Ten Years of Bringing Folk Legends to Southern Maine!

Profile by Bob McKillop

Shawn Henderson is a folk music lightning rod.  He puts himself out there in the folk music storm, attracts the positively charged, electrified energy that is shooting around that environment, and brings it down to earth for the rest of us to enjoy.  He passes that energy on, and takes for himself only the excitement and lingering warmth of the transmission.  He is one of the many people, without whom, the folk community would not exist in the robust condition that it does.

The success of the Kennebunk Coffeehouse, which Shawn manages and promotes, is based on a simple but highly effective strategy.  When I asked him to describe his initial approach to promoting the venue when he took on the job, Shawn recalled that he said to himself, “I’ll just try to put on shows that I like, and hopefully everyone else will like them too.”

That has worked out pretty well – for a long time now, the shows that Shawn likes have filled the First Parish Unitarian Universalist Church on Main Street in Kennebunk with folk fans every second Saturday of the month, from September to June.   Shawn is very excited about this, his tenth season, which will include Greg Greenway (September 13), Pierce Pettis (October 11), and a special double bill with Edie Carey and Meg Hutchinson (November 8).  Shows later in the winter and through the spring include Christopher Williams, Ronny Cox, Scott Ainslie, and Brooks Williams.

Shawn also hosts a Friday afternoon radio show, “Stay Tuned” on WSCA 106.1 FM, Portsmouth Community Radio, in Portsmouth, NH.  The show airs from 2 to 5 PM, and has featured, among others, Peter Mulvey and Kris Delmhorst, Eliza Gilkison, Jonathan Edwards, Ellis Paul, and John Gorka.  In the coming weeks, guests include Grammy Award winner, Ed Gerhard (August 22), and Tracy Grammer (October 10).

Shawn is a tall, good-looking man, totally bald, with a deeply resonate voice (perfect for radio), a great sense of humor, and a gentle, kind disposition.  He is able to put his guests totally at ease and let their true personalities emerge, both on stage at the Kennebunk Coffeehouse, and on the “Stay Tuned” radio show.  His easy-going and self-confident demeanor allows you to feel comfortable being exactly who you are.

Below, Peter Mulvey and Kris Delmhorst in the WSCA studio for Shawn's radio show, "Stay Tuned".

Born and raised in southern New Hampshire, Shawn moved to Kennebunk as a young man, to make his living as a tradesman, and has lived there ever since.   He describes his relationship with music in this way:  “I’ve always been a music fan. It was probably an escape, as a kid, and it has always made me feel better.  I try to play the guitar, but I wasn’t ever very good.  When I started the coffee house, my desire to play the guitar waned; running the venue, I found that I was still creating music, but I was a lot better at promoting than I was at playing the guitar.  I said to myself, ‘this is much better; people are going to smile hearing this, as opposed to what they do when they hear me play!’”

The Kennebunk Coffeehouse had been operating as a church function at the First Parish Church prior to Shawn’s involvement.  His former wife was the secretary of the church, and he would attend concerts there with her from time to time.  The job of running and promoting the coffeehouse series opened up, and  knowing Shawn’s love of music, his former wife urged him to take over the job.  Shawn met with the church leadership, convinced them to give him free rein regarding the operation of the venue, and along with a lot of help from Dale Robin Lockman (of Mom’s Home Cookin’), started booking artists.  His first show was a sell-out (Cormac McCarthy, of Berwick, Maine), and the venue has been successful every season since that first one.

For Shawn, promoting the venue was always about generating excitement. “Excitement breeds excitement – the venue just bred excitement throughout Kennebunk. It really was crazy, that first year, I think, I’m not sure we sold out every show, but it was pretty cool!”

Persistence, a strong belief in what he was doing, and a willingness to take chances and book the best talent, are the strategies that Shawn has employed in making the coffeehouse a success.  He set some goals for himself for booking some of his favorite artists. Those artists and their management took a wait-and-see attitude toward the Kennebunk Coffeehouse at first, but Shawn eventually won them over. “I had a wish list when I first started of three people – John Gorka was number one on the list, then Ellis Paul, and Lucy Kaplansky – those were the top three; I said if I could get those three to come, then I’ll be happy, I figured I was doing something right.”  Paul was the first of his “dream team” to appear at the coffeehouse, then Kaplansky, and finally John Gorka performed.  Gorka has been back several times; Shawn considers him a friend, and he will be performing for the 10th anniversary show this season.

He took some chances that more experienced venue promoters might have found too risky.  He laughs about the time he booked Richie Havens.  “Of course I didn’t know any better.  I contacted his agent, and it was a ton of money they were asking.  I wasn’t really sure - We had no money in the bank, but I really wanted him to come.  So I agreed to the money, and I was just so scared, because I kept thinking, if this fails, I’m going to jail because the money’s coming out of my pocket, and I’ve got no money in my pocket! – But fortunately, the show didn’t fail and it was great!”

As do most folk promoters who know the score, Shawn credits his crew of volunteers for the success the coffeehouse has enjoyed.  “It would be impossible to continue without them,” he says.  He is especially grateful to Mark Nesvig, who has skippered the soundboard at the coffeehouse for most of the ten years Shawn has run the venue. 

“We had Cliff Eberhardt come”, Shawn told me, “He was very gracious, and he said ‘you know what, you’ll never get Gorka to come play here unless you improve the sound system’.  I said to myself, we gotta do something!  I basically prayed – ‘alright, God you gotta help me out here..’, and it was weird, the next month this guy came up and introduced himself, and said, ‘If you ever need any help, let me know’.. and I said, have you ever run sound?  And he said ‘Yeah, been doing that for about thirty years’, and I said, let’s talk!”  Mark’s skill at the soundboard, and the top-notch equipment that Shawn has brought into the venue, have contributed to the great reputation that the venue enjoys among national and regional touring folk musicians.  Mark Erelli has this to say about Shawn and the Kennebunk Coffeehouse:

“Shawn is one of the most ardent and knowledgeable of folk music supporters in New England, and in a field as crowded as it is, that is saying a lot.  He first brought me to Kennebunk to open for Roger McGuinn, treated me royally like a headliner, got me in front of a big audience, and I was hooked.  Five years later, I still look forward each time I get to return for his series.”

Shawn is one of the people to whom the folk scene owes a great deal of gratitude.  He holds down a job and has a life that is full of the normal demands of modern existence.  Yet he devotes all the time he can to promoting folk music and folk artists, through the Kennebunk Coffeehouse and his “Stay Tuned” radio show on WSCA.  And through it all, he manages to remain the down-to-earth, friendly, giving person that he is.  He wants very little in return for his efforts: Just to be able to see and hear some great music, to be involved in bringing that music to the public, and to make his life more full and enjoyable in the process.

I encourage you to take a good look at the upcoming season for the Kennebunk Coffeehouse (click HERE to go to the website, see the schedule, and buy tickets!)  Make plans to catch a show or two.  You are sure to witness some wonderful live, original music, and you’ll be supporting one of the best-run and most successful folk venues in the country – and, you’ll be supporting Shawn Henderson; I can’t think of a single person who deserves that more than he does.