Performers will fill Depot stage for musical review
The Nelsonvillians are coming! Actually, it’s just one of the village’s 650 or so residents: singer and guitarist Dave Llewellyn.
Llewellyn produced a musical variety show that will take place at the Philipstown Depot Theatre on Saturday (Jan. 18). Beyond a seven-piece band, he’s bringing along a bunch of friends from around town. Many rehearsals took place in his Main Street home.
“Dave wanted to bring his band and some local musicians together for a showcase,” says Amy Dul, the theater’s executive director. “We said, ‘Absolutely.’”
Singer-songwriter Conor Austin will kick things off. Sandy McKelvey, a guitarist and singer, will perform a 2023 composition, “Another Way,” which incorporates the rhythmic style of Argentine milonga, a precursor to the tango.
McKelvey specializes in the classical guitar repertoire of South America and will be accompanied by Carolyn Llewellyn on cello, violinist Rachel Evans and double bass player Mike Casale.
Dul recalls a band of young rabble-rousers, the Nelsonvillains, rocking things up a few years ago, but Saturday’s show is all in good fun. Led by the guitar-slinging Llewellyn, the ensemble will play “lesser-known songs written by artists people love,” he says, including Tom Waits (“Rain Dogs”), David Bowie (“What in the World”) and Frank Zappa (“Black Napkins”).
Along with Carolyn Llewellyn on cello, the band consists of Bo Bell (drums), Lucky Bell (vocals), Arahm Lee (bass), Diem Lee (keyboard) and John Hutchison (guitar).
Another friend, Cold Spring resident Mike Berkley, is fine-tuning Emma, a 90-minute opera set in 2038 that centers on identity, humanity and the ethical dilemmas of artificial intelligence. Berkley also plans to produce an animated film.
This is the first time any selection from the 25-song score will be played publicly, so it’s a world premiere. A prerecorded five-song excerpt, “The Emma Suite,” will be accompanied by Dave Llewellyn on guitar and vocalist Molly Bernstein, a student at Haldane High School.
The program includes “14 Billion Years,” a bouncy, synthy ditty, and the anthemic “Cosmic Collision.” Another song, “Fly From Here,” features a prominent acoustic guitar part. An abstract video component “with imagery that supports the narrative of each song, like a laser light show at a rock concert, is going to be pretty wild,” says Berkley.
Along with “a nature preserve with our own trail system on Bull Hill,” it appears Nelsonville now has a house band, says Llewellyn, who launched the vegetable production program and farmer training efforts at Glynwood in 2006. He moved to his current digs nine years ago.
“When I tell people where I live, it draws a blank almost every time, but people are amazed that there’s like 600 of us and we have our own mayor and everything,” he said. “But most of the time, it’s easier to say I live in Cold Spring.”
The Philipstown Depot Theatre is located at 10 Garrison’s Landing. Tickets are $25 at philipstowndepottheatre.org.
