Tom Pirozzoli figures that during his peak decade and a half as a troubador, he sang and played guitar at 200 or more shows a year.
And even with a steady stream of recording sessions on top of the tours, he somehow found time to sit at a workbench or an easel at his home base near Mount Sunapee.
“My wife was convinced I’d burn out,” Pirozzoli recalled last week, during a telephone interview from his house in Goshen. “I’d restore antiques during the day, jump in the truck to go to a gig. On my nights off, I’d paint.”
Nowadays, Pirozzoli, who will turn 66 this month, is balancing his artistic output, with more of a focus on capturing on canvas, in a style he describes as “contemporary impressionism,” the scenery, the agricultural bounty, the people and the light around northern New England.
That leaves him time to play closer to 35 to 45 shows a year, among them one or two appearances a month at the Canoe Club in Hanover, plus weddings and other private parties with fellow guitarist Gerry Putnam. He also helps book the Thursday-night folk shows that have brought performers such as John Gorka, Cheryl Wheeler, Vance Gilbert and Richie Havens to the Flying Goose Brew Pub & Grille in New London.
And occasionally, Pirozzoli achieves a harmonic convergence, such as his concert Friday night with Meriden guitarist Kit Creeger at the Harbor House Livery in Sunapee Harbor, where he’s also joining two other visual artists in opening an exhibit of their works.
“It’s a big deal for me to do this,” Pirozzoli said.
The yen to mine both veins of creativity goes back to his undergraduate days at Fairfield University in Connecticut, in the early 1970s. One day Pirozzoli attended an outdoor art show to see the paintings of a friend, looked around at some of the other works and thought, “Hey: I can do this.”
By the mid-1970s, Pirozzoli was busking and selling his paintings around Boston and Cambridge, and later playing gigs at coffeehouses and at anti-nuclear rallies around and New England.
After moving to New Hampshire in 1977 and working a variety of jobs that included running lifts at the Sunapee ski resort, Pirozzoli found the music taking precedence. From the mid-1980s through most of the ’90s, he was recording studio albums — he’s up to eight now — touring as the opening act for the likes of Doc Watson, Greg Brown and Jesse Winchester and collaborating with fellow guitarists such as Willy Porter.
Finally, about 10 years ago, a friend talked Pirozzoli into painting more with oils, and started selling them for him. The first to find a buyer was of what he calls “a folk-y barn.” His more recent work has evolved toward scenes ranging from the old train depot in Chester, Vt., and barns in places like Windsor to still lifes of vegetables and fruit and candids of coffee-shop waitresses and farmers market customers. He pays close attention to the quality of light.
“It’s taken a while, but it all came down to doing the work and sticking to it,” Pirozzoli said. “It’s the old 1 percent inspiration, 99 percent perspiration.”
He also figures, after traveling around the world as far as Tibet, that it helps to live in a place where audiences appreciate and support both of his passions, while he gets around in a Toyota pickup with crank windows.
“I’m counting my blessings to still be able to go out and do this,” Pirozzoli said. “I’ve been self-unemployed for the last 40 years, and I’ve done pretty well.”
Tom Pirozzoli and Kit Creeger perform at the Harbor House Livery in Sunapee Harbor on Friday night at 7, during a concert that also serves as an opening for an exhibit of Pirozzoli’s paintings and the photographs of Ken Schuster and the paintings of Vicki Koron. Admission is $15. To learn more, visit pirozzoli.com or sunapeecoffeehouse.org.
The Quebecois roots trio De Temps Antan plays a free concert on the green in Hanover tonight at 5:30. For an hour before the show, the band will set the rhythm for a demonstration of Quebecois dance overseen by Revels North artistic director Nils Fredlund.
This evening at 5:30, folk singer-songwriter Ashley Storrow leads cellist April Reed-Cox and singer-banjoist-mandolin player Putnam Smith onto the green in Woodstock for Pentangle Arts’ final summer brown bag concert.
Blues master Taj Mahal leads bassist Bill Rich and drummer Kester Smith into the Flying Monkey Performance Center in Plymouth, N.H., tonight at 7:30. For tickets ($55 to $65) and more information, visit flyingmonkeynh.com or call 603-536-2551.
