BELLOWS FALLS — Stone Church Arts in Bellows Falls presents folk artist Elizabeth Rogers as part of its 2012-13 concert series.
Look for Rogers to accompany herself on guitar as she performs her own songs, focusing on life, love and longing, this Saturday, Nov. 24, at 7:30 p.m., at the chapel of Immanuel Episcopal Church, 20 Church St., Bellows Falls.
“I tell stories of my life,” Rogers says. “My songs are a search for a way to feel at home.”
Tickets range from $13 to $20.
Reviewers have compared Rogers to her musical inspirations Joan Baez, Suzanne Vega, and Joni Mitchell. She has two albums out: One Fine Day (2004) and Breathe & Begin (2010).
Home is a big deal to Rogers. Although she lives on Cape Cod, Vermont retains a special place in her heart.
“I have spent a lot of my life traveling around the world,” she says, “When I decided to settle down, I chose Putney. I knew Vermont because, when I was young, I went to camp there, and later worked as a camp counselor. I felt at home in Vermont, and decided to make it my permanent base.”
However, after Rogers fell in love, she found herself moving to Massachusetts last year to be with her partner.
“I had a wonderful time in Vermont,” she adds. “And it was terrible for it to end. Because even though I like Cape Cod, I miss the Green Mountains and its people. [Saturday's] concert will be a chance to connect with a lot of old friends.”
The Stone Church concert is another homecoming of sorts. While living in Putney, Rogers regularly hosted the open-mic “Final Friday” Coffeehouse at Stone Church Arts. This is her first concert of her own at that venue.
'An incredible privilege'
Rogers was born and raised in Manhattan. At 9, she began singing with the New York City Opera and the Metropolitan Opera companies.
“My father was a professional musician,” she says. “He worked in the New York City Opera Orchestra. Even as child, I loved to sing, so I auditioned for those choruses.”
Rogers says she found it an incredible privilege to be part of that powerful genre of music, but she confesses that she never was a huge opera fan.
“I do enjoy an opera if I know it well,” she says.
Rogers says she even considered attending a conservatory, but knew that she lacked the discipline required of an opera soloist.
In college, she expanded her musical repertoire with jazz. Rogers has toured internationally both as a classical and jazz singer.
But she found her musical calling in folk.
“Folk music saved me,” she says. “It is the music closest to who I am. And by writing my own songs I can express what I know.”
In 2000, Rogers moved to northern Scotland, where she concentrated her efforts as a folk-singer/songwriter. She spent much of the last decade living in an intentional community in Scotland called Findhorn, where she spent four years managing a theatre while cultivating her singing career.
In early June, 2009, she returned to the United States and began pouring a year of her life into making music while touring the western United States and Japan.