Literacy Together has a determined group of students waiting for volunteer tutors so they can move forward on their goals for a better future. We’re offering in-person and remote volunteer opportunities. We have programs teaching English to immigrants, adult literacy for folks working on a GED, and youth literacy for kids struggling to learn to read. In addition, we welcome everyone -even if they are not ready to volunteer- to attend to learn about the literacy challenges we face in Buncombe County. Thank you!

Imaginations will soar in this new musical based on Peter H. Reynolds’ best-selling book, The Dot.

DOT DOT DOT: A New Musical is an exciting new musical based on the Creatrilogy trio of award-winning picture books by New York Times bestselling author Peter H. Reynolds (The Dot, Ish and Sky Color). Adapted by Composers Keelay Gipson and Sam Salmond, the musical, like the series, celebrates the power of originality, self-expression, and opening our eyes to look beyond the expected.

When Marisol (Sky Color), a young artist and curator of the Musee de Marisol, decides that her gallery requires more than her own art, her search for emerging talent leads her to Vashti (The Dot), whose dots inspire Ramon (Ish) to become an artist in his own right.

The musical follows Marisol’s journey to help her new friends, and her entire community, break free from self-criticism and learn to let their imaginations soar. Recommended for grades 1-4.

The Student Series is open to school groups, homeschoolers, community groups and families.

Imaginations will soar in this new musical based on Peter H. Reynolds’ best-selling book, The Dot.

DOT DOT DOT: A New Musical is an exciting new musical based on the Creatrilogy trio of award-winning picture books by New York Times bestselling author Peter H. Reynolds (The Dot, Ish and Sky Color). Adapted by Composers Keelay Gipson and Sam Salmond, the musical, like the series, celebrates the power of originality, self-expression, and opening our eyes to look beyond the expected.

When Marisol (Sky Color), a young artist and curator of the Musee de Marisol, decides that her gallery requires more than her own art, her search for emerging talent leads her to Vashti (The Dot), whose dots inspire Ramon (Ish) to become an artist in his own right.

The musical follows Marisol’s journey to help her new friends, and her entire community, break free from self-criticism and learn to let their imaginations soar. Recommended for grades 1-4.

The Student Series is open to school groups, homeschoolers, community groups and families.

Students will receive a solid foundation in beginner Ukulele skills for vocalists. Chords, Rhythm patterns, and basic theory will be introduced through songs with an uplifting message. Students will also learn to play the song that the Songwriting Class will be writing and get to record it in the One Mic Studio.

Queer Music Exploration – Students will explore guitar, bass, drums, singing and piano with a focus on learning music by artists from the LGBTQ+ community. Students will have the chance to interact with their peers and share their experiences through music.

ICONIC COUNTRY ROCK GROUP, ALABAMA, ANNOUNCES NEW DATE ON 2023 ROLL ON 2 NORTH AMERICA TOUR

THE MULTI-PLATINUM BAND WILL HIT THE STAGE AT

BON SECOURS WELLNESS ARENA ON NOV. 9, 2023

WITH VERY SPECIAL GUEST GRITS AND GLAMOR FEATURING

 PAM TILLIS AND LORRIE MORGAN

Multi-platinum selling country rock group ALABAMA has announced an all new 2023 tour “ROLL ON NORTH AMERICA.” The tour will include a stop in Greenville, South Carolina, at Bon Secours Wellness Arena on Nov. 9, 2023, featuring very special guest PAM TILLIS AND LORRIE MORGAN. This will mark the second “Roll On” Tour in the band’s 50+ year history since 1984.

Over 50 years ago, cousins Teddy Gentry, Randy Owen and the late Jeff Cook left the cotton farms of Fort Payne, Alabama to spend the summer playing music in a Myrtle Beach, South Carolina bar called The Bowery. It’s a classic American tale of rags to riches. From humble beginnings picking cotton in the fields to international stars, ALABAMA went on to sell 80 million albums and change the face and sound of country music.

Quality songs that have become the soundtrack for American life are the foundation for ALABAMA’s stellar career. The group introduced rock style guitars, lights, pyrotechnics and sounds to the country audience that has inspired many of today’s brightest country stars including Kenny Chesney, Jason Aldean and Luke Bryan. While their music continues to stand the test of time, their numbers and stats are beyond compare.

Five decades since starting the band, ALABAMA has charted 43 #1 singles, including 21 #1 singles in a row, and have won dozens of CMA, GRAMMY®, and ACM Awards. They are members of the Country Music Hall of Fame, the Musicians Hall of Fame and have their own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In addition, they are world-class philanthropists who have raised millions of dollars for various charities.

Join the Balsam Mountain Inn and Mountain Memories Productions along with musical guest William Ritter as we present an evening of traditional mountain ballads and folk tunes!