With six string musicians playing Vivaldi, The Farm to Ballet Project dances in celebration of the rural seasons on Saturday night at the Billings Farm and Museum in Woodstock. The doors open at 5:30. For advance tickets ($15 for ages 13 and older, with additional donations welcome) and more information, stop by the farm or visit billingsfarm.org or flynntix.org.
The current incarnations of The Platters and The Drifters headline the third annual Ottauquechee Musicfest on Saturday night at the Quechee Club’s ski area off River Road. The Josh Logan Band opens at 6 and the Motown supergroups take the stage around 7:15. After the last encore, there will be a fireworks display. To reserve tickets ($25 for members of the Quechee Club, $30 for non-members, $10 for students), pre-order picnic baskets or learn more, visit quecheeclub.com/summer-music-series or call 802-295-9356.
The Boston-based Modernistics tap-dance to jazz standards, bebop and more, Saturday night at 7 at West Claremont Center for the Arts. Admission is by donation. For more info, call 603-738-0022.
Opening its 25th summer in residence at Dartmouth College’s Hopkins Center, the New York Theatre Workshop this Saturday presents two works-in-progress.
At 4 in the afternoon, Becca Blackwell performs They, Themself and Schmerm, a timely rumination on the writer-actor’s life and transgender evolution. And at 7:30 Saturday night, workshop performers stage Nigerian writer Mfoniso Udofia’s Her Portmanteau at the Warner Bentley Theater in Hanover.
For tickets ($6.50 to $13) and more information, including plays that the workshop will perform on Aug. 13 and 20, visit hop.dartmouth.edu or call 603-646-2422.
At 6:30 Wednesday night at the Ben Mere Bandstand overlooking Sunapee Harbor, saxophonist Greg Abate plays jazz with singer-keyboardist Bill Wightman, percussionist Tim Gilmore and tenor sax master Matt Langley.
The six acrobatic showmen of Circus Zambia perform on the Norwich Green at 3 p.m. on Aug. 13. For more information about the ensemble and its efforts to develop a circus school for young slum-dwellers from their native Lusaka, Zambia, visit facebook.com/circuszambia.
The Cirque Us! troupe, whose Circus Smirkus alumni include Liam Gundlach, of Thetford, and Sam Gurwitt, of Norwich, wraps its 2016 summer tour at Northern Stage’s Barrette Center for the Arts in White River Junction, with performances of the theme of “One Man’s Trash” at 2 this afternoon and 7 tonight. Admission is $20 at the door; to check for ticket availability, call 802-296-7000.
The New London Barn Playhouse wraps its production of The 39 Steps, Patrick Barlow’s adaptation of the John Buchan mystery novel and the Alfred Hitchcock movie, with performances tonight at 7:30, Friday afternoon at 3, Friday and Saturday nights at 7:30 and Sunday afternoon at 5. For tickets ($20 to $29) and more information, visit nlbarn.org or call 603-526-6710.
Opera North shifts into high gear over the coming week with performances at Lebanon Opera House of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita (tonight and Saturday night at 7:30, Wednesday afternoon at 2), Puccini’s Tosca (Friday and Tuesday nights at 7:30, Sunday afternoon at 5) and Donizetti’s Daughter of the Regiment (Saturday afternoon at 2, Wednesday night at 7:30). To reserve tickets and learn more, visit operanorth.org.
BarnArts Summer Youth Theater’s 2016 troupe stages an adaptation of Disney’s Alice In Wonderland Jr. at Barnard Town Hall on Friday and Saturday nights at 7 and on Saturday and Sunday afternoons at 2. For tickets ($8 to $12) and more information, visit barnarts.org or call 802-234-1645.
With accompaniment from the Aeolus Quartet on Friday night at 7:30 in Randolph’s Chandler Music Hall, soprano Mary Bonhag and baritone Matthew Patrick Morris perform the East Coast premiere of Vermont composer Evan Premo’s chamber opera The Diaries of Adam and Eve, an adaptation of the Mark Twain book. Admission is by donation. For more information, call 802-728-6464.
The Claremont Opera House’s Repertory Theater Company opens its second season this weekend with performances of Grease, the musical homage to 1950s suburban culture, on Friday and Saturday nights at 7. Admission is $10 at the door.
Singer-songwriter Tim Gurshwin serenades the Lebanon Farmers Market on Colburn Park this afternoon between 4 and 7.
