Alaska's Fiddling Poet - Ken Waldman

Alaskan Fiddling Poet, Ken Waldman, makes his debut appearance in Pamlico County at the Old Theater in Oriental. He's bringing his group The Secret Visitors, which features Western NC multi-instrumentalist, Adam Tanner. Waldman's appearance is part of a longer residency which includes a visit to local schools.
 
Ken Waldman combines Appalachian-style string-band music, original poetry, and Alaska-set storytelling for a performance uniquely his. He has eleven books, nine CDs, and since 1995 has appeared at the widest range of concert series, festivals, and clubs, from the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage to the Woodford Folk Festival in Queensland, Australia. Reviewers have compared his stage show to John Hartford and Garrison Keillor.
 
Accompanying Waldman will be Bryan and Barbara Blake, leaders of the Unknown Tongues, a band from Carteret County that plays Cajun music; Lizzie Thompson, a cellist, from Northern California; and Adam Tanner, an instructor at the bluegrass and old-time music program at Eastern Tennessee State University in Johnson City, Tennessee. A mandolin player, fiddler, and guitarist, he's toured throughout the United States and Europe with bands such as The Crooked Jades and Hunger Mountain Boys.

Ken Waldman has drawn on his 30 years in Alaska to produce poems, stories, and fiddle tunes that combine into a performance uniquely his. A former college professor, Waldman has had published six full-length poetry collections, a memoir, a children's book, and has released nine CDs that mix old-time Appalachian-style string-band music with original poetry. Since 1995 he’s toured full-time, performing at some of the nation’s leading universities, festivals, arts centers, and clubs.