One of my first live shows was at Awendaw Green.

SEE NUUMUUN AT AWENDAW GREEN Covering GREGORY ALAN ISAKOV

We are so lucky to have people like Eddie White and Brooks Greer who are willing to go out to support live music.  

Read their story below.

Eddie White & Brooks Geer
A Community Built Around Live Music

Just north of Charleston, tucked beside the Sewee Outpost, something special has been happening for years.

Awendaw Green has grown into one of the Lowcountry's most welcoming homes for original live music—a place where established musicians, touring artists and young performers can share a stage, find an audience and become part of a community.

At the heart of the story is Eddie White.

Eddie helped create Awendaw Green around a simple idea: give musicians a place to play and people a reason to listen. What began as an informal gathering grew into the beloved Wednesday-night Barn Jam, bringing together different genres, generations and musicians from Charleston and beyond.

When zoning issues threatened the original Barn Jam location, Brooks Geer, the Geer family and Sewee Outpost helped give the music a new home. That partnership allowed Awendaw Green to continue growing while maintaining the relaxed outdoor atmosphere that makes it so special.

Today, a night at Awendaw Green feels more like a gathering of friends than a traditional concert. There are picnic tables, trees, food, families, dogs and, most importantly, original music.

Eddie has also helped support musicians far beyond the Barn Jam through festivals, recording projects, production work and events throughout the Charleston area. Along the way, an incredible "volunteer army" of sound engineers, artists, vendors, musicians and music lovers has helped keep the community going.

That's why Awendaw Green is more than a venue.

It's part of Charleston's musical infrastructure.

It gives emerging artists somewhere to begin, touring musicians another place to be heard and audiences the opportunity to discover music they might otherwise never encounter.

Charleston's music scene is built by people willing to create opportunities for others. Eddie White has spent years doing exactly that, while Brooks Geer, the Geer family and Sewee Outpost helped provide the place where that community could flourish.

Thank you, Eddie. Thank you, Brooks and the Geer family. Thank you, Sewee Outpost—and thank you to everyone in the Awendaw Green community who keeps showing up and supporting original live music.

Sometimes building a great music community doesn't require a fancy concert hall.

Sometimes you just need a stage, some open land, people who care—and someone willing to turn the sound on.

Originally founded in 1991 by Carter McMillan and Kevin Wadley, Music Farm helped launch Charleston's modern live music scene. Today, it is operated through a partnership between Frank Productions, Live Nation, and the Charleston Music Hall team. The venue remains famous for introducing audiences to legendary artists before they became household names while continuing to host an exciting mix of rock, hip-hop, indie, comedy, and touring performances

I did a show at the Music Farm  earlier this summer.  It was SO MUCH FUN!!

Music Farm — Charleston’s Legendary Rock Room

Few Charleston venues have played as important a role in the city's modern music history as Music Farm. Since 1991, the Farm has been the kind of room where local musicians, college students, touring bands, and future stars collide—often with audiences standing only a few feet from the stage.

From a musician's idea to a Charleston institution

READ MORE: THE MUSIC FARM

THANKS TO Charles Carmody and NS2

The People Helping Build Charleston's Newest Live-Music Ecosystem

When we go to a concert, most of us see the finished product: the stage lights come on, the band walks out, the crowd gathers and the music begins.

What we don't see are all the people who made that moment possible.

Venue managers. Promoters. Sound and lighting crews. Bartenders. Security teams. Marketing staff. Production crews. Restaurant workers. Artists. Agents. Local partners.

At The Refinery, one of Charleston's newest live-music destinations, bringing all of those pieces together has helped transform a former industrial property on the Upper Peninsula into something much bigger—a growing community built around music, food, art and gathering.

And some of the people helping connect those pieces are the Team at The Refinery.

 Me performing with friends at the Refinery

READ MORE ABOUT THE REFINERY HERE

Thank you!

It is easy to thank the musician standing beneath the lights.

We should.

But occasionally we should also look behind the stage.

Charleston's live-music community exists because people build stages, book artists, run sound, sell tickets, pour drinks, clean venues, promote shows, take financial risks and create places where musicians and audiences can find each other.

Drew Augustine and the Refinery team are helping build one of those places.

And perhaps their most meaningful contribution isn't any single concert.

It's creating another piece of Charleston's musical infrastructure—a place where national artists can visit, local musicians can grow, creative people can meet and the community can gather around music.

A century ago, this property helped fuel Charleston's industrial economy.

Today, it's helping fuel something very different:

Charleston's creative community.

Thank you to Drew Augustine, Lindsay Nevin, The Flyway Companies, the Refinery team, Rob Lamble, Ear For Music, the production crews, hospitality workers, promoters, artists and everyone else behind the scenes who keeps the music playing.

Charleston is a better music town because you're doing the work.

I really enjoyed performing at the Refinery Last Week!!!!

We are so lucky to have Charles Carmody and NS2 dedicated to developing a thriving music ecosystem in Charleston!

• The Visionary: When Carmody took over the Hall in 2012, his first-year goal was to book 20 national acts; he ended up booking 48. By 2024, he scaled operations to host well over 200 events annually. 
• The Local Champion: Despite the venue's shift to a national corporate parent, Carmody has fiercely protected local culture. He champions regional artists, hosts local series like "Charleston LIVE," and supports homegrown talent like Shovels & Rope and Susto. 
• Physical Innovation: It was at Carmody's behest that Frank Productions stepped into full venue operations to fund growth. He helped pioneer structural changes, such as installing a removable seating system on the main floor that increased maximum capacity from 965 seated guests to 1,200 general admission fans

• The Evolution: NS2 began as the exclusive booking agency for the Charleston Music Hall in 2014. In 2020, they stepped up to completely take over day-to-day operations and venue management from the property owner, Bennett Hospitality. 
• National Muscle: The backing of Frank Productions connects Charleston to a massive national network. This industry leverage dramatically increased the venue's ability to pull in premium, major national touring acts, comedians, and artists. 
• The "Venue Ladder" Expansion: To further expand the local footprint, the corporate group took over and reopened the historic local club, the Music Farm, in 2022. This created a multi-tier venue system allowing artists to grow from playing smaller club shows to larger theater crowds in the same market. 

Every week we shine a spotlight on the dedicated people and places that make it possible for artist to share and connect to audiences!  

Every week I want to shine a light on the people and places that support live music.  We are grateful to have them!

Make sure and visit and support them!

Huge thanks to Charles Carmody, Austin Poisson, Brian Sarkin, Whitley Lewis, Mclean Collins, Jimmy Varn, Cameron Boon, Bonnie Woolfe Jones, Dy'Mond Franklin, Cadyn Scott-Owens and the whole team at the Charleston Music Hall for all you do!!!

CHARLESTON MUSIC HALL

Housed inside the beautifully restored 1850 South Carolina Railroad Depot, Charleston Music Hall is one of the city's premier performance venues. While the historic building predates the venue, today's Music Hall is operated by a team dedicated to preserving Charleston's cultural heritage while presenting nationally acclaimed musicians, comedians, and community events. Its intimate theater setting, excellent acoustics, and rich history make every performance memorable.

 

 

Charleston Music Hall — From Railroad Depot to Charleston Listening Room

The Charleston Music Hall is unusual among Charleston's music venues because its story begins nearly 150 years before its first modern concert. The building at 37 John Street has survived the railroad era, the Civil War period, the 1886 Charleston earthquake, decades of industrial use and roughly 60 years of vacancy before being rescued and transformed into a performance hall. Today, it is one of Charleston's most distinctive places to hear music.

READ MORE: THE CHARLESTON MUSIC HALL