Lacey house concert lover organizes live-streamed Respite Concerts with local talent

Bill Lange of Lacey loves few things as much as house concerts — the intimacy and the energy of experiencing live music up close and sharing it with friends and neighbors.

With traditional house concerts halted during the pandemic, Lange has launched a virtual version of the shows he loves, which he is calling Respite Concerts, featuring such South Sound talents as traditional music twosome Dante and Eros Faulk, Olympia brothers who’ll play a live-streamed show at 7 p.m. Monday, Oct. 12.

The Faulks — Dante on cello and Eros on fiddle — are well known in the local old-time music scene, having played at Northwest Folklife, Wintergrass and the Olympia Old Time Festival with their previous group REDS Band.

“I really enjoy live music, and what makes live streaming so exciting is that it’s all happening,” Lange told The Olympian. “Everybody has to be ready at a specific time. It’s like a regular concert, except that the musicians don’t get to see the audience.”

His intent is to give people a safe way to experience live music — and to bring the audience as close as possible to the musicians.

A videographer, he’s filming the performances from multiple camera angles, capturing the immediacy of the shows.

That’s something he started doing while producing house concerts in his home and those of his neighbors at Panorama.

“One of my neighbors talked about a social club called After Eight, and the in joke was that it was for people who could stay up past 8 p.m.,” he said. “The idea was to have member events, and I started producing house concerts.”

Lange limited the audience size for the shows to about 30 people. “The musicians and the audience had this intimate connection, because we were in close quarters,” he said.

That meant turning people away, though, so he began filming the concerts so he could share them with a broader audience.

“I came up with this idea of doing music video profiles,” he said. “I would record an interview with the musicians and then I would record the performance. It was a combination of video production and house concert.”

Those videos are available on his website, where he also plans to post films of the Respite Concerts, which started last week with Choro Tomorrow and will continue Nov. 1 with jazz pianist David Deacon-Joyner.

“The plan is to have two concerts a month through the end of the year,” he said. “Then we’ll see how it goes.”

Respite Concerts: Dante & Eros

• What: Sibling string players Dante and Eros Faulk — formerly of REDS Band — will perform traditional and original tunes in a livestream show as part of the twice-monthly Respite Concerts.
• When: 7 p.m. Monday, Oct. 12
• Where: YouTube
• Tickets: Free, with donations appreciated
• More information: Producer Bill Lange’s website has concert details and concert/interview videos, including one with the REDS Band, the Faulks’ collaboration with River and Sage Scheuerell.
• Next up: Jazz pianist David Deacon-Joyner will give a solo concert at 4 p.m. Nov. 1 on YouTube