Special Guests Performing with Flemons Include Andy Hedges and Tony Trishka
GRAMMY Award-winner, Two-Time EMMY nominee, and 2020 United States Artists Fellow Dom Flemons will perform three nights at Symphony Space in NYC, each evening has a special theme and musical presentation: American Songster Night April 28; Cowboy Night April 29 with special guest Andy Hedges; and Bluegrass Night April 30 with special guest Tony Trischka.
WHO: The American Songster, Dom Flemons with special guests
WHAT: American Songster Night; Cowboy Night; and Bluegrass Night
WHERE: Symphony Space, 2537 Broadway (at 95th St), NYC
WHEN: April 28-30, 2022
TICKETS: www.symphonyspace.org/events
An expert player on the banjo, guitar, harmonica, jug, percussion, quills, fife and rhythm bones, Flemons has branded the moniker “The American Songster” since his repertoire of music covers over 100 years of early American popular music. Flemons is a songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer, actor, music scholar, historian, and record collector.
In 2018, Flemons released a solo album titled Dom Flemons Presents Black Cowboys on GRAMMY Award-winning record label Smithsonian Folkways Recordings and received a Nomination for “Best Folk Album” at the 61st GRAMMY Awards. This album is part of the African American Legacy Recordings series, co-produced with the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C.
The Black Cowboys album peaked at #4 on the BILLBOARD Bluegrass Charts and Flemons was nominated for “2018 Artist of The Year” at the International Folk Music Awards, “Best Acoustic Album” at the 2019 Blues Music Awards, “Best Folk Album” at the 2019 Liberia Awards, won a 2019 Wammie Awards for “Best Folk Album”, won a 2019 Living Blues Award for “New Recordings/ Traditional & Acoustic album”, and received the ASCAP Foundation Paul Williams “Loved the Liner Notes” Award.
Flemons was chosen to be a “Spotlight Artist” at the Soundtrack of America event curated by the world-renowned Quincy Jones and EMMY Award-winning Director Steve McQueen.
In 2018, he had his major solo debut on the Grand Ole Opry, on a night with Carrie Underwood and Old Crow Medicine Show, and has been included in the American Currents Class of 2018 exhibit at the Country Music Hall of Fame Exhibit.
GRAMMY-nominee Tony Trischka has, over the past half-century, garnered a reputation as one of the most influential figures in roots music. “[I]n fiddle- and fret-conscious circles from Nashville to Groton, Mass.,” the New York Times wrote in 2006, “[Trischka] is known as the father of modern bluegrass.” He has worked with Paul McCartney and the Dixie Chicks and served as band leader for the Shakespeare in the Park.
Andy Hedges is a songster, reciter, storyteller, guitarist, and collector of cowboy songs and poems. The son of an Italian schoolteacher and a rodeo cowboy-turned-preacher, Andy was born in Lubbock, TX, in 1980. He grew up in the small community of Tokio, Texas, where his family paid rent on an old farmhouse by looking after a few head of cattle. It was there that Andy fell in love with traditional music by listening to his father’s cassettes of cowboy songs.
Andy’s vast and varied repertoire includes classic cowboy poetry recitations, obscure cowboy songs, dust bowl ballads, and blues. He also hosts a podcast, Cowboy Crossroads which features in-depth interviews with fellow musicians and poets. His performance with folk legend Ramblin’ Jack Elliott at the 60th Newport Folk Festival was named one of the “10 Best Things We Saw” by Rolling Stone.
In 2005, Flemons co-founded the Carolina Chocolate Drops who won a GRAMMY for “Best Traditional Folk Album” in 2010 and were nominated for “Best Folk Album” in 2012. He left the group to pursue his solo career in 2014. In 2016 the Carolina Chocolate Drops were inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame and are featured in the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Flemons has archived the legacy of the CCD’s in his personal collection at the Southern Folklife Center at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, NC.
