QCMS Student & Teacher Showcase
Come hear and see the student and teachers from Queen City Music Studios show off what they have been working on in their lessons this spring! Queen City Music Studios is a proud sponsor of Staunton Jams.
Website
The Cry Babies
The Cry Babies are an Americana band made up of local musicians who love to joyfully engage the audience through the songs and stories they share throughout their performance. Their music incorporates beautiful harmonies with a rich bluesey folk sound through original, traditional, and popular songs that will often surprise you as well as warm your heart.
Website
The Hot Mamas
The Hot Mamas are sass, spunk, feminist rage and acoustic punk, beautiful harmonies and a junkyard bathtub full of homemade instruments on roller skates. The Queens of the Queen City in Staunton, VA.
Website
Valerie McQueen
Unhurried and authentic, singer-songwriter Valerie McQueen uses her voice as an instrument to tell life’s stories. A little bit folk, sometimes country, Valerie chronicles a life shaped by seasons through melody and rhythm, sharing experiences that we can all relate to.
Influenced by strong female voices like Gillian Welch and Allison Krauss, Valerie marries her powerful voice, acoustic guitar and purposeful lyrics to create songs that embody the stories she’s telling.
Valerie released her 11 song solo-album titled “Speckled Moon” in August 2023. She also released two singles, August and Fly, in the beginning of 2023 and both are available on streaming platforms. She is currently performing around the Shenandoah Valley with her band members, October Thomas, Steve Sutton, Joel Kenney, & John Allietta.
Website
Sarah White & The New Band
Born and raised in the two Virginias, Sarah White’s musical style is as familiar as it is hard to define - not quite country, not quite rock, not quite folk - but a little bit like all of the above. A chameleon-like performer with ever changing line-ups, White has grown into a talented songwriter with a sizable body of poignant, catchy, and moving songs.
White started her career in the late 90’s with two albums of mysterious, lo-fi, experimental folk-rock on the popular Jagjaguwar label. Her 1997 debut All My Skies Are Blue, was a collection of 4-track recordings pressed straight to CD. In 2000 she released her first studio album, the stunningly original Bluebird which The San Francisco Bay Guardian described as:
“A delicately bare and pretty album that ensures the singer-songwriter a place in the company of Cat Power’s Chan Marshall and Edith Frost. Yep, that good.”
“Sarah’s music kills me, beautifully from the ground up, no plastic.” — Dave Matthews
Sarah performs solo and with the band and wields a well-worn Jumbo Gibson acoustic. She has performed with Merle Haggard, Justin Townes Earle, Earl Scruggs, Will Oldham, Dave Matthews Band Caravan and was once named Best Songwriter in her hometown of Charlottesville, Va.
Website
The Wilson Springs Hotel
Another genre-defying group whose catalog flows seamlessly through bluegrass country ballads and full blown rock and roll tunes, The Wilson Springs Hotel is one of the best up and coming acts hailing from the state of Virginia at the moment.
With an electrifying live show characterized by heavily improvised jam-heavy instrumentation, each tune from The Wilson Springs Hotel is a sonic adventure you will not want to miss.
“Magnetawan” – The Wilson Springs Hotel
The Milestones
The Milestones were birthed by longtime friends Alex Wandres and CJ Metz in a dingy Baltimore warehouse, where guitars would roar well into the night. As they emerged from that seedy void of a practice space, often as the sun was getting ready to rise, some kind of rugged, raucous, and righteous rock n roll came out with them. Now joined by drummer Devin Ritts and Owen Fuste on bass, the band has refined the rawness of their initial sound and sculpted it into their own brand of infectious indie dance rock, rife with carefully crafted hooks over expansive guitar soundscapes. If you're able to catch them live and witness the charisma that these 4 musicians share while they let loose on stage, you will understand they never lost the explosive energy of those original late night jam sessions - that storm just keeps rollin' on.
Website