Saro Lynch-Thomason
Songs of Resilience & Resistance from Appalachia
Sunday, February 7, 4:30-5:30 p.m.
at Electric Maid Community Exchange, 268 Carroll Street NW, D.C. (half a block from Takoma Metro station)
Saro Lynch-Thomason presents photos, stories and songs from over 200 years of social and environmental movements in Appalachia. Ballads, hymns and folks songs paint a picture of the Mountain South's experiences of slavery, miner's revolts, mountaintop removal, black lung, outmigration, the Civil Rights movement and more. Come expecting to learn a lot and sing along! This is an encore presentation of one of Saro's workshops from Youth Traditional Song Weekend 2016, a gathering cosponsored by FSGW where she was a faculty member. Suggested donation $10.
Saro is an award-winning ballad singer and activist from Asheville, NC. As a child she became attracted to British folk revival music, learning ballads from recordings of singers like Sandy Denny and pop-balladeers like Sinead O'Connor. While at college in New York, away from her native Southern climes, she was introduced to Appalachian song traditions. She moved to western North Carolina in 2009 to learn from (and eventually perform with) traditional singers like Sheila Kay Adams and Bobby McMillon.
In 2012 Saro completed Blair Pathways: A Musical Exploration of America's Largest Labor Uprising -- a researched compilation of over 20 historic songs from West Virginia's labor wars. A strong traditional song leader, Saro has led the Asheville Community Sing since 2010 and she regularly teaches regional ballad workshops, Wassailing choruses, and May Day choruses on social justice themes. In 2013 Saro completed her solo CD Vessel --a 100% a cappella compilation of ballads and songs from Appalachia and the British Isles. Saro believes that solo and group song can provide powerful forms of inner therapy and outward social empowerment. She enjoys teaching song as a way to educate about historic rights struggles in Appalachia and beyond.
For more information about Saro and her albums, children's book and activist work, visit http://sarolyncht.bandcamp.com and www.blairpathways.com.
