PUTNEY — Next Stage Arts Project and Twilight Music present a contemporary singer/songwriter twin bill with Antje Duvekot and Mark Erelli at Next Stage on Friday, Feb. 11, at 7:30 pm.
“Antje and Mark have been central figures in the New England contemporary folk music scene for the last 20 years,” Twilight Music's Barry Stockwell said in a news release. “They've headlined so many memorable Twilight Music shows in that time that I jumped at the chance to bring them together for a twin bill - two of the finest singers and songwriters that I know on our stage for one night only.”
Antje Duvekot is a German-born, American-raised singer/songwriter whose songs have been critically praised for their hard-won wisdom, dark-eyed realism, and street-smart romanticism. “Her bicultural upbringing and relative newness to English have helped shape her unique way with a song, giving her a startlingly original poetic palette,” continues the news release. “They are the keys to the powerful, even revolutionary, empathy that informs everything she writes.”
She has won top songwriting awards, including the Grand Prize in the John Lennon Songwriting Competition, the Kerrville Folk Festival Best New Folk Award, and the Boston Music Award for Outstanding Folk Act.
Since the release of her debut studio CD, Big Dream Boulevard-voted the top Folk Release of 2006 by The Boston Globe and named to the Top 10 Releases of the Year by NPR's Folk Alley-Antje has been touring extensively, criss-crossing the U.S. and Europe.
She has played at major festivals, including Newport, Mountain Stage, Philadelphia, and Falcon Ridge. Antje's most recent studio release, Toward the Thunder, centers around themes of courage, resilience, and striving for something better. (1)“As with most of her writing, a sense of hope and perseverance shines through the songs.”
Mark Erelli has toured internationally as a solo artist for the past 23 years, appearing onstage from coffeehouses to major folk festivals (Newport, Philadelphia, Shrewsbury) to Fenway Park, where he sang the national anthem before a Red Sox game. He has won music awards ranging from the Kerrville Folk Festival Best New Folk Award to Grand Prize in the International Song Contest.
In recent years, Erelli has gained notoriety as a multi-instrumentalist sideman and producer, accompanying Grammy-winning artists such as Lori McKenna, Paula Cole, Marc Cohn, and Josh Ritter from Nashville's Grand Ole Opry to London's Royal Albert Hall.
In addition to producing two records for McKenna, Erelli's own diverse discography includes collections of Western swing, lullabies, bluegrass (with his band, Barnstar!) and songs of social conscience, as well as several highly acclaimed collaborations with artists such as Jeffrey Foucault.
His song, (2)“By Degrees,” on which he was joined by Rosanne Cash, Sheryl Crow, and others, was nominated for the 2019 Song of the Year at the Americana Honors and Awards. Erelli's latest album, Blindsided, combines the exuberance of his signature sound with the wisdom that comes with over 20 years of songwriting.