Editorial: When Life Gives You Music, Appreciate the Unexpected

What started as a night listening to a band at a café turned into seeing a solo artist with a back-up band at a vineyard.

Yes, my travels are taking me far and long this summer. On Friday, July 8, I went to Harrisburg in hopes of seeing a band at a local Harrisburg café. The journey started out planning to see the other band, and upon arrival I find out that the event time was changed without notification on media. I take full blame because I should have double-checked the time sooner, but needless to say, plans changed from here.

Luckily, I had a back-up plan and the time for this gig did not change, as opposed to the other band. However, when my sister, my traveling companion and camera woman for the day, and I arrived at Spring Gate Vineyard where the artist’s website said the show would be, we were very confused when we did not see said performer.

Spring Gate Vineyard was packed and even had a live singer playing when we first arrived. Thinking it was an opening act, we decided to stick around to see if the person performing after was the other artist I planned to see. We were surprised when half an hour after the opening act a full band started setting up. The act we were expecting simply had a guitar for his gigs from media pictures.

Naivety sunk in and we just figured maybe these people were setting up for him, and maybe this singer actually did have a band for occasional gigs. We were soon brought to light when singer Taylor Perry started playing.

As it turns out, the back-up gig we planned on going to was instead down the road from where we were. In the meantime, since I still had not heard back from the second performer to confirm the venue, we decided to stick around for a bit so we could hear just what Taylor Perry was made of.

Perry did not disappoint. Perry mentioned how she tried out for The Voice but never made the cut to the live shows, and I honestly don’t see why. As my sister put, “She’s definitely better than a lot of artists I’ve seen on that show,” and I can’t help but agree.

Perry performed mostly covers, but she also performed some of her own songs as well. Her voice is a reminiscent version of Kelsea Ballerini and 2007-2011 Taylor Swift. In other words, Perry’s voice is definitely made for the country genre. She even performed a cover of Ballerini’s song “Peter Pan.” However, Perry also mixed it up by performing a cover of “Ain’t it Fun” by Paramore, which definitely brought up the music atmosphere and shows that Perry is not afraid to cover multiple genres.

I was not able to get an interview with Perry as we had to leave after about half of her set due to the long day and commute back home, but my night was definitely made great by being able to see her perform. It was a beautiful night with the scenery and the way the stage was set up for the performance. My sister also got a wine slushie that she enjoyed, and I grabbed a red velvet cupcake from Lancaster Cupcake, one of the few vendors there, so the Vineyard itself has a lot to offer on Friday nights.

So the night ended up turning into seeing an artist I never planned on originally seeing. I thought I would reflect on this experience because it is the first time that two different events did not end up working out for a story. Perhaps I will cover one or both bands I planned on seeing in the future, though.