Photos by Stacey Estrella
Laura Stevenson is a Saugerties-based songwriter who has released five full-length albums over her decade-long career. She cut her teeth in the Brooklyn and Long Island DIY punk and indie rock scenes, performing as keyboardist and vocalist of Jeff Rosenstock’s band Bomb The Music Industry! in the mid to late 2000s. She has toured internationally on her own, as a headliner, and alongside the likes of The Go-Go’s, Against Me!, The Hold Steady, and The Gaslight Anthem. Despite this rather punk-leaning-pedigree, her musical aesthetic leans decidedly on the side of serene. Influences ranging from Leonard Cohen, Judee Sill, Elliott Smith and Dolly Parton place Stevenson more musically aligned with the Great American Songbook than her resume may indicate. Her most recent work, “The Big Freeze”, arrived in spring 2019 via independent Don Giovanni Records and has been met with praise from NPR, Pitchfork, VICE, and Rolling Stone.
Laura has been a Hudson Valley resident for five years, though rarely performs in the area and this concert marks her Saugerties debut. The setting of the Saugerties Reformed Church is a space that lends itself immensely to the live translation of the beauty of Stevenson’s recorded output. She will be accompanied in part by violinist Aidan Kohler, also a resident of the Hudson Valley, who has performed on almost all of Stevenson’s albums, though rarely has performed with her live.