Avi Salloway is a musician, activist, and educator based in Vermont. He grew up learning music directly from American folk legends, Pete and John Seeger, and from an early age was exposed to the power of music to bring people together. Avi’s performed over 1500 concerts in 25 countries around the world and collaborated with renowned artists including Jack Johnson, The Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Bombino, David Longstreth (Dirty Projectors), The Low Anthem, and Pete Seeger.
Artist Category: Rock
Paul Bielatowicz
Paul Bielatowicz has earned a name for himself as a technical guitarist in the Prog Rock genre. Paul has toured the world as a member of both the Carl Palmer Band (Emerson Lake and Palmer) and Neal Morse’s band (Spock’s Beard, Transatlantic). His live performances with these two bands have been well documented on both live albums and DVDs.
Aside from his busy touring schedule, Paul’s career as a studio musician has seen him making album appearances alongside Paul Gilbert, Mike Portnoy, Randy George, Neal Morse and Carl Palmer, to name but a few.
Over the years, Paul has been a regular contributor for the UK guitar magazines; writing regular columns for Guitarist Magazine and working as a transcriber for Guitar Techniques magazine. Through his work with Guitar Techniques magazine he has also had the opportunity to interview some of the biggest names in rock guitar, including Steve Vai and Joe Satriani.
Oh, and he has a BA (Hons) in Jazz… but that’s not very rock ‘n’ roll, so he likes to keep quiet about it!
Antigone Rising
Best known for relentless touring and masterful musicianship, Antigone Rising played upwards of 280 shows a year in their early days. Whether it was an open mic on a Monday night or a jam packed New York City hometown show, the ladies and their infamous Vanna White (the band’s beloved 15 passenger van) eventually blazed a trail straight to arenas alongside The Rolling Stones and Aerosmith.
Founding sisters Cathy and Kristen Henderson have always had the same philosophy. Play better than the boys and make sure the fans feel like part of the family. That philosophy plus writing undeniably catchy songs has allowed this self sustained group to maintain her independence and leave an indelible mark on an industry best known for leaving girl (bands) behind.
Girls Rising (501c3) main objective is to inspire girls to pursue nontraditional career paths. Through outreach workshops the band performs at schools and community centers around the world, Antigone Rising is inspiring the next generation of kids to be game changers! To learn more about the band’s nonprofit, or to make a donation, visit Girls Rising.org online!
Martyn Joseph
Martyn Joseph is a completely unique and mind blowing artist. Take everything you think you know about singer songwriters….and rip it up. For one man and a guitar he creates a performance with a huge far-reaching sound that is energetic, compelling and passionate. Be it to two hundred people or twenty thousand, he blows the crowd away night after night.
November 2021 saw him release his most recent studio album entitled “1960”, with songs of both insightful observations of our times, along with poignant more personal reflections. The album was made Folk Album of The Month in Mojo and awarded 4 starts by Uncut, and is still in the UK Official Folk charts in Feburary 2022. April 2019 saw him win a “Wales Folk Award” for “Here Come The Young”, the title track of his 2018 album, of which Uncut magazine said “He’s never sounded more potent than he does here”. In 2018 he was honoured with a ”Spirit of Folk” Award by Folk Alliance International in Kansas USA and he also received Fatea magazine’s “Lifetime Achievement Award” here in the UK.
He is gifted with the rare ability to speak to the soul with his expressive and poignant lyrics and has a career spanning 30 years, 33 albums, over a half a million record sales and thousands of live performances. Compared to Bruce Springsteen, John Mayer, Bruce Cockburn and Dave Matthews, he has created his own style and reputation as a mesmerizing live performer and stands in his own right, built on a reputation for giving what thousands have described as the best live music experience of their lives. A unique talent driven by passion, social awareness and love for his trade, he’s a jaw dropping guitar player who has developed a unique percussive style, teamed up with a powerful show stopping voice, and has been called “The Welsh Springsteen”.
Concerned with making music that is relevant and vital to his audience, he engages with challenging narratives tackling the complexity of the human condition, underpinned with a promise of hope. In his own words “Really what I do is to try and write songs that might step up and make some sense of a moment in time. A good song makes you feel like you’re not alone in the world.” He is hailed as a raconteur weaving tales on topical concerns, as well as stories on the fragility of love, with a magical ability to reach out to his listeners through his passion and humour. Stunning reviews single him out as an unmissable solo performer whose music stays with you long after the show has ended.
Jim’s Big Ego
Perform a Google search for “the Greatest Band in the History of Recorded Music” and you will get only one result: Jim’s Big Ego.
Hailing from the small New England town of Boston, Massachusetts, Jim’s Big Ego has carved a unique place in the the music world by rocking harder, fresher, louder, sweeter and better than everyone else.
Jim’s Big Ego’s secret to awesomeness is singer, songwriter, super genius, Jim Infantino. Armed with the innate ability to create songs that are more brilliant than all others in history, Infantino gives the band the gift of greatness.
Jim’s Big Ego compares itself to such major players as The Great Wall of China, The Grand Canyon, Antarctica, and other things you can see from space. However, when pressed to label their music, they name their genre of music “Unpop for the Unpopulous”.
While the debate still rages over whether the band’s formation was a matter of divine providence or historical inevitability, one fact remains clear: if the world ended today, Jim’s Big Ego would die happy knowing that they were more talented than Oasis, more popular than Terence Trent D’Arby and richer than MC Hammer.
Blake Morgan
Blake Morgan’s current three-year run of sold-out concerts at New York City’s Rockwood Music Hall has fueled an extraordinary string of recent headlining performances for the artist around the globe: over 140 concerts across nearly 100,000 miles of touring on both sides of the Atlantic.
