Multi-platinum selling recording artist Natalie Merchant performs a Carnegie Hall Family Concert today, April 26 at 3:00 p.m. in Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage. Based on Merchant's recent book and music project Leave Your Sleep, the concert features nursery rhymes and lullabies by 19th- and 20th-century poets set to the singer's beautiful melodies, performed by a chamber orchestra and with projected illustrations by renowned artist Barbara McClintock. James Bagwell conducts the performance, which also features musicians from the dynamic chamber music collective Decoda, pianist and accordion player Uri Sharlin, and guitarist Gabriel Gordon. This Family Concert is presented by Carnegie Hall's Weill Music Institute and recommended for children ages 5−10.
Immediately following the concert, Natalie Merchant and Barbara McClintock will sign copies of Leave Your Sleep in the Citi Café. Prior to the day of the concert, copies of the book are available in the Carnegie Hall Shop, as well as online at carnegiehall.org/shop. Books will also be sold in the Carnegie Hall lobby during and after the concert. Please note that the artists will only sign books (limit one per child).
Carnegie Hall's young patrons, the Notables, host the Fifth Annual Family Party following the performance. Guests will enjoy prime seating during the performance and a post-concert family party in the Rohatyn Room featuring refreshments, crafts, cookie-decorating, face painting, and other child-friendly activities. Proceeds support the music education and community programs of
Carnegie Hall's Weill Music Institute, which annually serve more than 400,000 people in New York City, across the US, and around the world. For more information please
click here.
Throughout
Natalie Merchant's 30-year career, she has earned a distinguished place among America's most respected recording artists, with a reputation for being a prolific songwriter with a compelling artistic vision and a unique and captivating performance style. With her latest highly acclaimed Nonesuch recording, Leave Your Sleep, which debuted on the Billboard Top 200 at number 17, Merchant embarks on a new artistic path, creating songs from literary inspiration, which are composed for expanded musical ensembles and orchestra.
Merchant began her musical career as the lead vocalist and lyricist of the pop music band
10,000 Maniacs and released two platinum and four gold records with the group between 1981 and 1993 (The Wishing Chair, In My Tribe, Blind Man's Zoo, Hope Chest, Our Time in Eden, and MTV Unplugged). Together with artists like R.E.M., they defined college rock and created the first wave of alternative rock bands.
In 1994, Merchant began her solo career with a self-produced debut album, Tigerlily, and in the years following, she released Ophelia (1998),
Natalie Merchant Live (1999) and Motherland (2001). In 2003, Merchant independently released an album of American and British folk music, The House Carpenter's Daughter, on her own label, Myth
America Records. Two years later, she curated a collection of her own work for a double album, Retrospective, and another for her former band, Campfire Songs.
Merchant has collaborated both on stage and in the studio with a wide range of artists including
Philip Glass,
Wynton Marsalis,
David Byrne, The Chieftains,
Mavis Staples, R.E.M., Daniel Lanois,
Ladysmith Black Mambazo,
Tracy Chapman,
Dan Zanes, Billy Bragg, and Wilco. Throughout her career, Merchant has also been dedicated to supporting and raising awareness for a variety of non-profit organizations, including Scenic Hudson, Riverkeeper, The Center for Constitutional Rights, Doctors Without Borders, Tibet House, Greenpeace, The
Southern Center for Human Rights, and Planned Parenthood, among others. . Merchant has also served as an appointed member of the prestigious New York State Council on the Arts (2007-2011).
