Songwriters in the Round

For one night only, Liz Barnez, Megan Burtt, Alysia Kraft & Bonnie Sims will share the stage for an epic evening of powerful music! Each highly accomplished artist and songwriter has achieved tremendous success at a regional and national level.  This “in the round” format spotlights the distinctive talents and songwriting skills of each artist as they take turns featuring their own songs. Additional harmonies, percussion, and spontaneous leads from the rest of the group will give each song an improvisational dynamic and make for a truly one-of-a-kind performance! The intimacy of this concert experience is heightened by down-home storytelling and the serenity of a beautiful outdoor setting surrounded by plants, trees, and nature.

Don’t miss this unique opportunity to see you favorites take the stage together!

• Date: Friday, September 17
• Doors: 5:30pm
• Show: 6:30pm
• Tickets: $20 ADV/ $25 Door/ Kids 12 & Under Free
• Audience members are encouraged to bring lawn chairs for additional seating
• Well-behaved pets on leashes are welcome!

Liz Barnez was born in New Orleans, Louisiana and grew up inspired by jazz, blues, folk, gospel, R&B, Dixieland, funk, and parade music. She embraced the diversity of her musical and creative upbringing and transformed those into her own eclectic style of music.

Liz Barnez started her musical career in the clubs and festivals in her hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana. She moved to Colorado in the late 1980’s and has been a mainstay in that music community since then.

Liz was voted by her peers as the “Best Singer-Songwriter Female” in the FoCoMA (Fort Collins Musicians Association) Peer Awards 2020.

Inducted into the Colorado Music Hall of Fame as a member of the Mother Folkers (the most carefully pronounced name in show business) in 2019. The Mother Folkers is a group of women musicians who began in the 1970’s with original members Mary Flower, Mary Stribling, Kathi DeFrancis, and Eileen Niehouse. Over the years the members have included Mollie O’Brien, Carla Skiaky, and Vicki Taylor to name a few. Liz joined the group in the early 1990’s. Read More

Megan Burtt is an international touring singer/songwriter decorated with national recognition. She is the winner of the Kerrville NewFolk, Rocky Mountain Folk Festival and Westword Music Award and a finalist in Mountain NewSong, Songwriter Serenade and Great American Song Contest.

In 2010 she released “It Ain’t Love”, a 12-song collection she made with bandmates, among them, Louis Cato (of Jon Batiste and Stay Human, house band for Stephen Colbert, Marcus Miller, Snarky Puppy, and Bobby McFerrin). She worked with the same group for her 2015 release “The Bargain” which charts her recovery from a serious illness with songs that move from darkness to light. In 2013 she released “In Good Company: The Colorado Sessions” a collaborative album of co-writes with Colorado bands including SHEL and Covenhoven.

Megan has toured as a headlining artist, and as support for acts including Gregory Alan Isakov, Mark Cohen, Brett Dennen, Glenn Phillips of Toad The Wet Sprocket, Lissie, Stephen Kellogg and Leanne Rimes. In 2015 she collaborated with the Colorado Symphony Orchestra as a featured artist. Read More

Having amassed devoted regional followings for projects Whippoorwill and The Patti Fiasco as a celebrated songwriter and incomparably magnetic frontwoman, Alysia Kraft has sold out most of Colorado’s big stages and directly supported icons Bon Jovi, Blondie, Nathanial Rateliff and Bonnie Raitt on significantly bigger ones. Embracing the complexities of growing up queer on a cattle ranch in small-town Wyoming and choosing to love within a landscape that didn’t always love back, her forthcoming album, “First Light” is a triumphant homecoming and a defining solo debut. Americana dipped in indie pop shimmer and folk bioluminescence will find crossover appeal with fans of HAIM, Kacey Musgraves, Sharon Van Etten, and Waxahatchee. Enlisting close collaborator J. Tom Hnatow & Grammy-nominated Justin W. Craig to produce and mix and acclaimed engineer, Sarah Register to master, “First Light” is open-hearted and vastly hook-adorned– with soundscapes as dimensional as Kraft’s western upbringing and the liberated narratives contained therein. Read More

I started singing as early as three years old, my father was a professional musician and played children’s music for a living. Growing up I played at theme parks and summer festivals with my dad in a traditional string band, singing and playing mandolin and acoustic guitar. I played at Six Flags Over Texas (Arlington) and Silver Dollar City (Branson) as well as public libraries all over TX in support of my father’s musical summer reading program. As a young child I sang on the theme song for the nationally syndicated children’s television program, Wishbone, as well as recorded two family band albums with my father, Mike Cruciger.

I went to South Plains College to pursue commercial music and songwriting, and ended up meeting my husband and future musical partner there as well. He was already playing in a bluegrass band based out of Lyons, CO, so after graduating I joined him in CO and started writing and playing live shows, forming my own band Bonnie & the Clydes and releasing four studio albums over the next ten years.

Over the next few years through mutual friends we met our current musical collaborator, Robbie Nevil. With Robbie we began experimenting with a way heavier produced sound and started cowriting, namely for sync licensing and dubbed our new project Everybody Loves An Outlaw. Sync music felt like a smart thing to invest in, as musicians who had primarily made our income from playing live shows and selling our merch at shows, having our foot in another camp felt like a wise move. When Covid shutdowns happened across our entire industry at the start of 2020 we started to realize how significant that move really was. We ended up having one of our songs with Everybody Loves An Outlaw, ‘I See Red’, get placed in a Netflix movie 365DNI/Days and subsequently “go viral”, changing the course of our career in seemingly an instant and giving us this incredible asset in the negotiations that followed. We went from being essentially invisible in the industry to taking meetings with VPs of A&R at Republic, Columbia, Arista and a handful of other labels, and ending up signing a singles deal with Columbia Records for ‘I See Red’ through the original music library that we had licensed our first batch of ELAO songs through, Extreme Music. We’re excited to see where our ELAO music leads while staying connected to our community and each other through our duo project.

This summer marks the 6th season of Fort Collins Nursery’s Rock Garden Concert Series. For one epic night, Fort Collins Nursery will transform from a retail space to a stunning and unique concert venue appropriately dubbed “The Rock Garden.” Audience members can relax under the evening sky, nestled along the banks of Dry Creek and the Cache la Poudre River, surrounded by beautiful plants, trees and wildlife. In addition to great music, this concert will feature a beer and wine tent and food truck.

The concert is a fundraising event benefiting The Vegetable Connection and funds raised will support their mission to create a healthier community through food education, increasing access to nutritional food, and supporting local farmers. 100% of the event profit from ticket sales and all donations from the auction and wine and beer sales go directly to The Vegetable Connection.

• Food: Schmickels Hot Dog Cart
• Drinks: Wine & Beer Tent
• Audience members are encouraged to bring lawn chairs for additional seating
• Well-behaved pets on leashes are welcome!

(All Proceeds benefit The Vegetable Connection)

TBA

Host or Publisher Fort Collins Nursery