Rufus Wainwright Brings Baroque Pop to Pine Plains August 1
Wainwright returns August 1 for a rare, intimate show at the Stissing Center to support Dutchess County democratic candidates.
Rufus Wainwrite
When Rufus Wainwright sings “Going to a Town,” it’s usually a lament for a republic gone sideways. On August 1, he’ll aim those velvet pipes at Pine Plains, turning the Stissing Center into the liveliest caucus this side of Iowa while raising cash for the Dutchess County Democrats. Call it baroque pop meets ballot-box boosterism.
Wainwright has been crossing borders—geographic and stylistic—since birth. Rhinebeck-born and Montreal-reared, he released his lush, self-titled debut at 24 and has spent the last quarter-century proving that Tin Pan Alley isn’t dead, it’s just wearing better mascara. Ten studio records later, he’s still swerving. Folkocracy (2023) found him harmonizing with everyone from John Legend to Brandi Carlile, recasting traditional ballads as Technicolor mini-epics
His appetite for grand gestures doesn’t stop at folk rehabs. "Prima Donna," his Paris-set diva opera, bowed in 2009; "Hadrian," a four-act gay love story starring a Roman emperor with relationship issues, stormed the Canadian Opera Company in 2018.
Most recently he unveiled "Dream Requiem," a choral blockbuster that ropes in Byron’s apocalyptic poem “Darkness” and Meryl Streep’s silken narration, prompting critics to utter the words “Verdi” and “Wainwright” in the same breath without blushing.
Between classical detours, Wainwright moonlights with pop royalty—Elton John, Miley Cyrus, David Byrne, Paul Simon, and a small army of others—proving that his elastic tenor fits as snugly around a Cole Porter standard as it does a Disney soundtrack. And then there’s his Judy Garland fixation: Rufus Does Judy at Carnegie Hall earned a nod and confirmed that no one milks melodrama quite like a Wainwright in a tux.
Expect Pine Plains to get the full jukebox: bruised torch songs from Poses, sardonic anthems like “Going to a Town,” maybe a cheeky Judy medley, and—if the mood strikes—an aria sneaked in between Dylan covers. Add the civic-minded kicker that every ticket sold fortifies down-ballot campaigns, and you’ve got a night where duty and pleasure share the same chair.
