We do have a waiting list. To join it, please email us at treehouseconcert [at] gmail [dot] com with name, number of tickets desired, and phone number. Our shows are packed but you never know; sometimes folks can't make it. Our goal is to share the music and maximize support for the bands. Thanks!

Vandaveer is the song-singing, record-making, globetrotting project penned and put forth by alt-folk tunesmith Mark Charles Heidinger. Born in Ohio, raised in Kentucky, and currently camped out in the nation’s capital, Vandaveer offers up melodic Americana that is both haunting and easy, forlorn and welcoming, with stories as universal as the songs they inhabit. Vandaveer shapeshifts from studio to stage and back with a revolving cast of characters, most prominent among them Rose Guerin, offering up the loveliest harmonies heard this side of Eden.

What started as a solo side project for Heidinger in 2007 blossomed into something more dimensional a year later, with Guerin adding new depth and color to Vandaveer’s sound. The two were integral members of DC’s Federal Reserve collective, a ramshackle group of folk and not-so-folk types alike curating monthly musical happenings throughout the DC area. Informal collaborations in that environment soon galvanized, with Guerin’s voice becoming a reliable fixture in Vandaveer. The band has toured regularly on both sides of the Atlantic since, playing nearly 500 shows, steadily building a diverse fan base from the ground up. Vandaveer will stop by the Tree House before hitting the road again to support their newly released record, Dig Down Deep.

photo by Shervin Lainez

On the song "Night," from Sean Rowe’s Anti- Records debut, Magic, the singer turns his rich, unnerving baritone to a moment of childhood innocence. Back then, he muses, you could fall "like a floating leaf," and the earth would "look up at you and smile." Rowe's deep, magical voice is nothing if not wise and experienced; he knows full well that after the innocence comes the fall. This ability to conjure dueling emotions – the elation of childhood versus the bruising of real life – marks the arrival of a skilled lyricist and songwriter.

In the tradition of Leonard Cohen and Van Morrison, Rowe utilizes his extraordinarily soulful voice, along with a poet's skill, to sketch a world where man and nature lie down uneasily side by side. Disconnected images flicker past in Rowe's songs like the random neon of a city street, or the trees down a country lane; on the song "Jonathan" Rowe offers burning cars – "I lit the dash, I took my sunglasses off, I like to see the fucker glow" – alongside moments of haunting innocence – "Remember after school at the Skylar park, trading in our stories for the dark." Then like a conjurer he makes these disconnected images come together, reminding us of all that we have forgotten, our place in the natural world. As Rowe explains, "A song like ‘Jonathan' is pretty dark stuff but it's also about trying to connect, trying to grab people. I'm not just writing for myself."

Vandaveer & Sean Rowe

Sunday, September 18

Tickets: $20 (Donation) 

Doors open at 5:00 pm, show starts at 6:00 pm

BYOB

http://www.vandaveer.net/

http://www.seanrowe.net/

Wow. We still can't believe this one. Two iconic singer-songwriters visit the Tree House on April 1st--and we ain't fooling. 

John Doe, founder of the seminal LA punk band X, is one of the most influential figures in American alternative rock. He’d always had a soft spot for country music, though, and after X broke up he began to explore a more roots rocks, alt-country direction. In 1990, he debuted the eminently satisfying Meet John Doe, which garnered worldwide acclaim. Another standout was 2005's Forever Hasn't Happened Yet, of which Rolling Stone said, "John Doe proves again that this punk legend/journeyman actor can still make great music." Two years later came A Year in the Wilderness, and in typical John Doe fashion its 12 tracks feature an array of guest appearances, including first time collaborations with Aimee Mann, Kathleen Edwards, and Jill Sobule. Entertainment Weekly calls his work "rip-roarin' and warm-hearted," and Q deems it "the tightest, finest, and most morally acute music of the last 20 years."

Jill Sobule writes folk-inflected compositions that alternate between ironic, story-driven character studies and emotive ballads, a duality reminiscent of such 1970s songwriters as Warren Zevon, Loudon Wainwright III, Harry Chapin, and Randy Newman. Over two decades of recording—yes, there has been life after “I Kissed a Girl,” her chart topping 1996 single—the Denver-born singer-songwriter has tackled such topics as the death penalty, anorexia, shoplifting, reproduction, the French resistance movement, adolescence, and the Christian right. Jill is at her best in front of an audience; she's funny, personable, and incredibly musically adept. Over the years, she’s shared the stage with the likes of Neil Young, Billy Bragg, Steve Earle, and Warren Zevon. Quite the serious guitar player, she even toured the world as lead guitarist in Lloyd Cole's band a few years back. In the words of New York Times music critic Jon Pareles, "Jill Sobule can claim her place among the stellar New York singer-songwriters of the last decade. Topical, funny and more than a little poignant...grown-up music for an adolescent age."

John and Jill's new collaboration is entitled A Day at the Pass, and you can buy and listen to their songs at either www.jillsobule.com or www.thejohndoe.com. We owe a big thanks to Tree House friend David Corn, who made this show possible.