The Flagpole Radio Café ^™

Flagpole Radio Café  Press Release

NEWS   NEWS   NEWS   NEWS   NEWS   NEWS   NEWS

DYNAMIC HARP SENSATION DEBORAH HENSON-CONANT,

TO BE GUEST ARTIST FOR THE FLAGPOLE RADIO CAFE.

Newtown, CT - the Newtown Cultural Arts Commission is pleased to announce that dynamic harp sensation Deborah Henson-Conant will be the guest artist for the February 4th presentation  of The Flagpole Radio Café.  Tickets are now on sale at www.flagpoleproductions.org . The show begins at 7pm at the Edmond Town Hall in Newtown, CT.  Ticket prices are $25 for adults, $20 for students and senior citizens.  If further information is needed, please contact us at info@flagpoleproductions.org.

            Deborah Henson-Conant is a prolific composer, a revolutionary harpist and a performer of irrepressible spirit.  . Her playing ranges from raucous to delicate and her performances blur the line between musical performance and theatrical event. She’s a cross-genre, Blues-Flamenco-Celtic-Funk-Folk-Jazz dynamo. She tells tall tales with the ease of a stand-up comic. She solos and wails like a rock guitarist. She turns music into theater and theater into something lyrical. See her once and you’ll never look at the harp the same way again.

            Deborah Henson-Conant has toured with the Boston Pops, opened for Ray Charles at Tanglewood, jammed onstage with Bobbie McFerrin and offstage with Aerosmith's Steven Tyler, and starred in the PBS special "Celtic Harpestry.” She's been featured on shows from CBS’ “Sunday Morning” and NBC’s “Today Show” to NPR’s “Weekend Edition” and the Food Network’s “Warped,” and interviewed by hosts and journalists from Scott Simon, Susan Stamberg and Studs Terkel to Charlie Rose and Joan Rivers.

            Her DVD & CD project with the Grand Rapids Symphony, "Invention and Alchemy," received a Grammy Nomination and is appearing on PBS stations nationwide. The project features her one-woman show with 80-piece orchestra. The DVD is a full-length concert program with over 45 minutes of behind-the-scenes features; a multi-camera, surround-sound disc, shot in hi-definition. It has an Emmy-winning director, Grammy-winning sound engineers and a program of symphonic music theater that brings Deborah’s show closer than the front row.

            Producer Martin Blanco reflected, “Part of the aspirations of The Flagpole Radio Café show and the mission of the Newtown Cultural Arts Commission is to bring extraordinary and distinctive performers to Newtown.  Deborah Henson-Conant is a musician whose artistry answers that call in both the virtuosity of her musicianship and the imaginative way she approaches her instrument.  Her work is a delight for the senses and will have great appeal for anyone regardless of their musical taste.  We are all looking forward to her appearance with much excitement.”

            Now beginning its fourth season, The Flagpole Radio Café, is an engaging show created by Jim Allyn, Martin Blanco and Barbara Gaines in conjunction with the Newtown Cultural Arts Commission.  It features music by Jim Allyn and the Radio Café Orchestra, a dynamic ensemble created for the show, and radio style comedy sketches by the hyperbolically named Flagpole Shakespeare Repertory Theatre.  . Each show features a musical guest artist such as Tom Chapin, Peter Yarrow, Ramblin’ Jack Elliot, Christine Lavin, Roger Ball of The Average White Band, Vanesse Thomas and Yale’s internationally acclaimed male choir The Whiffenpoofs.