With Pomfret native Tristan Henderson on mandolin, the Pete’s Posse ensemble performs old-timey music during the Feast and Field Farmers Market in Barnard tonight from 5:30 to 7:30.
The Renegade Groove plays funk, soul and rock at Colburn Park in Lebanon tonight at 7.
On the theme of “In an English Garden,” mezzo soprano Paula Rockwell sings works of Purcell, Handel, Barber and Quilter and selections from musical theater, tonight at 7:30 in the First Baptist Church of New London. For tickets ($5 to $25), call 603-526-8234, or visit summermusicassociates.com.
Singer-guitarist David Greenfield spans decades and genres during a free concert Friday night from 5 to 7, at the Barrette Center for the Arts in downtown White River Junction.
ToasT plays a free concert of funky soul on the Norwich Green Friday night between 6 and 8.
The Tammy Jackson Band plays a set of country on the Newport Town Common on Sunday night at 6.
Still More Cats rocks Colburn Park in Lebanon on Monday night at 7.
The Lyme Town Band performs on the common in Fairlee on Tuesday night at 6:30. The concert is a fundraiser for the Fairlee Community Church of Christ, which will pass around a collection plate for donations.
The Moonlighters play big-band rhythms at the Quechee Green on Wednesday night at 6:30.
Wednesday night at 7:30 at the Congregational Church in Norwich, a teen ensemble from the Village Harmony program performs songs from South Africa, the Balkans, the nation of Georgia, the American shape-note canon and the Renaissance. Admission is $5 to $15. For more information, visit villageharmony.org.
The Flames play music of the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s for the dance that the Thetford Historical Society is hosting on Saturday night at the East Thetford Pavilion. Jenn Gerber and Phil Ciotti will lead a lesson in swing dance at 6:30, and the Flames will perform from 7 to 9. Admission is by donation.
Bluesman Arthur James performs at the Boho Cafe in downtown White River Junction tonight between 7 and 10, followed Friday night at 7 by The Ya Dads.
Brian Warren and Mike Gareau appear at Bentley’s restaurant in Woodstock tonight at 8.
Singer-songwriter Durg performs with guitarist Mike Stockburg in the tavern at Jesse’s in Hanover on Friday night starting at 5.
Pianist Gillian Joy commands the keyboard at the Canoe Club in Hanover on Friday night at 6:30. Following her to the microphone with shows between 6:30 and 9:30 over the coming week are pianist Keith Bush on Saturday, pianist Peter Kaplan on Sunday, mystery guitarist Idrdeef on Tuesday and guitarists Ed Eastridge and Rachel Fickes on Wednesday.
Royalton singer-songwriter Alison “AliT” Turner appears at the Inn at Weathersfield in Perkinsville Friday night at 7, and joins Soulfix at the Lake Morey Resort in Fairlee on Saturday night at 8:30. Turner also collaborates with Michael Parker at Crossroads Bar and Grille in South Royalton on Tuesday night at 6.
Saxophonist Peter Concilio leads drummer Tim Gilmore, keyboardist Bruce Sklar and tenor- and soprano-saxophonist Scott Mullett into Skunk Hollow Tavern in Hartland Four Corners for a set of jazz, on Friday night starting at 8.
∎Eight Feet Tall pulls into Windsor Station to play a set of reggae and hip-hop on Saturday night at 10, and Mike Parker and Jason Cann join forces to rock the house on Tuesday night at 6.
Jim Yeager presides over an open-mic from 7 to 10 tonight at the Boho Cafe in downtown White River Junction.
Ramunto’s Brick & Brew Pizza in Bridgewater hosts an open mic starting at 7:30 p.m. on Thursdays. Participants get a free large cheese pizza.
String players of all ages and abilities are welcome at the weekly acoustic jam session at South Royalton’s BALE Commons on Friday night from 6:30 to 10.
Joe Stallsmith leads a weekly hootenanny of Americana, folk and bluegrass at Salt hill Pub in Hanover on Monday nights at 6.
Bradford’s Colatina Exit holds an open mic on Tuesdays at 8 p.m.
The Seven Barrel Brewery in West Lebanon runs an open mic on Tuesday nights at 8.
Jim Yeager hosts an open mic at Hartland’s Skunk Hollow Tavern, at 8:30 on Wednesday nights.
David Corriveau can be reached at dcorriveau@vnews.comand at 603-727-3304.