Society Hall  "where community celebrates!"

Society Hall is thrilled to welcome back Colorado Western singer Jon Chandler, with his trio, for a Christmas and Holiday themed show Wednesday, December 18th at 7:00 pm. The concert will also benefit the San Luis Valley Cancer Relief Fund. Tickets are $20 and are available at the Green Spot at 711 State Ave in Alamosa, or at the link below. The concert will also stream live on the Society Hall Facebook page and You-Tube channel. Appearing with Jon will be the well known Denver multi-instrumentalist Ernie Martinez as part of his trio. Jon will be presenting a mix of his well-loved western songs, together with some Holiday favorites.

Jon Chandler is a three-time winner of the prestigious Spur Award from the Western Writers of America. Linwood, his moody examination of Doc Holliday’s life won the Spur for Best Song in 2009, while his tribute to Wyoming’s Hole in the Wall country, Morning Star Moon, received the award in 2012. His novel The Spanish Peaks received the WWA’s Medicine Pipe Bearer Award (Spur Award) for Best First Novel, and he was named True West Magazine’s Best Western Musician. Wyoming Wind, A Novel of Tom Horn, was a finalist for the Colorado Book Award. A seventh-generation Coloradan, Jon’s music and stories reflect his heritage, and his eight CDs, two novels, two non-fiction works, and myriad short stories and nonfiction articles are collected by western lifestyle aficionados worldwide. He hosts the iconic monthly concert series America’s Soul Live at the Olde Town Pickin’ Parlor in Arvada, Colorado. Homage, his new recording of cover songs that have influenced his writing and singing, was released in Summer 2019 to exceptional reviews. Jon is currently celebrating the release of his anthology “Ghost Smoke”, a retrospective collection that also features three new songs.

The Los Angeles Daily News dubbed Denver native Jon Chandler the “...best western songsmith since Ian Tyson,” while Texas’s Country Line Magazine exclaimed, “Thank God for Chandler and his gang of musicians.” A review of Jon Chandler’s iconic CD WESTERNS includes the phrase, “Chandler’s music is literate and literary.” That about covers it. There’s not an ounce of stereotypical Gene ‘n Roy retro-cowpoke, Lazy Z Chuckwagon faux-western schtick in his music, voice or prose. Chandler writes and sings of the historic and contemporary West - not particularly cowboy songs and stories, although they tend to show up with frequency. His songs owe more to Larry McMurtry, Elmer Kelton, Robert Service and Mark Twain than they do to anyone in a band that ends with Wranglers or Ramblers. Simply put, his music and his writing are reflections of his heritage. A seventh-generation Coloradan, his novels, songs and poems serve to keep the West’s frontier ethic alive.

"Jon Chandler is part Wallace Stegner, part Jack Schaefer. He’s part Bruce Springsteen, and part Rambling Jack Elliott. He’s part William F. Cody, and part Cole Younger. Yet he’s distinctively original, a poet laureate of the American West of past, present and future."

- Johnny D. Boggs

Singer/Songwriter Max Gomez grew up in Taos, New Mexico, where he fell under the influence of country blues early on and developed a songwriting style that was uniquely his. He received critical acclaim upon the release of his debut album Rule The World (2013, New West Records); and his subsequent EP, Me and Joe (2017, Brigadoon Records), contained a freshly minted classic, “Make It Me,” which has gained over 4 million listeners on Spotify alone.

As a budding performer, Max apprenticed in the rarefied musical micro-climate of northern New Mexico, where troubadours like Michael Martin Murphey and Ray Wylie Hubbard helped foster a Western folk sound both cosmic and country.

He has shared billing on hundreds of stages with stalwarts of the genre like James McMurtry, Buddy Miller, John Hiatt, Patty Griffin, Tommy James & The Shondells, Jeff Beck, and Johnny Depp. Judging by the company he keeps, Gomez is poised to emerge as a prominent voice of Americana’s next generation. The forthcoming album, Memory Mountain, is set to be released in 2025

Society Hall is thrilled to welcome back regional favorite Tish Hinojosa, celebrating the release of her new CD With a Guitar and a Pen, with a special CD release concert Sunday, January 12th at 7:00 pm. Tickets are $20 and are available at the Green Spot at 711 State Ave in Alamosa, or at the link below. The concert will also stream live on the Society Hall Facebook page and You-Tube channel.

Singer-Songwriter Leticia “Tish” Hinojosa was born on December 6, 1955 in San Antonio, Texas to Mexican immigrant parents. She is the youngest of thirteen siblings. Displaying her lifelong interest in music, Hinojosa began performing at an early age. She has released 16 albums between 1987 and 2024 in English and Spanish in a variety of musical genres such as folk, country, pop and Latino. Hinojosa’s interest in cultural diversity is a recurrent theme in both her work and her personal life, and is expressed not only through her award-winning cross-cultural musical productions but also in her volunteer work with several humanitarian organizations and causes.

Tish left San Antonio in 1979, moving to northern New Mexico where she honed her songwriting and singing skills and worked as back-up singer for country artist, Michael Martin Murphey. She also lived for a period in Nashville, Tennessee. During this time, she worked as a demo singer for Mel Tillis’ publishing company. She eventually settled in Austin, Texas in 1988 where she was welcomed by Austin’s vibrant live music scene.

In 1987 Hinojosa recorded her first self-released album, “Taos To Tennessee”. After her move to Austin, she was signed to A&M Records and released her first internationally acclaimed record “Homeland”. The song “Donde Voy” (Where I Go), earned quadruple platinum status in South Korea. In 1992, she signed with Rounder records, releasing five albums with that label. “Culture Swing” was named Folk Album of The Year by the National Association of Independent Record Distributers (NAIRD). “Cada Niño”, a bilingual (Spanish-English) children’s record won the prestigious “Parent’s Choice Gold Award” in 1996. Other records on this label are “Frontejas” a collection of original and traditional Spanish language songs celebrating the Texas-Mexican border, “Sign of Truth”, and a live record, “The Best of Tish Hinojosa Live”, recorded at one of Austin’s premier listening rooms “The Cactus Café” on The University of Texas campus in 2002.

In between her time at A&M and Rounder Records, Tish recorded with Austin based “Watermelon Records”, releasing her popular Spanish language live record “Aquella Noche” (That Certain Night), and the Christmas themed “Memorabilia Navideña”, re-released later in 2002 as “From Texas For a Christmas Night” on the New West record label.

In 1994, Tish signed with Warner Brothers Records in Nashville and produced two albums alongside acclaimed producer Jim Ed Norman – “Destiny’s Gate” and the bilingual and all Spanish “Dreaming from The Labyrinth”/ “Soñar Del Laberinto”. In addition to an active recording and touring schedule, Hinojosa appeared on multiple television broadcasts including the ABC TV special of the Alma Awards in which she was an honoree and performed duets with Dwight Yoakam and Kenny Loggins. She also made three separate appearances on PBS’s “Austin City Limits”, appeared on Good Morning America, on ONYX TV in Germany, WDR TV Germany, SWR TV Switzerland, and VPRO TV Netherlands.

Hinojosa’s humanitarian works include serving as spokesperson for both The National Latino Children’s Agenda and The National Association of Bilingual Education, and was active with The United Farmworkers of America. Tish also performed at The White House by invitation of President and Mrs. Clinton.

Hinojosa was married to entertainment attorney Craig Barker from 1982 to 1999. Barker managed her career and filled in as bass player in her band. The couple have two children, Adam Craig Barker, born in Nashville in 1984, and Maria Cristina Barker (Nina), born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1987. Tish lived in Hamburg, Germany, from 2005-2013. While there, she recorded three albums, “A Heart Wide Open”, “Our Little Planet”, and “After the Fair”, and continued touring throughout Europe and the U.S.

In 2018, Tish recorded an album entitled “West”. In 2019, she was inducted into “The Texas Institute of Letters” – the second singer-songwriter after Willie Nelson to achieve that honor. Tish and her husband, Lynn Nixon, divide their time between Austin, Texas, and Tubac, Arizona. She continues to write, record and tour. She enjoys spending time with her large extended family in San Antonio, with her children, and five grandchildren.

Hinojosa continues to support Humanitarian, Bilingual, and cultural causes, particularly Hispanic cultural causes through her performances and participation in school and cultural outreach programs.

Don't miss the warm and wonderful Tish Hinojosa, returning to Society Hall at 400 Ross Avenue in Alamosa on Sunday January 12th at 7:00 PM. Doors will open at 6:00. Tickets are $20.00 and are available at the link below or in Alamosa at the Green Spot. Society Hall – Where Community Celebrates!

Alexa grew up in a musical family in the horse country of Southern California, where her father collected vintage guitars. She began studying classical voice when she was seven, and she attended the Orange County School of the Arts and Elon University, where she delved into musical theater.

At age 17, however, an entirely different musical spark was ignited when she saw The Wailin’ Jennys open for Nickel Creek, and she took the hard-left turn from musical theater to Americana. She had been on her way to Broadway, but the lure of performing original material was strong.

As she says about her change of focus: “Musical theater’s be-honest-and-tell-the-truth training taught me how to tell other people’s stories as if they were my own. But because they weren’t my own, there was no real passion.” Nowadays, Alexa’s live performances of her original songs signal the advent of a major new voice in folk, with passion to spare – with Taste of Country writing, “Alexa Wildish has been steadily building herself a reputation of being a soulful and deeply emotional artist.”

Before the pandemic changed everything, Alexa had auditioned in 2019 for The Voice, wanting to increase her visibility as a singer. As a songwriter, she was equally ambitious, submitting her work to Planet Bluegrass competitions that resulted in her taking home first place in 2019 at Rocky Mountain Folks Festival. With her unique command of vocals, guitar, and octave mandolin, Alexa traveled to Nashville just before COVID shut down the country to record her self-titled debut EP, released in 2020.

Alexa Wildish’s new EP, After Love, released on September 27, 2024, comes after her celebrated run as a contestant on NBC’s The Voice in 2023. Her appearance on The Voice was a life-changing event for Wildish, who released her self-titled debut EP of original music in early 2020. While her performances on the show were watched by millions of viewers, behind the scenes, Wildish was on a journey of profound self-discovery and vulnerability, one in which she honed her craft as a stellar vocalist and showcased her talent in the art of conveying what is at the heart of a song.

Ingrid Avison is a Colorado based singer-songwriter who believes in music and songwriting as spell-casting. A superb vocalist, Ingrid brings a subtle tremble in her voice that is pure and grounded while lifting into a full throated wail almost effortlessly. Ingrid lives in a world of secrets; as a desert wanderer she discovers them, as a therapist she holds them, and as a writer she confesses them, letting you in on the raw, intimate details of what it means to be truly alive today. Her songs blend catchy melodies, insightful and provocative lyrics and biting social commentary.

It’s telling that Ingrid’s debut recording is a sophisticated mélange of Americana and at times otherworldly cinematic soundscapes that breath life into her compelling stories of desert sojourns, lost love, death and time traveling into other dimensions.

Ingrid’s creative journey coalesced quickly as she has made room in her life for her new found passion. Living in a quiet cabin home in the mountains with her dog, Olive, and cultivating a steadfast dedication to the songwriting muse has been essential. She recently released her debut EP, produced by her neighbor, Steve Szymanski, a co-founder of Planet Bluegrass, who says it felt meant to be. “I actually first met Ingrid walking her dog down our road and invited her over to my studio to record some of her new songs.” A musical bond quickly ensued and is manifest in the music on Ingrid’s debut EP.