Morgan’s performances have not only become a New York City word-of-mouth sensation––he regularly features Grammy-nominated and Grammy-winning special guests who join him for unique on-stage collaborations––they’ve become a sensation on the road too, where he’s sold out concerts across the United States, the United Kingdom, and continental Europe.
There’s no sign of slowing down for the artist––the new 2018-2019 season of Morgan’s artist-in-residence concert series at Rockwood Music Hall runs from September 20th through May 16th. Simultaneously, Morgan will be back out on the road and joined by chart-topping powerhouse and Grammy™ nominee Tracy Bonham for two sets of national U.S. tour dates.
Native New Yorker Blake Morgan is a recording artist, multi-instrumentalist, record producer, and the founder and President of ECR Music Group, a global music company that operates under an elemental principle unprecedented in the music world: all of its artists and labels own one-hundred percent of their master recordings. Morgan’s ideas, opinions, and editorials on music have been published regularly, including by The New York Times, CNN, Billboard Magazine, The Huffington Post, and The Guardian. His music advocacy has taken him to Capitol Hill numerous times where, as the founder of the #IRespectMusic movement, he continues to fight for music makers’ rights in the digital age.
Tim Gearan
A beloved fixture in the Boston music scene for more than 25 years, Tim Gearan has become a bonafide local music hero. His warm, raspy baritone, jaw-dropping guitar skills and wry, poignant songwriting have graced the bars, pubs, and music halls throughout New England, creating a loyal cult-like following.
Gearan, a New York native, started his career as a lead blues guitarist, spending ten years touring as a sideman for the great Toni Lynn Washington, as well as collaborating with the Grammy-winning singer/guitarist Susan Tedeschi. Finding his own artistic voice, Gearan settled in Somerville and began writing and performing on his own, crafting an intoxicating blend of Americana, folk and blues with shades of Randy Newman, Tom Waits, JJ Cale, Leon Russell and Lowell George. He quickly established himself as a force in the Boston’s resurgent roots music scene, and his Boston area residencies have become a “can’t miss” staple of the city’s nightlife.
The Mammals
Indie-roots trailblazers, The Mammals, are a high-octane Americana quintet from New York’s storied Hudson Valley carrying on the work of Pete Seeger & Woody Guthrie with a deep original repertoire, searing American roots sound, and a message of hope for humanity.
Known for their jubilant, high-energy shows, The Mammals deftly move from older-than-dirt banjo duets to sound-the-alarm topical fare that’s right in line with the times, bouncing from rafter raising hoe-downs to hear-a-pin-drop a cappella balladry.
The new album, Sunshiner, bottles The Mammals’ on-stage effervescence and lyrical intellect along with some very beautiful studio magic. Sunshiner bursts open with the soaring, up-tempo idealism of Merenda’s “Make It True,” with echoes of The Byrds, and then takes a more modern, Feist-inspired, turn with Ungar’s soulful plea,“Open The Door.”
The Mammals treasure the timeless traditions of song, story-telling and dance. Their work is to continue a musical odyssey so that the same handmade music passed down to them makes it thru to future generations one song, one concert at a time.
Dennis Brennan
Dennis Brennan was born on the wrong side of the tracks in Marlboro, Massachusetts.
At age 9 he entered show business as Rumplestiltsken in a grammar school play. In 7th grade he performed “Louie Louie” with a local garage band at the Berlin, Ma. Town Hall and quickly evolved into “the lead singer”
That band evolved into “The Paranoids”, his musical outlet throughout his high school years. They opened shows for both The Remains and The Barbarians, garage band legends who are each featured on “Nuggets, original artyfacts from the first psychedelic era” Rhino R2 75486.
Following high school. Brennan’s education continued as lead singer in such well regarded outfits as “The Dirty Rye Band”, The West Side Band”, “The Martells”, and “Push Push”. These bands performed in every bar and dive on the east coast. An education indeed.
In 1992 he formed the Dennis Brennan Band and started his solo career, quickly releasing two critically acclaimed recordings on Upstart Records, a division of Rounder. In 2000 he released “Rule #1” on ESCA Records which resulted in glowing reviews from The New Yorker, The Chicago Sun Times, The Boston Phoenix as well as other publications nationwide. These recordings showcase Brennans ability “to not just tip toes into genres, he strips naked and plunges right in.” Bill Holmes, AMPLIFIER.
Sarah Potenza
After years of touring with her band Sarah & The Tall Boys, Sarah Potenza was chosen over 50,000 candidates to appear on The Voice. Judge Pharrell Williams’ reaction to Potenza’s on-air audition gives you a pretty good idea of the level of talent of this incredible singer. Williams’ immediately exclaimed, “You’re giving this generation something they’ve never seen before”. Potenza left the show as a top 20 finalist then headed to Nashville, where she quickly integrated into the local music scene, becoming a staple at the world renowned Bluebird Café and the globally broadcast Music City Roots program. She continues to earn raves for her big voice, which seamlessly blends roots, rock and soul.
NPR Music exclusively premiered the music video to Potenza’s debut album, ‘Monster’. Programmers have been supporting her gritty sound and unstoppable resolve, resulting in ‘Monster’ moving quickly up the Americana Radio chart. NPR Music calls the album a “blistering, riff-propelled personal anthem,” while No Depression states, “You won’t find any gimmicks on MONSTER, just pure unadulterated rock and roll.” Sarah’s album also received rave reviews from Rollings Stone. In September the magazine named her one of the top 10 artists you need to know, stating “Potenza is to the Blues what Adele is to Pop.”
