Victoria Victoria

Breakout artist Victoria Victoria is praised for her proficient songwriting, bewitching vocals, and celebratory live performances, inviting audiences into a communal experience. Named a “rising act” by RollingStone Magazine, Victoria’s playful yet insightful lyrics and lush harmonies leave listeners entranced.

Victoria’s songwriting is what first caught the attention of GRAMMY award-nominated producer and guitarist, Charlie Hunter. After passing demos back and forth in the pandemic, the two teamed up to write and record their album, To the Wayside. Since the release of their debut collaborative effort in 2022, the two have toured along the east coast, playing NPR’s Mountain Stage, The Kennedy Center, the Rochester Jazz Festival and more. In addition to Charlie and Victoria, the pair team up with drummer Scott Amendola and vocalists Halle Elliott and Maia Kamil, creating a timeless yet reinventive soulful experience. 

Learn more at https://www.victoriavictoria.org/

Nigel Wearn

Nigel Wearne saunters after dark in the music of the night, blending blues, jazz and Americana-noir. Hailing from Gunditjmara country in the deep south of Australia, he's a guitarist and multi-instrumentalist with diverse influence from Nick Cave, Tom Waits and Rickie Lee Jones. A deep thinker and truth speaker with a penchant for all things peculiar, he sings of human frailty, grace and the cosmos; songwriting that cuts to the bone.

Nigel has toured Australia, New Zealand, the US, UK and Canada and he's performed at a long list of music festivals, including MerleFest, AmericanaFest, Cambridge Folk Festival (UK), Adelaide Guitar Festival (Australia), Bristol Rhythm & Roots Reunion, Mile of Music and Old Settler’s Music Festival. 

His sophomore album, Black Crow garnered wide critical acclaim including a 4-STAR review in Rolling Stone, a nomination for Best Country Album at the Music Victoria Awards and it debuted at #1 on Australia's AMRAP Charts. His latest offering The Reckoning (released Nov 2023) received a nomination for Best Blues Work at the 2023 Music Victoria Awards, a 4-STAR review in The Weekend Australian and had two songs selected as finalists (top #10) in the International Songwriting Competition. Inhabiting the after-dark realms of blues, jazz, soul and rock 'n roll; this is Americana-noir. 

Learn more at https://www.nigelwearne.com/

Rod Abernethy

Rod Abernethy is a unique blend of an authentic southern folk troubadour, master acoustic guitarist, and award winning songwriter and composer for film, TV and video games and the Overall Grand Prize Winner of the 2021 International Acoustic Music Awards. In 2019 he was the Grand Prize winner of American Songwriter's Bob Dylan Song Contest. His last album Normal Isn’t Normal Anymore, produced by Grammy nominated producer Neilson Hubbard (Mary Gauthier, Kim Richey, Glen Phillips), received rave reviews from No Depression, American Highways and The Wall Street Journal and was the Top 20 CD of 2021 at No. 11 on the Folk International Folk Charts.

Rod’s talents go beyond being a dynamic performer, vocalist, instrumentalist, and storyteller. He’s a prolific photographer, a sculpture artist of whimsical steampunk found-object robots and a seasoned teacher and adjunct professor at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston Salem, NC, where he teaches how to score video games. As composer, Rod has scored and produced music for countless television shows, commercials and over 80 video games including the Electronic Art's blockbuster hit "Dead Space" which won a BAFTA Award in 2009 for Best Use of Audio and Tolkien's "The Hobbit" for Vivendi Universal which won the Game Audio Network Guild’s Video Game Soundtrack Of The Year in 2003. 

Rod continues to perform live in acoustic venues and halls across the country. Past venues include The Woodstock Folk Festival (Woodstock, IL), Club Passim (Boston, MA), The Cat’s Cradle (Chapel Hill, NC) and the ISIS Music Hall (Asheville, NC). He will also be a featured artist on this year’s popular PBS series, Songs At The Center hosted by Eric Gnesda.

Learn more at https://www.rodabernethyguitar.com