Stephen Jenkinson & Gregory Hoskins

Author/Activist Stephen Jenkinson and recording artist Gregory Hoskins fuse their separate work into an evening that is part book reading, part concert, part poetry, part lamentation, part ribaldry, part lifting the mortal veil and learning the mysteries there. What would you call such a thing? We called it Nights of Grief & Mystery. That’s what’s been performed to sold out houses in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, England, Scotland, Wales, Iceland and the USA.
Concerts for Turbulent Times they surely are. We aren’t poets, maybe, but the evenings are poetic. They are musical and grave and raucous and stilling, which probably means they are theatrical. They are nights in which love letters to life are written and read aloud. There’s some boldness in them. They have that tone. These nights have the mark of our time upon them, and they’re timely, urgent, alert, steeped in mortal mystery. They’re quixotic. They have swagger. What would you call such a thing? We called it Nights of Grief & Mystery.
Seven years, 2 short films, and three full length recordings after its’ inception, Nights of Grief & Mystery: Rough Gods Tour travels the dark road again with a handful of not-to-be-missed duo shows that harken back to the beginning of their collaboration.
“We do so when the current appetite is for either distraction or distress, and we seem to be in neither business.” SJ
WHAT THE AUDIENCE HAS SAID: “And for the whole show I just sat in wonder: How is it even possible to let music and words be engaged in such a fertile merging!? I felt that those deeply touching stories of Stephen Jenkinson were somehow brought to life by the music as if by midwifery and the wonderful voice of Gregory Hoskins and the feminine and sexy band. I know from my work as an author that it is very tricky to intertwine story-telling or reading with music. But this event proved the impossible. I looked around by the end of the evening and saw us all there in wonder and uplifted spirit, yet deeply rooted in our inner archives.” Oddný Eir – Reykjavik, Iceland
“Wow. Just wow. What a beautiful, heart wrenching, funny, brilliant show. I was astounded by the eloquence and poetic nature of Stephen’s oratory style, and by the (for lack of a better word) TOTAL BAD-ASSNESS of the band.” N, Tuners Falls, ME
“My heart is still full and my tongue is drunk from last night.” MS , Franklin, TN”So utterly heartbreaking and beautiful.” MLF, Ithaca, NY
“Extraordinary! It was a beautiful and unraveling intimate night.” LG, Roanoke, NC
“The show was beautiful and dark and compelling and cathartic. Educational yet humbling. Strange yet familiar. It was a singular experience. I’m still kinda dumbstruck by the whole thing.” CT, Kitchener, ON
“I highly recommend this show to you. Highly. Higher than highly.” PS, London, ON

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