Susan Werner, an innovative songwriter with a large voice and a killer live show comes to the Mainstay in Rock Hall on Friday, June 24, at 8:00 p.m. Tickets are $20. For more information and reservations call 410-639-9133. Information is also available at the Mainstay’s website .
Susan Werner is a classically trained singer who upon completion of her studies, turned to songwriting and has since been acclaimed as one of the country’s finest singer-songwriters. Her songs effortlessly slide between folk, jazz, and pop, all delivered with a sassy wit and a classic Midwestern charm.
She boldly weaves old with new to create altogether new genres of music when existing ones don’t suit her muse. Her performances regularly keep audiences guessing and laughing simultaneously. Her work infuses traditional styles and methods with an unmistakably contemporary worldview and challenges listeners to experience music from a fresh and unexpected perspective while thoroughly enjoying a show.
Werner made her first public performance at age five, playing guitar and singing at church. She began playing piano at 11, and after earning a degree in voice from the University of Iowa, she completed her graduate studies at Temple University in Philadelphia, where she performed in recitals and operas. While she’ll still on occasion perform “Madame Butterfly” to close one of the 125 club dates she does annually throughout the U.S. and Canada, she opted to forgo a career as an opera singer and dedicated herself to songwriting, initially performing at coffeehouses from Washington D.C. to Boston.
She launched her recording career with the self-released “Midwestern Saturday Night” in 1992, which was followed by “Live At Tin Angel” in 1993. The second album impressed executives at Private Music/BMG, which released her major label debut “Last Of The Good Straight Girls” in 1995. She also received critical accolades for her subsequent recordings “Time Between Trains” (VelVel, 1998) and “New Non-Fiction” (Indie, 2001).
“The music industry loves to pigeonhole recording artists,” Werner says, “but I like to see myself as having more of a painter’s career, giving myself the freedom to try entirely new things, to incorporate new colors, new language into my songs.”
In her 2004 release “I Can’t Be New”, she delivered her modern contribution to the Great American Songbook by writing originals in the style of Gershwin and Cole Porter, but from a present-day woman’s point of view. It was for her work on this album that The Chicago Tribune called her “the most innovative songwriter working today.” The album went to #1 on Amazon.com, the song “I Can’t Be New” was included in iTunes Cabaret Essentials and Werner appeared on Marian McPartland’s “Piano Jazz” and A&E’s “Breakfast With The Arts”.
The album was inspired by her time playing at the Pen and Pencil Club in Philadelphia, where she had a standing Friday night gig. Werner says she was the “‘chanteusey’ in the corner, [the one who would] sit down, play piano and sing.” If someone requested a song she didn’t know, she says, “I would come back the next week having learned it. [It was] graduate school in the Great American Songbook.”
In 2007, she blended faith and doubt in her “agnostic gospel” record “The Gospel Truth” – a collection of original songs drawing on gospel music traditions from Folk, Bluegrass, Americana, R&B, Soul and Spiritual. It presented lyrics that were praised by religious believers and non-believers alike across the country. NPR “Weekend Edition’s” Susan Stamberg may have put it best when she called “The Gospel Truth” “a musical, lyrical examination of personal, social, and political faith in America… [from] a hip, wry, gifted performer.” The Gospel Truth was named 2007 Top Folk Album of the Year by NPR/Folk Alley and WUMB, and Susan Werner was named Best Contemporary Folk Artist at the 2008 International Folk Alliance music conference.
It was with “I Can’t Be New” and “The Gospel Truth” that Werner firmly established her reputation as one of the boldest creative forces on the acoustic scene today. While the concepts are never simple, she has proven time and time again, her steadfast ability to deliver on the truly original promises of her inventive, visionary way of making music.
Her 2009 release “Classics” was her first album of arrangements for strings and voice. She said, “With ‘Classics’ I hope to make classical music a little less scary for people. Some people treat it like fine glassware, up in the cabinet somewhere, too fragile for everyday use. But classical music is more sturdy and practical than most people imagine and it reveals so much about the composition underneath – in this case, some undeniably great songs by great songwriters.” To find songs for the CD she went through the Billboard Top 40 for the years 1965 to 1975. She played them on the piano, listening for songs “that had a certain lyrical and musical elegance to them, because those would be the ones that would be interesting to render in a string quartet.”
Her newest recording, “Kicking the Beehive,” is an 11-song collection of provocative, poignant, lyrical originals that are infused with the rustic roots of American folk, blues and country music. Produced by country singer and songwriter Rodney Crowell and recorded in Nashville, the recording features such all star-guests as Vince Gill, Keb’ Mo’ and Paul Franklin.
“Kicking the Beehive” is a personal project where Werner explores the full impact of looking beyond the superficial and delving into honesty. With pockets of humor, wit, heartbreak, incisive commentary and pure rowdiness, “Kicking the Beehive” has Werner passionately telling the condensed short stories of characters who confront such issues as homelessness, addiction, social alienation and disappointment. “A good song is a good window,” Werner says. “All these songs can let us see outside ourselves. And as a songwriter, the best moments come when I can hold the songs up like a mirror so that people can also see themselves.”
Werner has appeared at major festivals across the country and has toured the nation with acts such as Richard Thompson, Keb Mo and Joan Armatrading. She was featured in the 1998 Peter, Paul and Mary PBS television special as one of the best of the next generation of folk songwriters.
The Mainstay (Home of Musical Magic) is the friendly informal storefront performing arts center on Rock Hall’s old time Main Street. It is a 501(c)(3), non profit dedicated to the arts, serving Rock Hall and the surrounding region and dedicated to presenting local, regional and national level talent, at a reasonable price, in an almost perfect acoustic setting. Wine, beer, sodas and snacks are available at the bar. The Mainstay is supported by ticket sales, fundraising including donations from friends and audience members and an operating grant from the Maryland State Arts Council. For information and reservations call 410-639-9133. More information is also available at the Mainstay’s website .
Upcoming Mainstay performances include:
July 9 Free Outdoor Concert New & Used Bluegrass
July 15 Bucky Pizzarelli, Nicki Parrott & the Redds
July 16 Buskin & Batteau
July 21 Max’s Mainstay All-Stars with Warren Vaché
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