With musicians playing trombones, trumpets, flugel horns, cornets, euphoniums, tubas and french horns, it’s a rare thing to hear a live 14-piece brass band. When the concert is a Musical Bridgestribute by the Golden Gate Brass Band for the 75th Anniversary of the Golden Gate Bridge (1937-2012), it is truly a “once in a blue moon” opportunity.
In Singing Lessons: A Memoir of Love, Loss, Hope and Healing(c. 1998 p. 174) Judy Collins recalls looking for songs for an album project in 1976.
“After the death of her husband, Dick Fariña, Mimi Fariña, Joan Baez’s younger sister, had started a nonprofit organization in San Francisco called Bread & Roses, to provide free entertainment for people in homes, jails and hospitals in the Bay Area.She wrote the “Bread and Roses” melody to a poem by James Oppenheim and I recorded it, using a choir of voices in a church in New York.”
In her liner notes for the album, also titled Bread & Roses Judy said:“Songs come from many places, unexpectedly, amazingly.”She relayed how Mimi had sent her a copy of the “Bread and Roses” poem. She thought it so beautiful that she asked her to set it to music.Her sister Holly Ann then designed a Bread and Roses tapestry piece featuring a single rose and wove it using hand-dyed yarns which was then used as the art for the inside album cover.
Lisa Bautista (left) with Joyce DeWitt, actress from Three's Company, and Kris Koskela, RRazz Room office manager, at the venue’s 3rd annual “RRAZZiversary” earlier this year.
We are grateful that The RRazz Room’s first annual “Season of Giving” in December will benefit Bread & Roses.Throughout the month, San Francisco’s Premier Nightclub is presenting many performers who support Bread & Roses including:Maria Muldaur (Dec. 7) and Pete Escovedo & Family (Dec. 9-11).Donations will be requested for Bread & Roses at each concert from Dec. 1-30, 2011.
With red, white and blue balloons bobbing cheerfully in the breeze, the band Moonalice played an upbeat Bread & Roses concert for the veterans at the VA Hospital in Menlo Park on Labor Day 2011. Blessed with beautiful sunny weather, this early afternoon special event was held on Monday, September 5 on a small stage in a grassy area to the right of the front door of the Community Living Center.
Our audience was a mix of veterans -- most from World War II who lived in the nursing unit close by and enjoyed the performance from a covered deck. They were assisted by other vets from the Vietnam era who came from a residential rehab program in a nearby building.
Photo: Moonalice performing a Bread & Roses show at Delancey Street Foundation in San Francisco.
A band of seasoned musicians, Moonalice features Roger McNamee on rhythm guitar, bass and vocals; Ann McNamee on keyboards and vocals; Pete Sears on keyboards, guitar, vocals and bass; Barry Sless on lead, pedal steel and bass guitars; and John Molo on drums and vocals.
Pete Sears launched the set with "Down the Road", a crowd pleaser and apt metaphor for this traveling band that goes all over the country playing outdoor festivals and parks as a living embodiment of their belief that music is a communal experience that should be shared.
Bay Vibes Songwriters Unplugged, the first CD from nearly two years of Sunday night concerts featuring the Bay Area's best singer-songwriters at Yoshi's in San Francisco, is now available for purchase on CD Baby. Co-sponsored by SF Bay Vibes and Sonic Zen Records, all proceeds benefit Bread & Roses' mission to bring live music to those who are isolated in Bay Area institutions.
Of the artists on this recording, a half-dozen are either current or former Bread & Roses performers who are mainly acoustic guitar and keyboard-based and sometimes have a variety of other accompaniment. Their not-to-be-missed songs include Megan Slankard's "Planets"; Jeff Campbell's "Southern"; Garrin Benfield's "Unbound"; Heather Combs "Time and Time Again"; Francesca Lee's "Maybe Today" and Valerie Orth's "Beyond This Song."
This recording represents the pinnacle performances of some of the hundreds of songwriters who have taken the stage in this weekly series. Founded in 2009 by Robin Applewood of SF Bay Vibes and Charlie Wilson of Sonic Zen Records, the two are a formidable duo in bringing performers and fans together in new combinations and in creating an evolving community to support songwriters and musicians playing original acoustic music.
All fans of contemporary acoustic music -- join us this weekend at The 2011 Kate Wolf Festival at Wavy Gravy's Black Oak Ranch in Laytonville, CA. Kate Wolf helped to repopularize folk music in Northern CA in the 70's and was a nationally known singer-songwriter/guitarist who died in 1986.
Bread & Roses will have a table next to the good folks at the SEVA Foundation on the right close to the main stage. Bread & Roses performers, who are a part of the line-up include: Taj Mahal who headlines Friday night; Aaron Redner with Hot Buttered Rum; Corrine West and Kelly Joe Phelps; Americana finger-style guitarist Stevie Coyle along with many other wonderful musicians who can be seen throughout the weekend.
