Irish Music
The Vashon Island Coffee Roasterie, at 19529 Vashon Hwy SW, will hop lively with Irish music by “The Wild Hares of Kildare” from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, Feb 17. Kim Nelson & Karen Dale play fiddle to Holly Tuttle’s whistle tweedlings and guitar backing of jigs, reels, and songs.
Artist Talk
Accompanying her current art exhibition at Vashon Center for the Arts (VCA), “The Art of Daily Practice,” Eliaichi Kimaro will present an artist’s talk at 2 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 17, in VCA’s atrium.
She will share new research findings about how engaging regularly in a creative practice, regardless of skill level, transforms brains and bodies. She will reflect on the most surprising takeaways from her daily writing and painting practice, including those daily journal pages on display in her exhibition.
Kimaro is an internationally exhibited and acclaimed creator who has used writing, music, photography, film, storytelling mixed media art to explore her personal and family narratives. Her talk is open to the public, at no charge.
Joanna Sternberg
Joanna Sternberg, a visual artist, singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, will play a house concert on Vashon at 8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 23.
Sternberg’s latest album, “I’ve Got Me,” tackles themes of isolation, loneliness, and self-care struggles with honesty and optimism. Over singsong melodies and stripped-back arrangements, Sternberg plays all the instruments on the album.
Sternberg, who grew up in Manhattan Plaza — a middle-income artists-only residence in New York City established in the 1970s — has a family legacy that provided a wealth of inspiration: their “Yiddish theater gods” grandmother Fraydele Oysher and great uncle Moishe Oysher, opera singer grandpa Harold Sternberg, their aunt comedian Marilyn Michaels, and, most of all, their father, painter, guitarist and songwriter Michael Sternberg.
Find out more about Sternberg’s concert, presented by islander Tyrel Stendahl, and get tickets here.
Early Music Concert
The vibrant “Telemann Paris Quartets” will be celebrated in the third program of the 2024 Salish Sea Early Music Festival, featuring acclaimed early music specialists violinist David Greenberg, harpsichordist Elisabeth Wright, viola da gambist Susie Napper and baroque flutist Jeffrey Cohan.
The concert will take place at 7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 23, at the Episcopal Church of the Holy Spirit, at 15420 Vashon Hwy SW. Admission is by a free will donation of $20 to $30, with those 18 and younger admitted free.
Georg Philipp Telemann’s “Paris Quartets” were written for and during his most significant journey away from home during his lifetime. Having been invited to visit Paris, Telemann composed and published the first set of the quartets in 1730, and left Hamburg for Paris seven years later, where all 12 of his new quartets were performed. The second set of quartets was published during this eight-month stay in Paris in 1738.
The program will consist of two quartets from his 1730 set entitled “Quadri a violino, flauto traversiere, viola da gamba o violoncello, e fondamento,” and two from the 1738 publication entitled “Nouveaux quatuors en six suites.”
Find out more about this and other upcoming concerts at salishseafestival.org/vashon.
Stephanie Anne Johnson
Tacoma vocal powerhouse Stephanie Anne Johnson, back on Vashon by popular demand, will present a concert at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 2, at Open Space for Arts & Community.
Johnson, who released a new album, “Jewels,” in 2023, has opened for Bernie Sanders, and artists such as Mavis Staples, Chaka Khan, Ani DiFranco, Joseph, Cedric Burnside, and Black Joe Lewis.
Purchase tickets and find out more at openspacevashon.org.
Karla Bonoff
Singer and songwriter Karla Bonoff will perform an intimate concert at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, March 7, at Vashon Center for the Arts.
Bonoff has enjoyed critical acclaim, commercial success, enduring popularity, and the unwavering respect of her peers. Her songs include “Home,” covered by Bonnie Raitt, “Tell Me Why” by Wynonna Judd, and “Isn’t It Always Love,” by Lynn Anderson.
Linda Ronstadt recorded several Bonoff songs, including three on her 1976 album “Hasten Down the Wind” — “Someone To Lay Down Beside Me”, “Lose Again” and “If He’s Ever Near,” as well as “All My Life”, performed in a 1989 duet with Aaron Neville.
Billboard Magazine has called Bonoff part of “a breed of singer/songwriters whose earthly anthems of soul-searching heartache and joy touched souls in a way that few can muster today.”
Find out more at karlabonoff.com, and get tickets to the show at vashoncenterforthearts.org.
Max Gomez
Singer/songwriter Max Gomez will appear with islander Steve Itterly in a concert presented by Debra Heesch at 8 p.m. Thursday, March 7, at Snapdragon Bakery & Café.
King, as a budding performer, apprenticed in the musical micro-climate of northern New Mexico, where troubadours like Michael Martin Murphey and Ray Wylie Hubbard helped foster a Western folk sound both cosmic and cowboy. For six years, Gomez also directed and produced the Red River Folk Festival, an event held in the musical mountain village of Red River, New Mexico.
He has shared billing on hundreds of stages with stalwarts of the Americana genre including Shawn Mullins, James McMurtry, Buddy Miller, Jim Lauderdale, Patty Griffin, and John Hiatt.
Find out more about Gomez at maxgomezmusic.com and purchase tickets for the show here.
