South by Southwest Festival - No...I'm Not Going.

Come next Wednesday, I'm going to really wish I owned my townhouse instead of renting it so I could install a DirectTV dish, enabling me to watch performances from the daily eight-hour live broadcast of performances from the 2008 South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas. The following artists are scheduled to perform a full 40-minute set at either the Lone Star Lounge or Bat Bar, located at the Austin Convention Center. Complimentary tickets are given to conference attendees, one of which is Wolf Trap's own Elsbeth Fager, who works faithfully alongside Peter Zimmerman in Programming & Production. El - if you're reading this...I'm supremely jealous. I want a full report of the new My Morning Jacket tunes...

If you subscribe to DirectTV - you'll have the opportunity to catch sets from:

Wednesday, March 12

The Bat Bar 7pm Earlimart 8pm Daryl Hall and Friends - One half of Hall and Oates who were at Wolf Trap in 1997 and 2005

Thursday, March 13

The Bat Bar
1pm Augustana - new album out on April 29 via Epic titled, Can't Love, Can't Hurt. New Single "Sweet and Low" is currently streaming on their MySpace page.
4pm The Answer
6pm Sia
8pm Hanson - MMM BOP

The Lone Star Lounge
2pm The Noisettes
5pm Martha Wainright - Rufus Wainright's sister who exudes a very innocent, endearing and ambient vocal style (very EmmyLou Harris in my opinion.) Aside from her brother, she is probably most well known for her recent collaboration with Snow Patrol on the track "Set Fire to the Third Bar"
9pm Tift Merritt

Friday, March 14

The Bat Bar
1pm Ferras/Katy Perry
4pm Dizzee Rascal
8pm Daniel Lanois - wrote "The Maker" which is often covered live by Dave Matthews Band
10pm X

The Lone Star Lounge
2pm Paddy Casey
5pm Joanna Cotten
7pm Deana Carter
9pm Ryan Cabrera

Saturday, March 15

The Bat Bar
2pm Justin Nozuka
5pm The Ting Tings
7pm Sons & Daughters
9pm The Lemonheads

The Lone Star Lounge
1pm Monte Negro
4pm Salvador Santana
8pm Carbon/Silicon
10pm Nicole Atkins

If you're not familiar with South by Southwest festival, take a few minutes to learn from the Flight of the Conchords duo in today's video of the week called, Best of Flight of the Conchords's "A Texan Odyssey". The documentary itself is in a five party series, all available on YouTube during which you will notice several past Wolf Trap artists including Morrissey (2007) and Lyle Lovett (17 time Filene Center performer.) Enjoy.

Have a great weekend,

Graham