Woodstock Wednesdays brings high quality music to our community. Enjoy and support performers who have worked with us over the years! Curtis and Loretta live and breathe folk music. Their music comes straight from the heart! They played at our Festival in 2006 and we are thrilled they are performing for Woodstock Wednesdays. Their music will move you!

The Video premieres HERE at 7pm/CDT Wednesday, September 9. It will remain in our Gallery after the show if you would like to see it again or share it with others.

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Featured Performers: Curtis & Loretta

Curtis and Loretta’s extraordinary harmonies and proficiency on a parade of stringed instruments create an alluring frame for their poignant original songs, and traditional pieces from America and the British Isles. 

The current menagerie includes mandocello, folk harp, guitars, clawhammer banjo, ukulele, and mandolin, plus a bit of kazoo, harmonica, and shakers. Curtis’ down-home sense of humor and Loretta’s theater background engage the audience in an experience that runs the gamut of rolling with laughter to holding back tears, with plenty of side-trips in between.  They have racked up countless miles each year, crisscrossing the country to deliver their own unique brand of folk singer/songwriter music.  Then worldwide events changed their touring.

Curtis and Loretta have had many events postponed due to Covid-19. You can visit their website curtisandloretta.com for further information on their upcoming virtual concerts: Sunday, September 13 – Harmony House Concerts; Saturday, September 19 – Hickory Ridge Concert; Monday, September 28 – Missouri River Regional Library;Tuesday, September 29 – Daniel Boone Public Library; Wednesday, September 30 – Brookings Public Library; Thursday, October 1 – Aberdeen Library. For even more detailed information including receiving an invitation to a Zoom concert, you can email Loretta at loretta@curtisandloretta.com.

The duo’s perennial humor is ever present, with songs and stories of harp players trying to get into heaven, small spenders on first dates, bugs, and lutefisk!  Their years of performing and touring together have honed their comfortable stage presence to a delightful edge. 

They received Arts Tour Minnesota Grants in 2018 and 2010, and an Artist Initiative Grant in 2015, all from the MN State Arts Board, and were named Best Acoustic Performers of the Twin Cities by City Pages in 2002.  They have been on the South Dakota Arts Council Touring Arts roster since 2011. Their CDs have appeared on “Top Albums of the Year” at folkradio.org, and they’ve received several nominations for “Best Acoustic Folk Artist” for the Minnesota Music Awards.  They’ve released nine CDs, and shared billings with such luminaries as Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie, Holly Near, Vassar Clements, Claudia Schmidt, and many more!  Curtis Teague and Loretta Simonet were married (to each other!) in 1987, and live in Minneapolis. 

WHEN THERE’S GOOD TO BE DONE – Latest CD

This recording is made up of 12 songs Loretta wrote, about real people who overcame great challenges in their lives. It’s the culmination of a year long project through an Artist Initiative grant that Loretta was awarded, from the Minnesota State Arts Board.

Guest musicians on the CD include – Peter Ostroushko on fiddle (5 cuts), Jacqueline Ultan on bowed cello (3 cuts), Sandy Njoes on stand up bass (9 cuts), Sherri Leyda on penny whistle (1 cut) and hand drum (1 cut), Chuck Leyda on mandolin (1 cut), and Bobb Fantauzzo on Native American style flute (1 cut). There’s also a choir of 10 wonderful women singers on the chorus of “Willmar 8.” Sandy, Sherri, Chuck, Bobb and many of the “choir” will join Curtis & Loretta onstage at the Cedar on Nov 22 ! 

There are detailed stories of many of the people in the songs on their blog at www.curtisandloretta/blog Go their website to read these poignant stories. These stories can bolster us all during these times! Courage and positive thinking can be contagious!

Donations

Please visit curtisandloretta.com to purchase CDs, join their email list, and to contribute to their Virtual Tip Jar. With gigs cancelled, performers need your support. Your donations and purchases are a powerful way to thank Curtis and Loretta for creating this Woodstock Wednesdays video.

You can even start working on your Christmas shopping by purchasing Christmastide. All your favorite Christmas carols, with beautiful harmony vocals and traditional stringed instruments, including folk harp, mandolin, mandocello and guitar. Plus harmonica, and celeste, an 1800’s musicbox-sounding keyboard are on this CD.

You may also donate to the Festival via the Donate Button near the top of the right column on every page of this website.

We know you will enjoy Curtis and Loretta’s show!