Culture

Jen Donovan, owner of Le Shag hair salons in Woodstock and Kingston, met Mercury Rev guitarist and co-founder Sean Mackowiak in 2004, when she was styling hair in Uptown Kingston and he had a studio on Wall Street. Mackowiak, known as Grasshopper, was among the musicians who spent time at the salon where Donovan worked, […]

For all of Woodstock’s reputation for nurturing artists, musicians, and innovators, one tradition stands out: the weekly drum circle on the Village Green. “What lies at the center of these events is the sheer frivolity of it,” Kevin Johnson, 72, a trained drum circle facilitator who coordinates the circle on Sundays from 4 p.m. to […]

A much younger Bruce Ginsberg was helping renovate a holistic healing center in Arizona in 1978 when he struck up a friendship with basketball star and Grateful Dead superfan Bill Walton, who was recovering from a season-ending fractured ankle. That’s how Ginsberg ended up as Walton’s backstage guest that summer at a Dead show at […]

When BERTHA: Grateful Drag brought its all-drag Grateful Dead tribute to Bearsville Theater on March 25, the performance blended improvisation, activism, and theatricality. After the show, Jacob Groopman—also known as Big Sissy Bertha—spoke about the band’s origins, politics, and what they hope audiences take away. BERTHA has been described as the world’s first Grateful Dead […]

Woodstock multi-instrumentalist Zach Djanikian was onstage with Graham Nash in September 2024, preparing for soundcheck, when his cell phone rang. The call was from his childhood friend, Ben Feldman. Years earlier, as Djanikian set out on a music career, Feldman became an attorney before making a sharp turn to pursue filmmaking. Now Feldman had a […]

As a teenager, Jim Weider worked at a stereo shop in downtown Woodstock called the Sound In. Weider said the shop was run by Kermit Schwarz, a local character beloved by local musicians of the time, was known for smoking three cigarettes at a time who often sported a ring of the antacid Maalox around […]

When Storey Littleton takes the stage at Levon Helm Studios on Jan. 31, opening for Cornelia Murr, the setting will be familiar. She has been playing music in that room since childhood. What is new is the timing. Her debut album, “At a Diner,” arrives on Feb. 8, marking her first full step forward as […]

The Bearsville Theater will host two nights of music and remembrance Wednesday and Thursday to honor Bob Weir, the Grateful Dead guitarist and co-founder who died Saturday and whose decades-long career left deep roots in the Hudson Valley. Wednesday’s event, titled “A Gathering to Celebrate the Life and Music of Bob Weir,” is free but […]

Phoenicia musician Robert Burke Warren was collecting his gear after a David Bowie tribute gig just after the new year when a 25-year-old woman approached the stage and smiled. “She looked at me and said, ‘thank you,’” Warren said, recalling his 90-minute show at the City Winery in New York City on Jan 3. It […]

Ask Pete Caigan about his three decades in the music business and the Woodstock resident will regale you with his passion for recording and his time collaborating with some of the biggest names in the industry.  He has an engineering credit on Sarah McLachlan’s 2003 album “Afterglow,” which sold 2 million copies. He mixed songs […]

With the death of Grammy-winning drummer and pianist Jack DeJohnette on Oct. 27, Woodstock lost a pillar, an anchor, a compass needle pointing home, and that proverbial porch light left on by a loved one, to guide you from the car door to the front door.  Yet the rhythm, the downbeat, the melodies, the soul, […]

The Woodstock Film Festival and the Woodstock Symphony Orchestra will team up this Saturday, Sept. 27, for a special benefit concert at the Woodstock Playhouse. The event, “Classical Music in Classic Films,” will highlight the close connection between music and cinema, featuring themes and soundtrack selections from films including “2001: A Space Odyssey,” “The Truman […]

Anyone who has seen Amanda Palmer on stage knows the force of her presence. She’s exacting, fearless, unafraid to mine the depths of her soul and bleed in public. At 49, she did just that last Friday night in Woodstock, where she returned with a batch of new songs that cut directly into the marrow […]

“What is funk?” Michael “Clip” Payne leaned back in a chair at Bread Alone in Woodstock—where he’s a near-daily fixture—eyes flashing beneath his cap. He grinned a wide smile. “It’s not even necessarily the music itself,” he said. “It’s the audacity.” He should know. Payne has spent nearly five decades immersed in funk’s wild current—first […]