Mimi Stern-Wolfe, pianist, and Laura Wolfe, singer/songwriter, will appear Sunday December 14 at 7 PM at The Pangea in a delightful program of songs by Joni Mitchell, original songs by Laura, a Harold Rome favorite, and some Lower East Side-influenced music by the mother & daughter team who are longtime Lower East Side residents.
The performance will be rich in variety and styles, reflecting the experience and eclectic tastes of the performers. Laura will sing a few of her favorite songs by the remarkable
Joni Mitchell, including "Blue" and "River." She will also perform several selections from her own CD "Siren," as well as lullabies from the CD "Tunes for Tots," recorded in the 90's by Laura and Mimi, and dedicated to little children.
Mimi Stern-Wolfe's long-established Downtown Music Productions presented a 2011 revival at Theater 80
St. Mark's of
Harold Rome's "Pins and Needles," and Laura will reprieve her featured song in that fine revival, in which she laments that "Nobody Makes a Pass at Me."
Mimi Stern-Wolfe, pianist/conductor/producer, is a longtime resident of the East Village and director of Downtown Music Productions, which has performed hundreds of imaginative, high-quality concerts in downtown sites, and has ventured uptown to perform at Merkin Concert Hall, Town Hall, and Lincoln Center. Mimi, a native New Yorker, studied with pianists Ray Lev and
Leonid Hambro, graduated Phi-Beta Kappa from Queens College, received a Masters in Music from the New England Conservatory, and did her graduate studies in Paris with legendary Nadia Boulanger.
Her concerts in New York have included several ground-breaking events. To name just two: in 1990, Downtown Music Productions presented "Composers of the Holocaust," a concert of music by Erwin Schulhoff, Viktor Ullmann, Pavel Haas, and other composers who died in the Holocaust. In a stunning, one-time event, Ullmann's Sonata No. 6 was played by pianist Edith Kraus, brought from her home in Israel for
the concert, and the pianist when the work was premiered in Theresienstadt. In 1990 Mimi began the annual Benson AIDS Series to honor the memory of her friend Eric Benson, who died of AIDS, and to perform, and often premiere, works by composers afflicted with or lost to AIDS. The concerts are usually presented on December 1st, world AIDS Day.
Mimi's many awards include a Mayor's "Arts Award in Music" for her "exceptional contribution to the arts and multicultural life of NYC," a Laurel Leaf Award from the American Composers Alliance, ASCAP's Chamber Music America prize, and most recently the 2014 Lower East Side Community Hero Award.
Laura Wolfe, multi-instrumentalist/vocalist/songwriter, was born into a family of professional musicians and political activists (her mother is
Mimi Stern-Wolfe and her father was a member of the Weathermen, a controversial political group well-known in the 60's and 70's). She has been described as a classic singer/songwriter in the tradition of
Carol King and
Laura Nyro, yet her music and lyrics resonate with the freshness and energy of a new generation." "Music shaped every aspect of my life....I think I sang before I even spoke," she remarked, and indeed, her training and experience are wide-ranging. In addition to her solo concerts, Laura has sung with gospel choirs, East Indian music groups, the synagogue group called Romemu, and in the European tour of the Broadway favorite "Hair," to name just a few. A student at LaGuardia H.S. and then Oberlin College, Laura has release several albums starting with "Siren," produced by Steve Addabbo (Dar Williams,
Shawn Colvin, and
Suzanne Vega).
Sunday December 14 at 7 PM
The Pangea, 178 Second Avenue (between 11th & 12th Streets)
Admission: $15 Food & Drink Minimum $15
Reservations:
212.995.0900
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