Peterborough Town Library and Friends of the Library will host “Songs of Old New Hampshire” with Jeff Warner Thursday, May 30, at 6:30 p.m. at the library, 2 Concord St.
Drawing heavily on the repertoire of traditional singer Lena Bourne Fish (1873-1945) of Jaffrey and Temple, Warner performs ballads, love songs and comic pieces that reveal the experiences and emotions of daily life in the days before movies, sound recordings and, for some, books. Songs from the lumber camps, the decks of sailing ships, the textile mills and the war between the sexes offer views of pre-industrial New England and a chance to hear living artifacts from the 18th and 19th centuries.
Warner presents musical traditions from the lumber camps of the Adirondack Mountains and the whaling ports of New England to the Outer Banks fishing villages of North Carolina. He accompanies his songs on concertina, banjo, guitar and several pocket instruments, such as bones and spoons. He is a folklorist and community scholar for the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts and a former State Arts Council fellow. He has toured nationally for the Smithsonian Institution and has recorded for Flying Fish, Rounder Records and other labels.
Warner is also a founder of the Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival.
This program is sponsored by the Friends of the Peterborough Library and by a grant from New Hampshire Humanities. The program is free and open to the public. Registration is not required.