BRATTLEBORO — John Sebastian, the songwriter, singer and storyteller who burst on the scene in the 1960s with the Lovin' Spoonful and is still spreading the gospel of American roots music, will appear at the Latchis Theatre in a benefit concert on behalf of the region's struggling farmers.
The Strolling of the Heifers New England Farm Relief concert, featuring Sebastian along with special guest Meg Hutchinson, will take place on Saturday, Nov. 13 at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets are available online via www.brownpapertickets.com, by phone at 800-838-3006, or in person at Vermont Artisan Designs or the Latchis Hotel front desk, both on Main Street in Brattleboro. Tickets are priced $45, $35 and $25, with a post-concert reception $15 with any ticket level.
Proceeds are earmarked for the Strolling of the Heifers Microloan Fund for New England Farmers, which extends loans to farmers who are not able to obtain credit through traditional sources.
Sebastian agreed to fill in for the earlier-announced headliner Richie Havens, who had to cancel for medical reasons.
Sebastian's musical contributions during more than four decades have become a permanent part of American musical fabric.
The Lovin' Spoonful made this new American music like nobody before or since, putting their first seven singles into the Top 10. At first the band would take older material from blues, country, folk and jug band sources - what we now term roots music - and made it sound modern.
The band's songs include “Do You Believe in Magic?,” “You Didn't Have To Be So Nice,” “Daydream,” and others.
Sebastian was born in 1944 in New York City to creative parents; his father was a noted classical harmonica player and his mother a writer of radio programs. Regular visitors to the Greenwich Village home included Burl Ives and Woody Guthrie, and the young Sebastian became a fan of, and then a participant in, the folk music revival that swept the nation in the late '50s.His skills on guitar, harmonica, and autoharp soon made him a sought-after accompanist on the Village folk scene.
After leaving the group he founded, he performed at massive festivals like Woodstock. He had been involved in music for films and Broadway, and his theme song to Welcome Back, Kotter became a chart-topping solo record.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, he continued to record, tour, and educate aspiring musicians with his instruction books for harmonica and guitar. The 1990s also saw him return to the group format with the J-Band, a contemporary celebration of his jug band heritage.
Sebastian's induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000 hasn't slowed him down. He was the subject of the PBS special Do You Believe In Magic: The Music of John Sebastian, and an album of duets with David Grisman was released in 2007. He has also lent his music in support of social, environmental, and animal rights causes.
Meg Hutchinson is a lyric-based, contemporary acoustic songwriter. Originally from rural western Massachusetts, Hutchinson is now based in the Boston area.
She has won numerous songwriting awards in the U.S., Ireland and U.K., including recognition from the John Lennon Songwriting Competition, the Billboard Song Contest and prestigious competitions at Merlefest, NewSong, Kerrville, Falcon Ridge, Telluride and Rocky Mountain Folks Festivals. She released Come Up Full on Red House Records in 2008, and is now celebrating the release of her new album The Living Side, which came out in February.
Strolling of the Heifers is dedicated to saving family farms by connecting people with the food they eat. Each year on the first weekend of June, it presents the Strolling of the Heifers Parade on Main Street in Brattleboro, followed by the Live Green Festival.
In partnership with The Carrot Project, in 2008 it launched the Microloan Fund, which addresses the credit needs of farmers not able to borrow elsewhere. More information can be found at www.strollingoftheheifers.com.
For more information about the artists, visit www.johnbsebastian.com and www.meghutchinson.com.