Harris Center For The Arts Presents Rock Icon Melissa Ethridge This March

Harris Center will present an evening with rock music icon Melissa Etheridge on Monday, March 18, at 7:30pm.

NOTE: This event is sold out. The Harris Center encourages patrons to purchase their tickets early for all remaining 2023-2024 season events. Harris Center Members receive early access to purchase tickets before the general public.

Melissa Etheridge stormed onto the American rock scene in 1988 with the release of her critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, which led to an appearance on the 1989 Grammy Awards show. For several years, her popularity grew around such memorable originals as "Bring Me Some Water," "No Souvenirs," and "Ain't It Heavy," for which she won a Grammy in 1992. Etheridge hit her commercial and artistic stride with her fourth album, Yes I Am (1993). The collection featured the massive hits, "I'm the Only One" and "Come to My Window," a searing song of longing that brought Etheridge her second Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Performance. In 1995, Etheridge issued her highest charting album, Your Little Secret, which was distinguished by the hit single, "I Want to Come Over." Her astounding success that year led to Etheridge receiving the Songwriter of the Year honor at the ASCAP Pop Awards in 1996.

Known for her confessional lyrics and raspy, smoky vocals, Etheridge has remained one of America's favorite female singers for more than two decades. In February 2007, Melissa Etheridge celebrated a career milestone with a victory in the "Best Song" category at the Academy Awards for "I Need to Wake Up," written for the Al Gore documentary on global warming, An Inconvenient Truth. As a performer and songwriter, Etheridge has shown herself to be an artist who has never allowed "inconvenient truths" to keep her down. Earlier in her recording career, Etheridge acknowledged her sexual orientation when it was considered less than prudent to do so. In October 2004, Etheridge was diagnosed with breast cancer, a health battle that, with her typical tenacity, she won. Despite losing her hair from chemotherapy, Etheridge appeared on the 2005 Grammy telecast to sing "Piece of My Heart" in tribute to Janis Joplin. By doing so she gave hope to many women afflicted with the disease.

On October 7, 2016, Melissa Etheridge released Memphis Rock & Soul, her first album since 2014's critically lauded This Is M.E. Recorded at Royal Studios in Memphis, the album received stellar reviews from the likes of Entertainment Weekly, Parade, Rolling Stone, American Songwriter, and more. She followed that up with the release of The Medicine Show in April, 2019. For The Medicine Show, Melissa reunited with celebrated producer John Shanks and sounds as rousing as ever, bringing a new level of artistry to her 15th studio recording. The Medicine Show deals with universal themes of renewal, reconciliation, reckoning, compassion, and, most profoundly, healing.

In June of 2020, Etheridge launched her own live streaming subscription and single ticket concert platform, Etheridge TV, and did over 200 live streams in 2020.

On September 17, 2021, Melissa released a new album called One Way Out. The 9-track album is a collection of songs Etheridge wrote in the late '80s and early '90s that never made the cut…. until then! The time was finally right, and fans finally got a deeper glimpse into who Melissa was then.

October 2022 saw Melissa's return to the theatre with her one woman show, My Window — A Journey Through Life. The critically acclaimed, sold-out run premiered at New York's New World Stages on October 13, and opened at Circle In the Square Theatre on Broadway in September 2023.

On September 5, 2023, Etheridge also released her memoir Talking to My Angels (HarperCollins), which debuted at #9 on the New York Times Bestseller list.

Individual tickets: This event is SOLD OUT.

About Harris Center for the Arts

Long envisioned as a critically important element for Folsom Lake College, the visual and performing arts center was initially conceived as a facility to instruct, develop, and guide talented students to become actors, musicians, dancers, visual artists, and behind-the-curtain technicians. The scope and size of the Center expanded significantly with a 2003 feasibility study which validated the need for a facility that could also serve as a regional arts center for the greater community.

In 2004, the project proposal approved by the Los Rios Board of Trustees was submitted to the California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office for final funding approval in the 2005-06 budget year. Construction of the $50 million project began in July 2008, supported by a State Educational Facilities General Obligation Bond, Local Measure A Bond, other District resources, and donations to the Folsom Lake College Foundation.

In February, 2011, the Center opened as "Three Stages at Folsom Lake College" and by the end of its second full season it had already attracted over 300,000 patrons to its offerings. In August, 2012, the Los Rios District Board of Directors announced the renaming of the facility to the "Harris Center for the Arts," honoring Chancellor Emeritus Brice Harris who, during his tenure, oversaw a doubling of the size of the District, including the development of Folsom Lake College. He, together with then President of the College Thelma Scott-Skillman, was perhaps most responsible for seeing the vision of a Regional Performing Arts Center for the community realized.

The 80,000-square-foot center includes three stages and is located at Folsom Lake College. Before Covid-19, it hosted more than 400 events per year. The venue, initially called Three Stages at Folsom Lake College, opened in 2011. It temporarily closed in July 2020, as the pandemic disrupted entertainment venues nationwide.

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