Watermelon may be out of season, but the Watermelon Wednesday music series is still going strong, bringing the finest in acoustic music to our area. The series will present the double bill of Swedish duo Vasen, and the nontraditional string quartet The Fretless, on Wednesday, Oct. 29, at 7:30 p.m. at the Whately Town Hall. Both acts are award-winning, internationally recognized talents known for their virtuosic musicianship and lively performances.
The show came about after Paul Newlin, the director and founder of Watermelon Wednesdays, saw Vasen perform at the Iron Horse in Northampton last year. He was so blown away by the talented group that he knew he had to bring these two world-class players to Watermelon Wednesdays. He reached out to Vasen’s agent, who suggested another band they worked with from Canada called The Fretless, which he felt would be a perfect pairing with Vasen.
“I checked out The Fretless online and wow,” Newlin wrote in a recent email. “Given their agent, I should have known they’d be great.”
The Fretless have toured and recorded together since 2012. The band formed to expand the musical boundaries of what a string quartet could be, achieving this by playing folk melodies and fiddle tunes in a classical music format. That format would be two violins, a viola, and a cello, and they also brought in a vocalist for some of their songs.
The Fretless have won a number of music awards, including a JUNO (the Canadian equivalent of a Grammy) in 2017 for Instrumental Album of the Year.
Vasen, made up of Mikael Marin and Olon Johansson, have been making music together for 37 years. They play a variety of traditional Swedish stringed instruments that you’ve likely never heard of – the oktavharpa, silverbasharpa and the nyckelharpa among them. Johansson is one of the leading players in the world of the nyckelharpa, an odd-looking traditional Swedish instrument also known as a keyed fiddle. It is played with a bow, but has keys that look like those on a hurdy-gurdy. It’s worth attending this show just to see and hear these different instruments.
“Our audiences, when they leave a Vasen concert, always seem very uplifted, very happy and satisfied, and that leaves us uplifted too,” Johansson told Strings magazine.
The music they create is a unique blend of Swedish folk tunes, with contemporary sounds, complex rhythms, and a solid dose of humor. Their global tours and collaborations with major players in the acoustic music world, like fiddle player Darol Anger, have led to significant recognition. The Punch Brothers even recorded Marin’s “Flippen,” which became a staple of their live shows, leading most listeners to think it’s an American bluegrass tune.
That’s quite an endorsement. If you are a fan of string band music, this is a show you won’t want to miss. “An embarrassment of riches” is the way Paul Newlin describes this double bill.
“This is just an amazing meld of classical and contemporary trad, I couldn’t resist,” he said. “I also love that one group is from Sweden and one from Canada.”
Tickets are available at watermelonwednesdays.com or at the door if still available.
Olivia Nied and Brian Dickens at the Shea’s Lounge
This is short notice but tonight (Thursday, Oct. 23) at 8 p.m., the Shea Theater Arts Center in Turners Falls will host one of their lounge series shows with musicians Olivia Nied and Brian Dickins. The lounge series hosts shows that take place in the theater’s lobby, providing a more intimate setting to listen to music.
Both artists performing at this show are from Turners Falls. Nied is an incredibly accomplished multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter and producer. Last year, she released her debut album “Just Enough,” a genre blurring record where she played almost all the instruments and wrote about her experience as an “AuDHD (autistic/ADHD) transgender young person pursuing radical joy against all odds.”
Brian Dickens has been performing his own songs throughout New England since 2004. He has three full-length albums and various EPs, and will begin work on another project at some point this year.
Tickets are available at the door or online at sheatheater.org.
Back Porch Festival announces headlining acts
The 12th annual Back Porch Festival, the roots music festival presented by Signature Sounds and inspired by Jim Olsen’s Sunday morning back porch radio show on 93.9 FM The River, will take place the weekend of March 27-29, 2026. The festival, which started as a one-day event in 2014, is now a multi-venue, multi-day event.
The festival features the finest in roots music and presents three evening shows held at the Academy of Music, plus more than 60 other shows taking place at 10 different venues throughout Northampton. Every year the festival includes a live broadcast of the Back Porch Radio Show held at either the Parlor Room or Iron Horse before a live audience.
The three headliners for the evening shows at the Academy of Music are Bertha, the world’s first “Grateful Drag” band, on Friday, March 27, at 8 p.m.; Back Porch Bluegrass Spectacular featuring Peter Rowan with Sam Grisman Project and special guests playing the music from the one time bluegrass supergroup Old & In the Way and more on Saturday, March 28, at 7 p.m.; and I’m With Her, the Grammy Award-winning trio of Aoife O’Donovan, Sarah Jarosz and Sara Watkins who are known for their stunning harmonies on Sunday, March 29, at 7 p.m. Olive Klug will open the I’m With Her show.
Tickets for those three shows at the Academy of Music will go on sale Friday, Oct. 24. VIP passes are on sale now and those include one ticket to each of the three headlining shows at the Academy of Music, access to mezzanine seating at the Iron Horse for all Back Porch shows (some limitations apply), and priority entry to all afternoon Academy of Music sets.
Ramble passes, which exclude the Academy of Music shows but allow entry to all the shows at the other venues, will be available sometime in November. The lineup for the Ramble Pass shows will be announced at that time. To purchase tickets, visit backporchfest.com.
Sheryl Hunter is a freelance writer who resides in Easthampton. Her work has appeared in various regional and national publications. She can be reached at Soundslocal@yahoo.com.