WILLIAMSVILLE — Music magic will be made at Manitou's forest theater on Sunday, Sept 18, with a 4 p.m. concert featuring local musicians, songwriters, and comrades Peter Siegel and Shawn Magee, with “solos, harmonic duos, and tasty backup from special friends bringing songs of love, hope, and cures for humanity,” according to organizers.
Siegel is founder of The Gaslight Tinkers and strikes a radical chord with American Roots music. Inspired and mentored by Pete Seeger as a Hudson Valley neighbor early on, Peter draws from the likes of Phil Ochs, The Band, Woody Guthrie, Dixieland, old-time fiddle tunes and Afro-Caribbean rhythms.
Raised as “a red diaper grandbaby,” Siegel's creations defy categorization. He's shared the stage with Pete Seeger, Jay Unger and Molly Mason, Judy Collins, Dar Williams, Utah Phillips, and Noel Paul Stookey. He's also played with bluegrass powerhouse Michael Daves in the 1990s “New Old Time” band Underbelly, “a supergroup of New England talent” according to The Berkshire Eagle. His performance of Tomorrow's Children with Pete Seeger won them a Grammy award.
Magee was raised in the folk traditions of New England, playing and performing music since he was a child. Radically transformed by a move to California, he owned and curated live music at a beloved music venue in San Francisco for 15 years and toured with his band The Barbary Ghosts. Pandemic songs he wrote straight from the heart “establish him as a troubadour of love par excellence,” organizers say.
Manitou is a nonprofit organization “building community with nature on 223 acres of conserved woodlands” at 300 Sunset Lake Road in Williamsville, 1.4 miles up Sunset Lake Road from Williamsville Road (unaffected by road closure from bridge reconstruction), sign on right or 5.6 miles on Sunset Lake Road from Route 9 in West Brattleboro.
Admission is by donation. For more information, call 802-258-8598 or go to manitouproject.org, petersiegel.com, or thegaslighttinkers.com.