Hot off a European tour, another successful holiday show and local toy drive, and cracking country music’s Top 40 single charts, singer-songwriter Jessica Lynn is on fire.
The Westchester native is also gearing up to record her third television concert, filmed locally of course, on Saturday, February 23. Lynn previously recorded 2013’s This Much Fun – Live from The Winery at St. George and 2015’s Jessica Lynn – Takin’ Over: Live at the Paramount in Westchester, both of which saw broadcast nationally by PBS. Now, Lynn has her sights on Peekskill’s Dramatic Hall for a more intimate, storytelling experience.
We caught up with Lynn to find out why this show is shaping up to be a truly unique experience, both for her and those of her fans lucky enough to score tickets.
How is this concert different from shows you’ve performed in the past?
The last two shows for PBS were kind of big productions. They had dancers, there were bigger stages, they had a lot of people, and they were full-band. This one is totally stripping down everything and going back to basics, and focusing on who I really am as a person and songwriter.
I’m going to be playing instruments a lot more than I usually do live, and just giving people an inside look into me and what the songs mean to me. It’s a lot more intimate than anything we’ve ever done in the past.
Because it is very intimate, we’re going to be doing a lot of crowd interaction and also a lot of crowd shots. So you most likely will see yourself on national television if you attend. It’s not like there’s going to be 800 people in the back; you’re going to be right there.
And we hear you’re hoping to showcase a few other local talents?
Yeah! So my friend Dan Zlotnik, who is an incredible singer-songwriter and musician, is joining me for two duets, one co-written by Devon Allman, who is Gregg Allman’s son. My friend John Winton is playing saxophone for us and we have a string quartet, and a lot of surprises along the way. Maybe a choir will show! I’m really trying to put an interesting and unique twist on country music and on the songs.
What led you to select Peekskill’s Dramatic Hall for your next television special?
I wanted something really intimate and something kind of vintage looking, and I’d heard about it but never really knew it existed until recently. We went in to just look and the vibe was just perfect with the dark woods and the wrought iron balconies. I felt like a songwriter inside there!
It holds the perfect amount of people and the stage wasn’t too big so it has that real intimate feel. I’m an independent artist and I’ve worked really really hard to put myself out there, and this show was important for me to showcase other independent artists that I feel like they deserve, so I thought why not showcase such a cool venue? Bring that into the spotlight and showcase all of Westchester. It’s going to look beautiful on camera, I know it.
|
|
Your recent single “Let’s Don’t” broke the Country Music Top 40 this month. (Congrats.) Can the audience expect your big hits at a more intimate event?
Yes, they can, but different versions of them! We’re doing acoustic version of my well-known songs, debuting some brand new music, as well as pulling out some songs from my past that people may or may not heard before that played a special in my journey to where I am today.
Lastly, this is going to be one of the last chances for a lot of local fans to catch you before your band jets off to Europe for your next world tour. Any other surprises you’d like to teaser for the show that they might look forward to?
There’s going to be a documentary portion that goes along with the show for the DVD and I’m really excited about that. I feel like it’s really going to give people an inside look into what we do, and just into who I am. I feel like a lot of my shows are kind of big productions. A lot of people don’t even know I play all the instruments that I play, and I think that’s what I’m looking forward to the most: showing people that I am the person behind the music, writing it and arranging it, and putting the band and the pieces of it together, the vision of everything. This show is really going to show that, this other side of me that I haven’t been able to show people before. As a songwriter and an artist that’s something that I’m really looking forward to, and I think it will be a surprise for people.
Jessica Lynn’s Live From Dramatic Hall films on Saturday, February 23 at 7:30 p.m., with a snow date of Sunday, February 24. Tickets are available in extremely limited quantities, so get them while you can and maybe we’ll see you on national TV.