Steve Simon & The Kings of Jazz are Brevard’s newest and most exciting and entertaining jazz band with a sound that combines the funkiness of George Benson, the soulfulness of Ray Charles and the smoothness of Diana Krall all wrapped together in big Count Basie style arrangements of American and Latin jazz classics. If you are looking for an amazing live jazz experience then check out the hottest jazz band in the coolest city in North Carolina performing every Thursday at The DFR Lounge from 7pm to 9pm

Russian pianist and composer Arsentiy Kharitonov has achieved fame and accolades for his “sumptuous tone, technical mastery, broad dramatic range, and elegant phrasing” (Fanfare Magazine). He is the  first-prize winner of the Franz Liszt International Piano Competition and won the Rachmaninov Competition in the Russian Federation. He has appeared at major concert halls in Europe and America.

PROGRAM
Arsentiy Kharitonov, Piano

Bach/Siloti 2 Preludes
R.Schumann Arabesque
F. Chopin Sonata #2
– Intermission –
S.Rachmaninoff (Preludes in D major, Gb major, Etude-Tableau op.39 #5)
A.Kharitonov Selective works (Sonata (I,II movements), Morceau, Waltz)
M.Ravel “Alborada del Gracioso”

Program Description
Brevard Music Center presents an evening treat for cinephiles and music aficionados alike. Following “White Lotus,” Min Xiao-Fen‘s acclaimed score for the 1934 classic Chinese silent film “The Goddess,” she received a commission from the Smithsonian Institution to compose new original soundtracks for “Romance of the Fruit Peddler” and “Romance of the Western Chamber,” two historical Chinese silent films from the 1920s. Known for her innovative approach to traditional music and her ability to seamlessly integrate diverse musical styles, Ms. Min will perform with master percussionist River Guerguerian, a leading figure in classical, jazz and world music. Together they bring a unique cross-cultural expression and artistic vision to the stage. Both films will be shown during the performance.

Featured Instruments
Min Xiao-Fen: pipa, ruan, sanxian, guqin, finger piano, sound effects, and voice.

River Guerguerian: Middle Eastern and Indian frame drums, hand drums, kanjira talking drums, berimbau, doumbek, Chinese gongs, hand-pan, didgeridoo, rain stick, and voice.

About the Artists
One of the key instruments in Chinese music, the pipa has a rich and storied legacy stretching back nearly two thousand years. Few artists have done more to both honor and reinvent that history than renowned pipa soloist, vocalist and composer Min Xiao-Fen. Classically trained in her native China, Ms. Min was an acclaimed traditional music soloist before relocating to the United States and forging a new path for her instrument alongside many of the leading lights in modern jazz, free improvisation, experimental and contemporary classical music.

In Ms. Min’s music, east and west, tradition and innovation, discipline and spontaneity, ancient past and unexplored future all flow together like streams joining in one vibrant river. NPR Weekend Edition lauded Ms. Min as “one of the world’s greatest virtuosos” and JazzTimes hailed her as “a pioneer in integrating her ancient instrument with modern jazz and improvised music.” The New York Times raved that her singular work “has traversed a sweeping musical odyssey.” Min’s expressive, uncategorizable voice has found her collaborating with such inventive luminaries as Wadada Leo Smith, Derek Bailey, Randy Weston, John Zorn, Christian Marclay and Björk.

River Guerguerian has been inspiring audiences with his ecstatic and versatile percussion for over 30 years. Whether collaborating with world-class artists, supporting symphonies or creating his own dynamic explorations of rhythm, River’s devotion and attention to the vibrant life of the drum reverberates through the mind and soul of the listener. In 1988 he began working with Grammy and Oscar-winning composer, Tan Dun. Over the next several years he continued performing with several artists, which placed him in the prestigious concert halls of most major cities of the globe, including Carnegie Hall, The Sydney Opera House, and Lincoln Center.

As a highly regarded studio musician, River has recorded on over 300 albums and film soundtracks, including the John Cage documentary film, “I Have Nothing to Say and I Am Saying It.” Over the whole of his prolific career, he has performed and/or recorded internationally with such individual and groups as the BBC Concert Orchestra, Paul Winter Consort, Lizz Wright, Chuck Berry, Sophie B. Hawkins, Ziggy Marley, Gipsy Kings, New Music Consort, Omar Faruk Tekbilek, Tibetan Singing Bowl Ensemble, and Talujon Percussion Ensemble. River also engineers his own percussion tracks for artists at his recording studio.

ARTISTS

Min Xiao-Fen, pipa
River Guerguerian, percussion

Auditorium seating is reserved.

Genevieve’s. Now in its sixth year, the Fine Arts Center concert series prepares student musicians for a career in the arts and entertainment industry by giving them a resume-building, professional opportunity to perform in paid settings.

Wanna hear the best local music ​and​ drink the best local beers? Hop aboard LaZoom’s Purple Bus and rock out with a local band while we take you on a journey to Asheville’s premiere local breweries.

A native of West Virginia, Charles Wesley Godwin makes cinematic country-folk that’s as gorgeous and ruggedly raw as his homeland. It’s Appalachian Americana, rooted in Godwin’s sharp songwriting and backwoods baritone. With 2021’s How the Mighty Fall, he trades the  autobiographical lyrics that filled Seneca — his acclaimed debut, released in 2019 and celebrated by everyone from Rolling Stone to NPR’s Mountain Stage — for a collection of character-driven songs about mortality, hope, and regret, putting an intimate spin on the universal concerns we all share.

