AN ALMOST SPRING WEEKENDER
AN ALMOST SPRING WEEKENDER
secret planet & race brook lodge present
MAR 8-9 ⩥ AN ALMOST SPRING WEEKENDER
at Race Brook Lodge in Sheffield, MAIt’s almost Spring.
You need to dance. Be outside. Stand around a fire or soak in a sauna. Climb a mountain peak. Jump in a waterfall.
Join us at Race Brook Lodge in the Berkshires for all or part of this thing. Their magical compound is part Dream Away Lodge, part Hundred Acre Woods — we’re so excited to collaborate with them on a weekend’s worth of dance-forward musical offerings.
The Barnspace at Race Brook Lodge
WHO’s COMING?
Orchestra Gold
BIGYUKI
Garth Stevenson
Nickodemus
Busquelo
Deejay Theory
ORCHESTRA GOLD
A decade-long collaboration between Mariam Diakite and Erich Huffaker has yielded something golden: an African psychedelic rock ensemble based in California with raw, hypnotic vocals and a groove that simply cooks.
The swinging six-piece soaks up vast Malian influences, from Afro Funk to traditional Bambara ritual song, and delivers them with A-grade aplomb and a clear devotion to fuzz, reverb and musical healing. The brass horn lines and hypnotic guitar riffs trace their sound back to the great African Orchestres of the 60s, 70s, and 80s.
Orchestra Gold plays Friday night in the BarnSpace at 8PM.
BIGYUKI
Japanese keyboardist and songwriter Masayuki Hirano is referred to in the industry as “NYC’s secret weapon.” He’s the musical equivalent of a savant linguist with a talent for all the vernaculars. Wild juxtapositions inhabit BIGYUKI’s performances: heavy beats laced with classical flourishes; techy low-end bleeps expressed through a heart-shaped sieve.
Best known for composing three cuts on A Tribe Called Quest’s most recent album and recently found on tour with José James, Kamasi Washington, and Antonio Sanchez, Masayuki is a heavily sought-after performer and composer with an infectious and beautifully weird palette of music.
Masayuki is joined by Randy Runyon on guitar and Jharis Yokley on drums.
BIGYUKI plays Saturday night in the BarnSpace at 8PM.
GARTH STEVENSON
Double bassist and composer Garth Stevenson, was raised in the mountains of Western Canada, where nature became his primary inspiration and the common thread between his life and music.
His three full-length solo albums, Alpine, Flying, and Voyage, are informed by his experiences carrying his 150-year-old double bass to the woods, beach, desert and other remote locations including Antarctica and Tuva.
Over the years, he has developed a unique style of forest concert: he leads a group out on a hike, finds a suitable place to play, and performs an improvised set inspired by the alchemy of set and setting.
Weather permitting, he’ll take us up the trail on Saturday at 1PM — otherwise his set will happen in the BarnSpace.
NICKODEMUS
Nickodemus is a traveler at heart—a connector of worlds, scenes, and people. At the helm of the Wonderwheel label, he’s a veritable encyclopedia of planetary parties. As a DJ, he can connect the dots between twenty or thirty genres in a single set, molding a synergetic dance experience that sets him apart as a leader in global fusion and heavy beats. He is also the founder of Turntables on the Hudson, a legendary, iconic expression of the NYC party scene.
His music has long thrived on the close relationships and mutual respect of friends across continents, felt through the worldly potions he cooks up in the studio, spanning electronic sounds rooted in Latin, African, and Eastern instrumentation. His latest album, Soul & Science, is the culmination of this musical connective tissue he’s established.
Nickodemus plays on Saturday in the BarnSpace at 9:30PM.
DEEJAY THEORY
A New England native by way of San Francisco, Deejay Theory has been fearlessly carving his lane in music as a forward-thinking producer, DJ, label boss and all around badman/nice guy. His sets track some interstitial magic between tropical bass, hip-hop, disco, dub, funk, reggae, reggaeton, amapiano, and other global dance genres.
Forever pushing the boundaries while always keeping the vibes, Theory approaches music through a universal lens sparking inspiration from all corners of the planet and dancefloors we share. His decade-plus span of highly sought-after remixes and custom edits have become go-to secret weapons for some of the highest profile DJs in the world.
Deejay Theory spins the late night set on Saturday night in the Down County Social Club, starting around 11PM.
BUSQUELO
Nat Rahav aka Busquelo selects deep, sublime, and multicultural sounds for discerning dancefloors. Using folkloric and the futuristic as skipping stones, his music invokes ancestral rhythms as the blueprint for excursions into international dance music culture.
A longtime member of the Turntables on the Hudson crew, he has been DJing in the NYC scene for two decades. In the 90's he founded and ran the record label RhythmLove with partner Nickodemus. He was a resident DJ at Bembe in Brooklyn for many years in the 00's. He also hosted a salsa radio show on WKCR called The Mambo Machine. He is also the founder of a music festival called Present Present which showcases emerging artists, many of whom have been awarded or nominated for Grammys.
Busquelo spins the late night set on Friday night in the Down County Social Club, starting around 11PM.
RACE BROOK LODGE
RBL is part Dreamaway Lodge and part Hundred Acre Woods. Located at the base of Mount Race in bucolic Sheffield, the forested inn features an 18th century tavern, gardens, pathways, fire pits, a sauna, and trails that head up the mountain to beautiful views and waterfalls.
Prepare for an epic hang in this layer cake. We recommend staying on-site, but if it’s fully booked (and it seems to be nearly at capacity already), consider the Sheffield Lodge or the Egremont Village Inn or another nearby option.
SCHEDULE OF MUSIC
8PM-11PM. Two sets of Orchestra Gold in the BarnSpace
11PM-1AM. DJ Busquelo in the Down County Social Club
Fri, March 8
Sat, March 9
1PM-3PM. Garth Stevenson Hike + Concert (meet in the Barnspace)
8PM-9:20PM. BIGYUKI trio in the Barnspace
9:30PM-11:00PM. Nickodemus in the Barnspace
11:00PM-1:00AM. Deejay Theory in the Down County Social Club