SongLives
Mark Dignam
and Jean Rohe

Admission:
$15 member /
$18 non-member

Please note this event is General Admission. Our box office opens one hour before each performance. Please arrive on time to pick your seat.

SongLives

Curated by Grammy Award-winner Susan McKeown

SongLives brings the rich tradition of busking on Dublin’s Grafton Street to the wonderful intimacy and acoustics of the Donaghy Theatre

Mark Dignam and Jean Rohe
Friday, March 21 | 8 pm

Mark Dignam

“The first time I heard Mark Dignam, I was down one end of Grafton Street and I heard this voice soaring from the other end, I had never heard anything that powerful on the radio or the TV. I was a kid at the time, and I just thought to myself, I wanna sing like that someday.” – Paddy Casey

Mark Dignam is an Irish born, U.S. based songwriter who began as a busker on the streets of Dublin. Dignam’s songs are always intelligent and insightful, balanced with an infectious sing-along quality. His sound draws comparisons to Van Morrison, Dylan, and Tim Buckley as well as the more contemporary songwriters of today like Elvis Costello, Billy Bragg, and Sun Volt. Live, Dignam delivers powerful, engaging performances with warm melody, lyricism, and strong personality. He has opened for Billy Bragg, David Gray, Richard Thompson, Joan Armatrading, Vic Chestnut, The Frames, Paddy Casey and a host of others. His music has garnered critical acclaim around the U.S., Ireland and the U.K. His first album Poetry and Songs From the Wheelwas named a Top Ten Best Debut of 1995 by Ireland's Hot Press Magazine, cementing Mark's reputation as a powerful voice on the singer-songwriter circuit and he’s continued to release records including In a Time of Overstatement and Box Heart Man.

Jean Rohe

“There are plenty of talented artists out there, but what sets Jean Rohe apart are the suppleness of her voice, the integrity of her vision, and the grace she shows in her wide-ranging journeys across the musical landscape.” – John Platt, WFUV

Jean Rohe is a multi-lingual singer, storyteller, and composer, mixing aesthetic approaches from jazz, folk, and Brazilian traditions. Her one-of-a-kind narrative songs, which range from fantastical riffs on old folktales to autobiographical sojourns, to “phonojournalism”, a genre of her own invention, have won recognition from the ASCAP Foundation and the New York Songwriters Circle, and her refreshingly candid performance won her the audience prize at the Montreux Jazz Festival. “A sure-footed young singer-songwriter,” in the words of The New York Times, she has performed with the Billboard-charting alt-country group Calexico, appears regularly on New York Public Radio, and has toured her projects throughout the U.S. and as far as Havana's Teatro Nacional. As a fellow at the MacDowell Colony last year, she began work on a new group of songs for a performance memoir about her grandmother and namesake. Though she is often found at the helm of her eclectic and genre-bending 8-piece ensemble, Jean Rohe & The End of the World Show, she also performs her solo repertoire. Her latest album, Jean Rohe & the End of the World Show, was released this past fall.

Past performers include Susan McKeown, Declan O’Rourke, Michael Brunnock, Brendan O’Shea, Mark Geary, Ann Scott, Niall Connolly, Wallis Bird, Anthony Mulcahy, Mundy, The Guggenheim Grotto, Jenna Nichols, Heathers, Gerry Leonard, Eleanor McEvoy, Warren Malone, John Spillane, Eamon O'Tuama, Mick Flannery, Casey Black.