Matt Lorenz’s vision, manifested in The Suitcase Junket, exists in the thrilling tension between the grand and the solitary. A true master of showmanship and musical invention, Lorenz performs alone what it would normally take a full five-piece band to accomplish. What instruments he requires, he builds entirely from scratch and salvaged materials.

While audiences at this year’s Rhythm and Roots Festival will be captivated by his visual spectacle, Lorenz is most serious about the songs. Homesteading in rural Western Massachusetts, his mind is crowded with wild characters, narratives, and sounds as varied as mountain throat singers and roadhouse jukeboxes. His acclaimed 2020 album, The End is New—produced by Steve Berlin of Los Lobos—perfectly captures his self-described “doom-folk” sound. It is a heavy, cinematic mix of hope, desperation, and brilliant lyrical observation.

Growing up in Cavendish, Vermont, Lorenz studied music and adaptive instrument design in college before cutting his teeth as a street performer in Barcelona, where he learned to truly project his voice. Upon returning to the US, he launched The Suitcase Junket with a discarded guitar and an antique suitcase refurbished into a bass drum. The name is a nod to his love of collecting old luggage and the definition of a junket as a “pleasure excursion.” Get ready for an unforgettable excursion of your own this Labor Day Weekend.