AUBURN — Some of Maine’s greatest past and present musicians will gather on Saturday, May 9, at the First Universalist Church in Auburn for a concert and fundraiser celebrating the late Tom Rowe, formerly of the legendary Maine band, Schooner Fare. 

Tickets are $25 for general admission and are on sale at PaperBrownTickets.com.

Among the many accomplished performers will be the remaining original members of Schooner Fare as well as Rowe’s son, Dave Rowe, who carries on his father’s legacy of writing and performing acoustic folk music as both a solo artist and member of the hard-working and high-energy sea-shanty duo, The Squid Jiggers.

“It wasn’t everybody’s father who was out touring four days a week, but it just seemed normal to me,” Dave Rowe of Schooner Fare said about his dad’s heyday. “The first time I walked on stage was an electric moment. It made me realize ‘oh yeah, that’s why dad does this.’”

Tom Rowe died in 2004, but not before a cherished decade of performing alongside his son, and Denny Breau as the Turkey Hollow trio.

Rowe has organized a remembrance concert for his father every year since his death, carrying on a long tradition among the Rowe family and their friends of using their musical talents for charity. Schooner Fare and another accomplished Maine band, Devonsquare, started the Jack McPhillips Memorial Fund nearly four decades ago to help Mainers in moments of unexpected need, like when the oil tank runs dry or the whole house goes up in flames.

“That’s what Jack did when he was alive and it’s what he’d still be doing,” said Rowe. “It’s a perfect fit to have this concert benefit the Jack McPhillips Memorial Fund.”

Along with Schooner Fare and the Squid Jiggers, the event will feature performances by Denny Breau, David Mallett and Phil House. The emcees will be Capt. Kendall Morse and Robert Skoglund, who is better known as the Humble Farmer.

So many talents and personalities coming together is sure to create an unforgettable night punctuated by the unexpected — music not heard in years or last-minute collaborations between performers — and certainly the performance of Dave’s favorite of his father’s songs, “Big House, Middle House, Backhouse, Barn.”

“That song is about family and that’s what these shows are about: family,” said Rowe. “A lot of the fans look at us as family because they’ve been listening to us in one form or another for 40 years or more.”

The 2015 Remembering Tom Rowe Concert begins at 7:30 p.m on Saturday, May 9, at the First Universalist Church, 169 Pleasant St., in Auburn. Tickets are $25 for general admission and are on sale at PaperBrownTickets.com.

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