Paramount Announces First Two Shows in Summer 2008 Series

Media Contact:

Kristen Gleason
Director of Marketing
The Paramount Theater
215 East Main Street
Charlottesville, VA 22902
434.979.1922 ext. 103
kristen@theparamount.net

For Immediate Release

April 17, 2008

Today The Paramount Theater announced the first two shows in its Summer 2008 Series. The Nels Cline Singers, the free-jazz ensemble fronted the Wilco lead guitarist of the same name, will perform on Friday, June 6 at 8 pm. Abigail Washburn & The Sparrow Quartet featuring Béla Fleck will bring the bluegrass/folk sounds of the unconventional quartet to the theater on Friday, June 27 at 8 pm.

Special Media Sponsors for Nels Cline Singers are WCNR 106.1 The Corner and The Hook Newsweekly. Special Media Sponsors for The Sparrow Quartet are WMRA 103.5 -- NPR News, NPR Talk and WHTJ Charlottesville PBS.


Recently named a "Guitar God" by Rolling Stone, Wilco lead guitarist Nels Cline is one of the instrument's most versatile, imaginative, and original players active today. Currently touring the US with Wilco, Cline alternates with performances featuring his long-standing free jazz trio The Nels Cline Singers (Devin Hoff on bass and Scott Amendola on drums). Combining breathtaking technique with informed musical intelligence, delicate lyricism, sonic abstractions, and skull-crunching flights of fancy, "the World's Most Dangerous Guitarist" (Jazz Times) has performed on over 100 albums in the jazz, pop, rock, country, and experimental music genres.

As an "artist who best embodies the notion of Americana as a worldwide musical language" (The Tennessean), Abigail Washburn has created a new sound that challenges traditional notions of country and culture --exemplified in the raw, transcendental music of the Sparrow Quartet, the all-star collaboration including Béla Fleck, acclaimed cellist Ben Sollee, and Grammy-nominated fiddler, Casey Driessen. Produced by Fleck and composed/arranged by the group’s members, Abigail Washburn & the Sparrow Quartet (May 2008) features an unprecedented combination of two banjos (clawhammer and three-finger-style), cello, and five-string fiddle that unfolds in a dreamlike chamber suite.

Tickets for both performances will be available to Paramount Theater members in a pre-sale period beginning April 21 for top level members and April 23 for all members. The on sale date for the general public is Monday, April 28.

All seats for the Nels Cline Singers on Friday, June 6 will be $25.50. Admission for The Sparrow Quartet on Friday, June 27 will be $28.50, $31.50, $34.50 and $39.50.

For more about Nels Cline Singers and The Sparrow Quartet, please visit www.nelscline.com and www.sparrowquartet.com.