Leo Kottke spoke on the origins of his 20 year relationship with Mike Gordon to the Plattsburgh crowd. He reflected about their first jam session at Trey’s barn in Burlington across the lake. It wasn’t until the last riff of the day that a groove was caught between the two and a blaze from one tiny spark was lit. Gordon reflected on how he sent Leo a tape of him adding bass to one of his tracks.
Photo by Kyle Donoghue
After three months with no reply, Kottke responded to Gordon that a lot of people send him what he did over the years and that it usually comes off “cheesy.” However there was something different about this tape and it helped lead them to that first jam session in Burlington.
photo by Kyle Donoghue
Pete Seeger once referred to Leo Kottke as the greatest 12 string guitar player in the world. The duo covered Pete Seegers “Living in the Country”, that made its notoriety live at New York City’s Bitter End club album. Freight train, freight train goin’ so fast, Please don’t tell them which train I’m on, So they won’t know which route I’ve gone. Leo and Mike played material from all three of their studio albums.
Leo gave the historical origins of their record Sixty Six Steps which naturally is named after the Queens Staircase in the Bahamas that is 66 steps high. Mike stepped out front solo again for Hank Williams “Old Habits.” He also offered a tour debut on its last night by collaborating with Leo on his original “I am Random,” of which the studio version features Jon Fishman on drums.
photo by Kyle Donoghue
The duo continued the tour’s tradition by playing through the encore so that we could all exit The Strand Center for the Arts at the same time. They landed on “From the Cradle to the Grave” from their most recent album Noon, singing, “Running for my life at every moment never have time to catch my breath, sometime I wish this crazy race were over, the thought of living scares me half to death. Everyday is the same… same old ways never change and were going to the cradle from the grave.”
