When Falmouth resident and musician Lily Rapoza returned to her hometown last year, she longed for the music community she had found at college in Tennessee. So, she decided to create it right here on Cape Cod.
It's called Songbird Collective, and it provides opportunities for local songwriters to showcase their work. CAI's Gilda Geist spoke with Rapoza to learn more about it.
Gilda Geist How did you come up with the idea to start Songbird Collective?
Lily Rapoza I grew up in Falmouth, and I went to college at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. I went for songwriting and audio engineering, and then I came back last year to Falmouth. I noticed that there was a stark difference in the music scene between Falmouth and "Music City"—Nashville, Tennessee. It was quite shocking to me, because I had gotten so used to being in a place where there was music everywhere, and I had gotten so used to being in a place where songwriters had avenues of expressing themselves. And I came back home, and I didn't see any songwriting situation anywhere. I didn't see any outlet for songwriters.
We don't really have a venue here in Falmouth. We have bars that are set up with some sound equipment, but it's not what I would call a venue because it's more about the drinking than it is about the music. And there's definitely places for that, there's places for playing music and drinking and having fun, but I was looking for more of a listening room. There are so many of those in Nashville and there aren't any here. And so, I had an idea to create something kind of inspired by Sofar Sounds, Tiny Desk Concerts, the Bluebird Cafe, which is pretty famous for discovering Taylor Swift. The first couple of shows were just me and whoever I knew that could play guitar and sing. And then as it started to kind of take off, people reached out to me and there were friends of friends who were musicians that wanted to play. I started getting people from Instagram and people in the audience had family members or friends who were songwriters or played. Now, I hardly even really have to go looking on my own for people to play, which is really, really nice.
GG Can you take us through what Songbird Collective looks like right now?
LR We're holding two shows a month right now. We're doing the second Thursday of every month at the Daily Brew Coffeehouse and Lounge in North Falmouth. And we are doing the last Saturday of every month at Coffee Obsession's Falmouth location. The shows are set up in two different ways. At the Falmouth Coffee O location, we have three songwriters playing 30-minute sets of their original music. The show is about two hours with breaks included, and we also have drinks to sell, and we have merchandise to look at, and so it's a whole event—but the music is the main focus.
There's a different set up for Daily Brew. We just had our first show, and it was a huge success. We sold, like, 88 tickets. It's set up in a writers' round Nashville style. So, we have three songwriters up on stage at the same time, and each of the songwriters goes through playing one of their songs, and then they start from the beginning again. We do that for about 40 minutes, and then we have a small break, and then we do it for another 40 minutes.
We pay songwriters based on ticket sales, and then I also have Venmo QR code tip jars that serve also as cash tip jars for them. They're also welcome to bring their merch and set it up. We also hire a photographer to come and take high quality, incredible, wonderful, edited pictures. And then we also have this video production team that is taking videos of their performances and uploading it and promoting it.
GG When did you start this? This is like the first year of it, right?
LR Yes, so I would say probably around this time last year I had my first show. So it's been a whole year of Songbird Collective and it's been a totally wild ride. It's just been so fun. I've made so many connections and friends from it. And the whole point of Songbird Collective is to build a community and to build a listening community, and I feel like I've done that, which is pretty awesome.
The next Songbird Collective show is at 6 p.m. on Saturday, August 30 at Coffee Obsession in Falmouth. You can find Songbird Collective on Instagram @itssongbirdcollective or on Facebook.
