nyc – Page 2

Motown at The Bitter End

So many artists came together to rock Motown songs Thursday night at The Bitter End! The Leave a Lasting Mark event raised over $1900 for the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America and was sponsored by Noble Steed Music and Funkadelic Studios.

The ladies of the night really made this event special for me. With so many beautiful and talented female musicians there was definitely some strong girl power in the air! Performing covers of Motown’s girl groups, like the Marvelettes and the Supremes, you gotta bring the GP!

Here are some shots from the practice the night before the show. I want to introduce you to some of these lovely ladies and their music!

From left to right

– Amy Rivard Singer/Songwriter, she has performed on Broadway and in over 30 countries with shows like Celtic Woman, Riverdance and The Roy Orbison Story.

– Ebonee Reigne New York based singer and model with a voice that dazzled everyone at the show!

– Jenn Summers Singer-songwriter with the indie record label Noble Steed Music, she brings a feel good beach vibe with her upbeat songs and has a cd release show coming up 6/18 at Rockwood Music Hall.

– Jenni Alpert Pop songstress with haunting, powerful, and sultry voice. She has independently performed in over 14 countries and her music has been featured on many major Network Television shows.

– Kate Steinberg She is a composer, performer, songwriter, session singer, music supervisor, vocal and piano instructor, musical theater enthusiast, and multi-instrumentalist based out of New York.

– and who is that last weirdo all the way on the right?? hehe 🙂

Now above we have Jonatha Brooke here on the right. She has been writing songs, making records and touring since her early days in Boston with her band The Story on Elektra Records. She currently has three musicals in development: Quadroon, with legendary jazz pianist Joe Sample; Hopper, and Death and Venice, both with playwright Anton Dudley.

And on the left is Michele Zayla, an amazing vocalist who has performed with Pink Floyd cover band The Machine. Her vocals will mesmerize you, whatever ‘it’ is, she’s got it!

I didn’t get photos of them, but Wendy LaManque is another talented vocalist who nailed her Supremes cover. And Annie Halo rocked the bass! She is also a sound engineer based in New York.

(PS: to all the guys, you rocked too!)

Now how could I not have an awesome night in the presence of all this talent?! I’m looking forward to the upcoming Leave a Lasting Mark events. There will be a Motown encore in Central Park on July 10th and back to The Bitter End on August 11th!

Oh and last but not least, there is video of each song on Leave a Lasting Mark you tube channel!

Here we (the rungs) are with our ‘Please Mr Postman’ cover!

Music

Get Down with MOTOWN!

Tonight at The Bitter End 7pm, we will join a huge group of talented musicians for the “Leave A Lasting Mark” Concert Series presents: MOTOWN! – a tribute to “Hitsville, USA.” The event will celebrate the songs & artists that live forever in music history and all proceeds will go to benefit the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America.

More good music for a good cause, now that is something I dig!

Music

Greenpoint Gallery

When we first pulled up to the Greenpoint Gallery, we thought we might have made a wrong turn. Sitting across the street from a large overpass and sandwiched in between big warehouses, the address we were looking for did not exactly seem like a venue. It turned out to be super cool! Large rooms with artwork that covered the walls from the floor to the ceiling, people everywhere dancing and having fun, the high stage with motion sensitive lights, and the pet wolves that the property owner called his pets made for a pretty eventful evening.

When we started our set, we realized that we left a piece of our equipment back in Ithaca, but we were able to make do without it. At first it was a real bummer, but the next day I received a text from a friend who found it on the stage right where we left it! How awesome is that?! Major thanks to that dude 🙂

And the host of the event at the Gallery, Carlos, was the nicest guy! I am so glad we were able to be part of the launch party fundraiser for his film, ‘Last Day.’ You can still donate to help fund the making of this film, find more information here: http://www.runningfilmmaker.org/

Here we are getting eaten by some of the awesome art:

Music

first Manhattan gig!

Last week’s show at Pianos was a blast. I was so excited to play that I decided to be daring and wear bigger heels than I usually do… they made me feel cool okay!

When we got to the venue, a band called the walking shapes was setting up. They were even more daring than my extra inch in height, (if you can imagine that..), they were doing a crazy 24 shows in 24 hours! Pianos was their 18th gig and despite an exhausting go of a day, their spirits were high. They put on an awesome show.

When we started our set, I was super happy to see some familiar faces. Thank you everyone for coming out! We played about a 40 min. set and used the house amps for our guitars and Ableton clips, everything sounded great.

And the staff were a very special group. The sound guy, the door guy, the bartender guy, the booking guy…..all of the guys! (and girls 🙂 ) were filled with good vibes.

Thank you Pianos!

Music

Pianos NYC

Our first gig in Manhattan! I cant wait to play, Thursday night at 7pm. Here is the funny poster I made for our set 🙂

Music

Pete’s Candy Store

Pete’s Candy Store in Williamsburg is cozy and welcoming and filled with good vibes! For anyone who hasn’t been there, the stage is intentionally separated from the bar in an adorable room where performers and audience members can completely immerse themselves in the music. We loved this stage and this room! It made a certain togetherness possible between us and the audience. Check out the cool lights that frame the stage over head 🙂

It was great to play at a venue in a new neighborhood. Before our set, I couldn’t resist one of their specialty sandwiches, the black forest ham which was delicious! I’m already thinking about our next show there, because I want to try to the roast beef! 🙂

Music

The Debut EP!

Happy New Year everyone! We are kicking off 2014 by self-releasing our debut EP!

Thanks to all of our old and new friends, 2013 was filled with fun live shows, lots of inspiration to create new music, and most importantly, good people to share it with. These songs are for you!

https://soundcloud.com/the-rungs/sets/the-rungs-ep

If you like what you hear, help us share our songs and connect with us via our social media pages here on the left and right menus.

Bloggers – We are looking for bloggers to help review our EP. Feel free to email me at mandy@rungsrungsrungs.com and I will gladly send you song downloads and any information you’d like about the band.

Thank you and best wishes to all 🙂

We are The Rungs. Thanks for supporting our music 🙂

Live

Wild Weekends

I must provide a recap on our recent weekend adventure.

It started over a month ago, when a good friend asked Diwas to host one of the weekly open mic nights she organizes in a newly established Brooklyn music venue called Shindig. We love getting out of town and visiting our friends, so of course he agreed, and we put it on our calendar, ‘a weekend in Brooklyn in June’. It was May at the time, so adding something to the next month’s agenda felt like such a ways off. But boy does time fly! The weekend was here before we knew it and ended it up being the perfect time to get out of town.

We hit the road early Saturday morning only to get an unexpected surprise on the way….

Our first band flat! I had never gotten a flat before, so I kind of thought it was exciting. The next surprise was that Diwas, a guy who I’ve never seen do much car work, got in there and successfully put on the spare like a pro. Definite road trip buddy! We were back on the road in no time 🙂

We drove for about two hours with the little donut spare, and despite feeling extra nervous in the nyc tunnels, the ride was pretty smooth all the way to Shindig! Our luck returned when we got to the venue in time, found a parking spot right outside, and enjoyed a night of entertaining and diverse open mic performances. Here is some of the crew: