Tickets: $20 adults/$18 student/senior
Michael Smith, the lyricist, composer and performer of renown, is a voracious reader and never at a loss for material. As early as age 16, when he set the words that appeared on the grave of Robert Louis Stevenson, Michael was adapting and setting literature, children's stories, and poetry to music.

Michael's songs set poems by F. Garcia Lorca (Five in the Afternoon), Wallace Stevens (Blue Guitar), Chilean poets Gabriela Mistral (Swallow) and Pablo Neruda, as well as Irish poetry (Songs of the Kerry Madwoman), set in a chamber opera, with poems by Patricia Monaghan, and Chinese Tang Dynasty poets (Painted Horse). Passages from Robert Cole's "The Spiritual Lives of Children" were transformed in We Become Birds. The words of essayist Ann Carson appear in a surprising way in Michael's song Seurat. Michael's original work was featured at the Poetry Foundation: And the Poet Sang, (2013) with Jamie O'Reilly and Peter Swenson, and in Brecht's Letters with Steppenwolf Theatre ensemble members (2014). His most recent recording is of songs inspired by Melville's Moby Dick.

Michael has been singing, writing and touring in North America for over five decades. His songs have been recorded by artists the world over. His song The Dutchman is considered a classic in the folk lexicon.

Tickets: $18 adults/$16 student/senior

Tickets: $20 adults/$18 student/senior

Tickets: $20 adults/$18 student/senior

Heather Styka dances where others fear to tread, gleefully cutting to the truth with gutsy vulnerability. She combines the lyrical intricacy of folk with a catchy melodic pop sensibility and the grit of classic country in songs that are smart and disarming. Call it folk, call it Americana, call it alt-country, but Styka's heartfelt croon draws as much inspiration from classic warblers such as Billie Holiday and Ella Fitzgerald as it does from Shawn Colvin and Eva Cassidy.
After growing up in the Chicago suburbs, Styka moved to the city to study creati ve writing, meanwhile honing her song craft among Chicago, Styka moved to the city to study creative writing, meanwhile honing her song craft among Chicago's long-standing folk community. Her 2011 release Lifeboats for Atlantis brought her to national attention, hitting #3 on the FOLK-DJ charts. Styka's honest, image-heavy songs have garnered her a number of awards, including being a New Fol k Finalist at the Kerrville Folk Festival (2015, 2017) and official showcases at Folk Alliance International, NERFA, SWRFA, and FARM.

Tickets: $18 adults/$16 student/senior