Tunesmith Night – January 13

Lee Penn Sky

Lee Penn Sky‘s songwriting is unadorned, the nature of his writing makes the songs all the more powerful – his metaphorical, vulnerable and often ironic lyrics have a way of getting to the heart of a matter and his presentation is often compared to Colin Hay’s solo work. As a solo artist he has a rootsy, direct, powerful and often melancholic style of conveying his lyrics which lends to a very dynamic and intimate feel. Lee Penn Sky has shared the stage with some amazing artists such as Glen Phillips from Toad the Wet Sprocket, Rhett Miller of Old 97’s, the Black Lillies, the Barefoot Movement, John Craigie, Mipso, Tony Furtado, Pual Cauthern, and Allie Kral from Yonder Mountain String Band. He has been billed with acts such as the Cowboy
Junkies, Son Volt, the Old 97’s, the Seldom Scene and many more.

Lee Penn Sky released his new album Lean into the Letter on 1/17/20, which chronicles an amazing journey that started with the discovery of a letter sent from Israel in 1958. This letter, found in the back of a drawer in a purse that belonged to Lee’s Great-Grandmother Sadie, was translated at a local synagogue, revealing the author as Sadie’s nephew, Jakob Nistel, thought to have perished with the rest of Sadie’s family in the Holocaust. Jakob detailed the perils of evading the Nazis until the end of the war, hiding underground, to ultimately immigrate to Israel to start a new life. Through the magic of the internet, Lee’s family located Jakob’s descendants in Israel, resulting in Lee, his mother, brother, and cousins embarking on a pilgrimage to Israel to connect with their history, their family, and their future. The songs that compose Lean into the Letter thread together Lee’s thoughts and emotions regarding Jakob, his survival in the face of horrific loss, his ongoing and unshakable faith, the discovery of and joy for new family, and ideas of resistance, depression, loss and anger in the context of historic and volatile conflicts that permeate the Holy Land. No Depression named a pre-release copy of Lee Penn Sky’s Lean into the Letter as one of their favorite albums of 2019! http://bit.ly/2EoUXDU 29 Left Down, a 13 song album, was released in March of 2015 to much anticipation and immediate critical acclaim. Several of Lee’s songs from his debut album Prelude to Hindsight released in 2006, have been played on folk and alt-country radio shows throughout the United States and in Europe. His song “The Trees” was included on In Our Town: Songs for BOISE 150 in 2013.

Heidi Muller

Heidi Muller is an award-winning songwriter who lives in Joseph, OR. A guitarist and mountain dulcimer player, she writes songs of place and story songs, steeped in the folk tradition but informed by the present day. She was a mainstay of the Seattle folk scene, then lived for a time in West Virginia before returning to the Northwest. With a career spanning four decades, Heidi’s song “Good Road” was the long-running theme song of Northwest Public Radio’s Inland Folk show. She has opened for Nanci Griffith, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Garnet Rogers, Jean Ritchie, and many others, and performed nationwide at venues from small concerts to the Kerrville Folk Festival and Mountain Stage. Her songs “Cassiopeia” and “Sacred Ground” were published in Rise Again, sequel to the legendary songbook, Rise Up Singing. Heidi has nine CDs, including four with her partner, multi-instrumentalist Bob Webb. For more info, please visit www.heidimuller.com.