Keepsake House presents an evening of storytelling and original music featuring pairs of songwriters and storytellers.
October 30 7:00pm
About this event
Come together for an evening of storytelling and original music featuring songwriters Alex Wong, Erika Ji, Jay Miners, and Marcie Hernandez and storytellers Annie Tan, Claudia Acevedo-Quiñones, David Glover, and Kelly Bachman. Songwriters and storytellers pair up to share their chosen stories through new songs never played live before, accompanied by a full ensemble. Be a part of this very special, FREE Keepsake House show where performance, music, and conversation intersect.
Doors: 6:45 PM
With music direction by TONIE.
This program is made possible by New York City Artist Corps and is co-produced by The Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural & Educational Center, a venue and partner of New York City Artist Corps.
Note: In accordance with the newest NYC Vaccine Mandate (Key to NYC), all artists and guests attending any concert held indoors must provide proof of at least one dose of any COVID-19 vaccine alongside a valid photo ID. Only guests and performers with both items will be permitted inside the venue.
SONGWRITERS:
Alex Wong
Alex Wong creates music to help people remember who they are and show themselves to the world. He has always had a complicated relationship with his own memories, unable to remember his own childhood birthday parties yet possessing many vivid, sensory memories from dreams, places he’d never been, and what seemed almost like isolated vignettes from another life. That dissonance led to the songs on his latest album, “The Elephant and the Seahorse.” As he looked closer at his memories from the past, he was forced to acknowledge that he had been “hiding” his identity as a second generation Chinese-American for much of his life. Memories of being told to downplay his ethnicity in school, social groups, or in the mostly-white music industry, assimilate to white culture, speak with no accent, and keep himself small rushed to the surface, along with waves of shame and anger for buying into this conditioning. A lot of deep questioning followed, which he chronicles for the first time in his song “Show Yourself.”
Alex is a Latin GRAMMY-nominated artist and producer known for his work with Delta Rae, Vienna Teng, Melissa Ferrick and Morgxn, among others. Alex’s music has been featured in movies including “The Last Song” and TV shows including “True Blood. Alex has toured all over the world, performing at festivals like Coachella, Outside Lands, and Corona Capital, in arenas in Mexico City and theaters in Europe and Japan, and on NPR’s Mountain Stage. During the lockdown, Alex curated and performed two virtual benefit tours featuring prominent AAPI artists and others, raising $10K to help organizations fighting anti-Asian hate via TheQuietVoiceFund.org.
Website | Spotify | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter
Erika Ji
Erika Ji is a cross-genre composer-storyteller. Her musical stories have been featured Off-Broadway and around the world by Broadway's Future Songbook at Lincoln Center, the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, the Nadia Boulanger Institute, and the Musical Theatre Factory at Joe's Pub at the Public Theater. Current projects include Yoko's Husband's Killer's Japanese Wife, Gloria (a musical commissioned by Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre), VISARE (an immersive circus experience + concept album, winner of the 2021 New Voices Project), and music directing for Virgin Voyages's ship-wide immersive show, Scarlet Night. As a conductor, pianist, and vocalist, Erika has performed on national TV for CBS Sunday Morning, at the Warfield Theatre in San Francisco, and for house concerts across the country.
Jay Miners
Jay Miners is a born and raised New York City-based singer/songwriter. She is the artist of two EPs and a full-length album “In Betweens,” releasing on October 8, 2021. Inspired by her parents’ old-soul records and the singer/songwriters of her generation, she quickly started to write songs at a young age. Jay’s single “Real Love”, released in February 2020 and written about our relationships with modern-day technology, gained early support from Spotify, making its way onto playlists including Fresh Finds and Fresh Finds: Indie. Her most recent EP “The Art We Make” has been described to have “captured emotional beauty” (Modern Music Maker, 2018), as it explores her journey as a songwriter and themes of identity & coming of age. Jay is the Co-Founder and Show Director at Keepsake House, a listening room for independent artists. When she is not writing songs, she enjoys baking sweets and teaching music.
Website | Spotify | Instagram | Facebook | Youtube
Marcie Hernandez
Marcie Hernandez's music lives in cultural dualities. Born to Puerto Rican parents & raised in Rochester, NY, Marcie is a singer/songwriter with a sound that combines Latin rhythms & instrumentation with the feel & lyrical vulnerability of indie folk music. Each of her songs is a snapshot of her life, telling stories of love & loss, growth & transformation. Marcie's debut album, “Amanecer,” is out now. Marcie also performed in the May 2021 Keepsake House show, Roots Less Traveled.
Website | Spotify | Instagram | Facebook | Youtube
STORYTELLERS:
Annie Tan
Annie Tan is a special education teacher, activist, writer and storyteller based in Chinatown, New York City. Annie fights for her students, public education, teachers unions, tenants rights, and Asian American issues, working to organize a better world. Her work has been featured in the New York Times, Huffington Post, The New Republic, PBS' documentary series “Asian Americans,” and twice on the Moth Radio Hour. Annie is currently working on her first book, a memoir, and hopes to write an epic book one day about her family and Asian American history.
Claudia Acevedo-Quiñones
Claudia Acevedo-Quiñones is the author of The Hurricane Book (Rose Metal Press, Fall 2023) and the chapbook Bedroom Pop (dancing girl press, Fall 2021). Originally from Puerto Rico, her work focuses on belonging, etymology, and dreams. Her poems and short fiction have appeared in The Brooklyn Rail, Salt Hill Journal, wildness, Radar Poetry, and other publications. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.
David Glover
David Glover is an artist drawn to telling needed stories; stories that challenge comfort, question vulnerability, and press at the potent roots of trauma and healing. His artistic body of work centers on identity, history, and home with a focus on the complexity and measures of Black life, love and liberation.
Website | Instagram | Facebook
Kelly Bachman
Kelly Bachman is a comedian from North Carolina currently based in New York. Kelly can be seen on FX/Hulu's "Hysterical" and her show, "Rape Jokes by Survivors," was featured at the New York Comedy Festival.
Website | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter | Youtube
MUSICIANS
TONIE (they/them), Music Director & Guitar
Vietnamese-American producer TONIE is doing their very best to make you cry, in all the best ways. The LA-native writes and produces each synth-pop track from the comfort of their skylit home studio in Brooklyn, NY—a perfect backdrop for the emotional vulnerability that colors their lyrics.
They are currently working on their debut studio EP “Songs to Sing to Myself”, an EP about their journey with depression set to be released next summer.
Abel Mireles, Saxophone
Carol Ma, Violin
Carol Mak, Vocals
Christine Sheih, Violin
Kenji Tokunaga, Bass
Kevin Lucero, Cello
Larry Wang, Piano
Peter Lin, Trombone
Shareef Clayton, Trumpet
Zac Swanner, Drums