Rose and the Bros: Rockin’ in the free world. (Jim Motavalli photo)

It was a cold weekend but you could ignore that because the music was so warming. The Back Porch Festival 2024 took place March 15-17 at a variety of venues around downtown Northampton, Massachusetts. Weekend tickets to all but a few of the shows cost just $29. Compare that to the $11,040 price for entrance to just one Billy Joel show from the scalpers. It’s great when the bargain music is so darned good, much of it curated from the ranks of the excellent and local Signature Sounds label.

The first show was by The Mammals, basically the husband-and-wife team of Michael Merenda and Ruthie Ungar, with band. This is the group that puts on their own music event, the Hoot, at the Ashokan Center in New York. They are a group that tours relentlessly, with both members writing prolifically and excelling on their instruments (guitar and banjo for him, fiddle for her).

Klezmer music wild in the streets of Northampton. (Jim Motavalli photo)

Highlights included Merenda’s “If You Could Hear Me Now” (from the Nonet album), a gentle song sung by Ruthie with a Dylan “Boots of Spanish Leather” vibe; their Woody Guthrie song, “My New York City”; and “The Hangman’s Reel,” a fiery fiddle duet with Rose Newton. They also did Ruthie’s dad’s “Ashokan Farewell” the Ken Burns Civil War theme, the song that “put me through college,” she said.

Newton is the leader of Rose and the Bros, based in Ithaca, New York. They’re a good-time zydeco band, made into something more than that with Newton’s singing, songwriting and fiddle, plus a crack, well-rehearsed band. They do covers (Michael Hurley’s “Blue Driver” among them) and originals from Newton and Paul Martin, the group’s farmer/guitarist. Martin also got to shine on the group’s singular jam tune, “Blue Thrush,” which reminded me of some of the workouts you’d hear during the 60s in San Francisco. The band got them dancing. Here’s that one on video:

From there it was over to Brattleboro, Vermont-based Low Lilly, two guitars and a fiddle, two women and one man (Liz Simmons, Flynn Cohen and new member on fiddle, Natalie Padilla). Cohen does the guitar solos. They all sang. I liked it. “All This Time” was a standout tune, and their new album, Angels in the Wreckage, was produced by Dirk Powell.

The Low Lily with new member Natalie Padilla (left) on fiddle. (Jim Motavalli photo)

Martha Scanlon is a very gifted singer/songwriter, dating back to her days with the Reeltime Travelers. She placed two songs into the Cold Mountain soundtrack but since then has kept a relatively low profile. In Northampton she was joined by longtime musical partner Jon Neufeld, an accomplished guitarist. They’re out of folk/country but their latest project is a covers album featuring songs by, get this, Radiohead, English Beat, Beyonce and Tom Petty. I would have loved to hear her “Hallelulah” (not the Leonard Cohen song).

Martha Scanlon (left) with Jon Neufeld and special guest Kris Delmhorst. (Jim Motavalli photo)

The peril of festivals like this is missing half of one show because you want to see the beginning of another. That happened when I rushed out to hear Rani Arbo and Daisy Mayhem, a group that doesn’t play around often enough these days. It was good to hear “Big Old Life” again, and their take on “Hear Jerusalem Moan.”

I’ve only recently discovered the music of Lisa Bastoni, who’s originally from Norwalk, Connecticut (Calf Pasture Beach gets a nod) but now lives (and works as an art teacher) in Massachusetts. She’s a great, great songwriter who captures the small moments of daily life with the veracity of a John Updike or Richard Ford. “Cheap Wine” is a standout on her latest album. Her neighbors cut down some lovely trees, installed an above-ground pool, and gave her “waterfront property.”

It was either that song or another one that contains the line, “Just because there’s a ladder doesn’t mean you have to climb.”

Viv and Riley harmonizing. (Jim Motavalli photo)

Viv (Leva) and Riley (Calcagno), a married couple from North Carolina (Viv is folk royalty down there) did one of the strongest sets of the weekend. She’s got a crystalline voice and writes wonderful songs, and he is a hugely accomplished multi-instrumentalist. He could also be a standup comic. This is from his “Is It All Over?:

Do you think they’ll ship us off
To the mines on Mars
And make us work there?
If they do, will the towns have bars
And amusement stars
And a Warby Parker?

And finally there was Peter Case, a blues-influenced raconteur of the old, beat school. He told wonderful stories and occasionally played a wry song or two. The Case show was held in Signature Sounds’ Parlor Room, the best place I know to hear music in Northampton. It’s right near the defunct Iron Horse, which is reopening under the Parlor Room Collective’s direction in May. That’s heartening. But the capital campaign continues.

Before leaving Northampton on Sunday morning we visited Signature Sounds “Back Porch Radio Live” at Progression Brewing. That gave us a chance to go away happy with the Deep River Ramblers (above) and the great and wonderfully manic, full-of-life Steve Poltz. “Quarantine Blues” is folk rap at its finest.