“I started a family around the time Seneca came out,” he remembers. “After my son was born, I remember sitting in the hospital, thinking about how that very experience would eventually become one of those life moments that flash before my eyes when I’m old. I realized that time is passing, and my time will pass, too. Becoming a father made it all sink in.”

Those realizations quickly found their way into his writing. If Seneca painted the picture of a southern son in the middle of American coal country, then How the Mighty Fall — produced once again by Al Torrence — zooms out to focus on wider themes of time, transience, and the choices we make. Songs like “Strong” “Bones” and “Blood Feud” are roadhouse roots-rockers, driven forward by fiery fiddle, lap steel and plenty of electric guitar. Godwin does most of his painting with more subtle shades, though, often waiting until How the Mighty Fall’ssofter moments to make his biggest impact. On “Cranes of Potter,” he delivers a murder ballad with finger-plucked acoustic guitar and elegiac melodies, unspooling the narrative with a storyteller’s restraint. Meanwhile, “Temporary Town” finds him returning to West Virginia after spending five years in the midwest, celebrating his homecoming not with barely-contained enthusiasm, but with measured excitement, light percussion, and a steadily-building arrangement. “I try to write with a sense of place,” he explains. “Up until now, that setting has always been my home, but I don’t think this new album is as locally-focused as my previous release. I hope these songs will connect with people wherever they live.”

The son of a coal miner father and a schoolteacher mother, Godwin began forging those musical connections in 2013, while studying abroad in Estonia. He’d learned the acoustic guitar several years earlier, looking for a diversion after failing to secure a spot on the West Virginia University football team. Halfway across the world in Estonia, he started strumming songs in his apartment, summoning the sights and sounds of West Virginia for a group of new friends who’d never laid eyes on the state. Fans were made, gigs were booked, and Godwin launched his full-time music career shortly after graduation.

Marriage soon took him to Ohio, where his wife worked as a fundraiser. Even so, West Virginia remained at the forefront of Godwin’s mind, and he saluted the area’s influence with his 2019 debut. Seneca was a hit, with Billboard praising the album’s “the vivid language and scenic ambience,” and Rolling Stone enthusing, “His voice, with its tight, old-world vibrato, is perfect.” Godwin hit the road in support of its release, touring domestically one minute and selling out shows in European destinations like Stockholm the next. When the global pandemic brought his touring to a halt, he set his sights on How the Mighty Fall, creating the album during a period that also witnessed the arrival of his son and the migration of his growing family back to West Virginia.

Charles Wesley Godwin has never been afraid to blur the lines, and How the Mighty Fall proudly straddles the borderlands between several genres. It’s a country album by an Appalachian-borne folk singer and blue-collar believer, laced with enough electricity to satisfy the Saturday night revelers and enough scaled-down acoustic balladry to soundtrack the slow, gentle pace of Sunday morning. For every “Lyin’ Low” — a driving folk anthem, its larger-than-life melodies flanked by banjo — there’s a softly sweeping song like “Lost Without You,” which finds Godwin’s voice echoing between stretches of pedal steel and symphonic strings. This is music for campfires and car rides, for pool halls and mountain peaks, for big-city diehards and small-town loyalists. It’s Charles Wesley Godwin at his best, diving into character studies and richly-created fiction while still offering glimpses of the man behind the music.

Eulogy Presents: Mary Lattimore + MANAS & E.M.M. (a collaborative project between Manas and Efrim Manuel Menuck of Godspeed You! Black Emperor)

with Topographies and Jon Mueller

ASHEVILLE SWIFTIES, living for the hope of it all? Cancel plans just in case they’d call? Come scream it out at the ultimate Taylor Swift Dance Party on Nov 10th!

– ALL AGES
– STANDING/DANCING ROOM ONLY

TAYLOR SWIFT DANCE PARTY: TIS’ THE DAMN SEASON

DJ playing Taylor through her eras, costume contest, lipsync battle, themed photo areas, free koozie, bracelet trading, and more!

We’re putting our build crew back together and we’d love to have you join us. Every 2 weeks, we’ll meet at 9 am for hands-on set construction! Whether your talents are building, painting, or you just want to learn, come out and join us every other Saturday for some creative fun. Tools and work gloves are helpful but not required

Wanna hear the best local music ​and​ drink the best local beers? Hop aboard LaZoom’s Purple Bus and rock out with a local band while we take you on a journey to Asheville’s premiere local breweries.

In recordings as well as live performances, Asheville based band Tina & Her Pony (queer fronted indie Appalachian folk) always strives to provide the listener with a deep oceanic counterpoint balanced with an earthy, time-honored musical approach. It’s an apt metaphor for the dark and the light of life, for the transformation of life’s joys and sorrows into songs that Tina & Her Pony has strived to create since 2010. Playing songs and telling stories from their latest album “Marigolds” (March 2023) as well as even newer songs, this concert will feature Tina’s 4-piece band, which weaves a fascinating web of sound and intention that draws the audience in. Listening to Tina & Her Pony offers a window into an interior landscape that begs to be explored.