Deb Talan & Wes Shirley LIVE at the Cedar Rapids Songwriter Series

About this event

The CR Songwriter Series connects songwriters and their songs with audiences in intimate settings.

Although songs are at the heart of every musical performance, it is often the songs that get lost in the hustle and bustle of clubs and bars. We hope to create a space where songs and the stories they tell are front and center, creating a connection between the songwriter and the audience that often gets missed in louder places.

Doors at 7pm - Music 7:30pm

BYOB

All Ages

Pay At the Door or On-line

General Admission - Limited Seating

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Deb Talan has been writing songs since she was 14 years old. Granted, her style has changed a bit since writing the forever-unknown smash-hit “Through the Window” about feeling numb, like life was going on somewhere out there but not accessible to her (at 14. so jaded.) She played clarinet, wrote songs on piano, later taught herself to play guitar in college, got obsessed with Shawn Colvin, was a vegetarian for 4 years, ended that with a hot dog and a swim in Lake Michigan, started a band in Portland, Oregon with her friend Mark, named it Hummingfish, wrote a lot of fun songs that people danced to ‘til they were all sweaty in that hipster/grungy/geeky Northwest kind of way.

Then, moved back to the east coast 6 years and a divorce later and began playing solo in Boston coffee houses (read: 4 different Starbucks that she also poured espresso at) opened shows for Catie Curtis (a songwriter hero of hers) met up with Steve Tannen and formed The Weepies, played shows all over the country and the world, toured in a real tourbus!

She moved to LA, got married to Steve, made 5 records and 3 amazing boy-children together with him, had songs placed in loads of movies and tv shows, moved to Iowa, got breast cancer, got chemotherapy and relied heavily on marijuana for pain and nausea relief (Legalize, for gods’ sakes, can we grow up as a country, please?) recovered from breast cancer, made a solo album, struggled with mental health issues (Childhood Incest Survivor, music has helped, and so have many blessed healers) and relationship issues for 6 years, got divorced from Steve.

She has a lot she could say these days. She prefers to listen. But playing songs for people is a close second. Music heals. Songs can be prayers.

Find out more debtalan.com

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Wes Shirley has been making music of some sort or another for 30 years, and is currently the songwriter, singer, and multi-instrumentalist for the Cedar Rapids, Iowa based band The Poor Poor Rich. Working from a foundation of American roots music, flourishes of Waitsian weirdness, gypsy punk and indie rock influences work their way into Wes’s music. Since 2025, he has also been producing The Cedar Rapids Songwriter Series, which connects singer/songwriters with audiences in intimate performance spaces, and which has brought some of Iowa’s best songwriters together with small, but appreciative, audiences.

Find him in the local project Poor Poor Rich, along with Rich Wagor on bass, Ben Schmidt on lead guitar and keyboards, Jonathan Welch on fiddle, and Wyatt Forster on drums. thepoorpoorrich.com