October 21, 2011

$18 / $21 at door

The Parkington Sisters

Heather Maloney opens

The Parkington SistersWe are proud to introduce two newcomers to the me&thee. Fresh from an appearance with the Dropkick Murphys at Fenway Park, the Parkington Sisters will grace our cozy stage. Based in Wellfleet, the Parkington Sisters buoy their Americana with lovely baroque arrangements heavy on strings. Opener Heather Maloney is touring in support of her second album, Time & Pocket Change. Heather’s singing and songwriting are garnering great acclaim.

The Parkington Sisters create an aural experience that is both magnetic in its delivery and genuine in its emotional impact. Seeded from a generation of musicians, Rose, Nora, Sarah and Ariel Parkington were raised in a wildly musical household where every room sounded with a spark of song, naturally inspiring their individual hearts and hands to find their own instrumental avenues. These roads led them through every direction, from stints in eclectic rock bands, to performing on stages in far away lands, with symphonies and string quartets, and to conservatory and university.

The sisters all hold degrees in string performance. It wasn’t until 2005 that they began performing instrumentals together for the first time on the streets of Provincetown. Eventually their passion for songwriting won out as their sound evolved into each sister writing and singing individually. Combining their diverse tastes, filtered through their acquired classical training, the sisters soon realized the potential for combining four dynamic voices with four confident instruments.

Rose plays guitar, piano and accordion; Ariel, Sarah and Nora play violin and viola. Nonetheless, all are multi-instrumentalists and their music is embodied by vibrant string arrangements combined with tight, interwoven vocal harmonies, and gorgeous, blending voices. Ambitious and intricate, the Parkington Sisters produce an undeniable expression of sisterhood able to slip from their hearts into a sound all their own. Since 2005, the sisters have traveled the country, capturing audiences wherever they play. They have been guest artists on recordings by The Spring Standards, Sonya Kitchell, Dub Trio, Dropkick Murphys, Horrible Crows, and they recently recorded their debut album at New York City’s Avatar Studios and Studio G with engineer/producer Joel Hamilton (Elvis Costello,Tom Waits).

Photo by Alyssa Maloof

. . .

Heather Maloney

Heather Maloney had one of her first public shows at a small coffee shop in Northampton Massachusetts in September of 2009. She was so nervous and timid that she had to be prodded onto the stage. In July of 2011 she walked out onto the stage at the Calvin Theater in front of 1,500 fans of the Grammy Award winning artist Jonny Lang and brought them to their feet in applause. Jonny immediately asked her to open three more shows and called her “an extremely talented songwriter and incredibly great singer.”

Heather has fallen in love with performing, having played over 225 shows in 20 states in 20 months, sharing the stage with such celebrated acts as Jonny Lang, Chip Taylor & Carrie Rodriquez, Mike & Ruthy, Vance Gilbert, Dala, David Wax Museum, Devil Makes Three, Caravan of Thieves, Jeffrey Gaines, Jill Sobule, Meg Hutchinson, Cliff Eberhardt and many others.

Photo by Richard Young

  • The Parkington Sisters‘ four-song eponymous EP (Self-Released) is like the best first date you’ve ever been on: transcendent, gooey, and short enough to leave you yearning for more. [T]he five Parkington Sisters manage to channel Joni Mitchell, Shostakovich, and Thelonious Monk in such an understated manner as to make the uninitiated heart leap. Opening track “Let Go” manages to cover more emotional and harmonic territory in five minutes than the last two Iron and Wine albums combined. . . . In the barren landscape of girl groups as forgettable as Twitter posts, the Parkington Sisters are the musical manifestation of Louisa May Alcott. David Mead in American Songwriter
  • Their music, an eclectic blend of acoustic, alternative, ethnic, classic, contemporary folk takes flight, floats across the airwaves, and settles in the soul, begging to be heard again and again. Kathleen Szmit in The Barnstable Patriot
  • . . .
  • On Heather Maloney:
  • Richly orchestrated post-coffeeshop pop held together by pipes and lyrics well beyond her years. The loom of singer/songwriters is long and shaggy; it’s always nice to see a thread sticking out. Portland Phoenix
  • Stunning folk-rock . . . emotional lyrics and tender moans tucked in tight with brisk musicianship. Worcester Magazine
  • Sharp, poignant lyrics housed in clever acoustic compositions, accented by Maloneys melodious, ‘operatic’ tendencies, are really what separates her music from straight ahead, folky pop tunes. You have to hear it to fully understand. Portsmouth Herald