CARTHAGE — New England Celtic Arts will present Maine Folk legend Dave Mallett at Skye Theatre Performing Arts Center in south Carthage on Sunday May 11. Curtain is 7 p.m. A pre-show jam session will begin at 6:15

 

In a career spanning four decades, Mallett has recorded 14 albums, had several hundred covers of his songs, including the American folk classic “Garden Song,” (Inch by Inch, Row by Row)  and performed in clubs, concert halls and festivals across the U.S., Canada and Europe. He has appeared on numerous broadcasts, including National Public Radio’s “A Prairie Home Companion.” Known for his carefully written, poetic offerings, his body of work has provided material for an eclectic list of artists that includes Alison Krauss, Pete Seeger, Hal Ketchum, Emmylou Harris, John Denver and The Muppets.

 

Life in an out-of-the-way place carries universal import, and people everywhere seem to understand what  Mallett’s songs are about. Although they are rooted in place, they speak to the essential things that move us all. If you grow up in a small rural town, as Mallett did, you can’t help but learn its stories. He knows about the people who shouldn’t have stayed, but did, and those who shouldn’t have left, but did. He knows the factory work, the fieldwork, the memories of summer dances, the loves and losses, and the stunning incidents of courage and despair.

 

Raised in a musical family, by the age of 10 he was touring with his older brother Neil, singing at Grange halls and county fairs. In his early 20s he started his solo career, writing his own songs and eventually performing them across the U.S., Canada and Europe. His songs have received international acclaim, and one of them, “Garden Song”, has been translated into several languages and is one of America’s most popular folk anthems. 

 

The songs Mallett writes and sings are filled with passion, evocative imagery, and a sense of the inevitable passage of time. The loss of American towns and rural landscapes is the subject of many of his songs, as are the issues of wilderness preservation and the struggle of the common man. When he is not touring, the place where he makes his songs is in his writing room in an old farmhouse with a view across the field and a tintype of his great-great grandfather on the wall. “I like to keep reaching out to touch the past,” he says, “to connect it with what’s going on now. To me music is one of the few things that is timeless … human emotion is one continual chain.”

 

Skye Theater is located 3 miles West of East Dixfield village at 2 Highland Drive off Winter Hill Road and Route 2 in south Carthage. Ticket price is $20. More information is available at: http://www.necelticarts.com or call 207-562-4445