Newfoundland Songwriter's Showcase

REGION -- New England Celtic Arts, in partnership with the Kingfield POPS and the Western Maine Story Telling Festival, will present a Newfoundland Songwriter's Showcase with Ian Foster and Terry Penney at Skye Theatre Performing Arts Center in South Carthage on Tuesday, at Unity Center for the Performing Arts in Unity on Thursday Nov. 1, and at The Herbert Hotel in Kingfield on Friday, Nov. 2.

Curtain at The Herbert, and Skye Theatre, is 7 p.m. and 7:30 in Unity. A pre-show jam session starts at Skye and Unity one hour prior to curtain. A weekend workshop will also be offered at Skye Theatre on Saturday, Nov. 3 from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m.

Two of Newfoundland's finest young songwriters will be touring Maine in a collaboration of Music Newfoundland, Skye Theatre, The Western Maine Storytelling Festival, and the Kingfield POPS. There will be a very full week of music, song and storytelling. The three groups have been working on this project for well over a year now and it finally all comes together in the spirit of collaboration that is flourishing in Western Maine.

Award winning songwriters Terry Penney and Ian Foster are joining forces on this project in hopes to make an annual event each fall featuring a combination of concerts and workshops that reach out to the many aspiring song-smiths in the mountains of western and central Maine. Terry and Ian will be the first performer-instructors in the series. A songwriting workshop is planned for Saturday, Nov. 3 from 1-4 p.m. to finish out the week.

Ian Foster is familiar with the cycle of a song. Since 2006, the Newfoundland-based songwriter has been writing, recording and touring his work around Canada and Europe. His latest release, The Evening Light, showcases songs inspired by the road, and by an examination of home that can only be made from the distance of travel.

His music combines many of the classic elements of folk songwriting and storytelling with newer approaches to the genre. His albums contain a mix of traditional instruments (banjo, upright bass, accordion, violin and cello all appear on his newest release) and modern instruments and effects. He regularly plays both electric and acoustic live, making tasteful use of looping and delay effects to create a bigger sound than one would expect from a solo player. He is nominated for four Music NL awards in 2012.

Terry Penney is a Newfoundland singer/songwriter whose songs are so vivid and image-driven they have been likened to '3-minute movies'. He is a world class storyteller and performer with the uncanny ability to 'put you there' in his songs and for the past decade he has done just that. Penney is an old soul who has always had a penchant for the past. Consequently, his songs are often set in a by-gone era when little boys dreamed of helping the Lone Ranger and World War veterans still walked the streets as young men.

Terry is a commanding artist with four full-length albums and numerous awards and honors (most recently 2009 SOCAN Songwriter of the Year). His extensive touring experience includes major events like the Kerrville Folk Festival and South West Regional Folk Alliance in Texas, the Belfast Nashville Songwriters Festival, the 2010 Canadian Corner tour in Ireland, and the Stan Rogers Folk Festival in Nova Scotia. Penney's highly anticipated fifth album, The Last Guitar, Was released in February 2012. Terry was voted 2012 Country artist of the Year at Music Newfoundland this past week.

The Herbert Hotel is located at 246 Main St. in Kingfield; Skye Theater is located three miles west of East Dixfield village at 2 Highland Dr. off Winter Hill Road and Rt. 2 in South Carthage; UCCPA is at 42 Depot St. in Unity. Ticket price is $15 at the door. For reservations at The Herbert, call 491-3370; at Skye Theatre, call 562-4445; or UCCPA at 948-7469. Reservations are strongly suggested at all three venues.