Beaucoup Blue | Americana Father and Son Duo

October 2, 2009 | Comments Off

Interview with Beaucoup Blue [16:02m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

From their website:

Beaucoup Blue is the Americana Philadelphia based duo of David and Adrian Mowry. Father and son have been performing their roots-based music nationally and internationally as a duo, quartet and, on occasion, quintet. Bridging many gaps in American music, their soulful traditional and contemporary styles mesh into an innovative and authentic sound. Although blues is a staple in their repertoire, they base their love in music from Folk, Soul, R&B, Jazz, Country and Bluegrass. All these interests and influences come out in their original songwriting in a unique way. A handsome range of instruments like six and twelve string guitars, slide guitar, round neck resonator guitar, combined with two soulful voices, encompasses a rich and honest feel, noticeably influenced by familial ties.

Beaucoup Blue had previously released two albums: Out Of The Woodwork (2003), and Hearts At Home (2005). The long awaited third album, Free To Fall, is produced by Grammy nominated Jim Salamone. The project features a world class rhythm section including Jeff Sheard on drums, Bill Zinno on acoustic upright bass as well as the extraordinary talents of a few friends. A guest appearance by Universal recording artist Melody Gardot, and the Americana Angels of Red Molly contributed their voices to this important work in classic proportion.

Posted by jamie | Filed Under Concerts in Your Home, Bluegrass, Folk, Jazz, MUSICIAN INTERVIEW

Peter Siegel | Radical Roots Music

September 30, 2009 | Comments Off

Interview with Peter Siegel [15:53m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

From his website:

Peter’s music is a melting pot of radical Americana. With roots in the Hudson Valley of New York, Peter was raised on Phil Ochs, lefty Jewish politics, the post 60’s environmental activism of the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, Pete Seeger, the old time square dance scene, Warner Brothers cartoons, Jimi Hendrix, and 70’s and 80’s pop. Put that together in a warm stew and you’ve got the mix that is Peter Siegel’s Radical Roots music.

The story began as a red diaper grandchild was trained by his violinist grandfather classically at the age of 3. From there, piano and classical guitar were corrupted by the 70’s folk scene in New York. Somewhere in between there was an awkward new wave mullet BUT in the last ten years Peter’s work as a singer songwriter, music teacher, kids’ performer composer, and player of roots music and fiddle tunes on a whole mess of stringed instruments has earned him acclaim locally and around the nation.

As a father and activist, thinking and acting locally come first. Traveling’s gotta, and will happen, but staying around home and biking to a gig is even better!

Posted by jamie | Filed Under Pop, Concerts in Your Home, Bluegrass, Comedy, MUSICIAN INTERVIEW, Folk, PODCAST

John Abrams | The Abrams Brothers, Viva La Vida

September 19, 2009 | Comments Off

Dr. Kent: What a great tune, Viva La Vida. Of course, it’s a Cold Play song, and what a version of it, it’s awesome. And I’ve heard that it’s going to be, or already has been, on CMT, and I’m welcoming to the show John from the Abrams Brothers. Welcome to the show.

John Abrams: Hey there, how are you guys?

Dr. Kent: Pretty good. So tell me, tell me about this song, Viva La Vida. I have not heard that before, and it’s pretty exciting. This was on CMT?

John Abrams: It’s going to be coming out on CMT this Monday in the United States, and this coming Saturday in Canada, and it’s a song by Cold Play that was released by those guys. They’re a British rock band. It was released last summer by Cold Play, and we’re certainly big Cold Play fans. So we decided to do a country rock version of the song and put it on the Internet last summer, and stirred up a whole bunch of buzz with CMT and a whole bunch of other people, and we’re really excited about it because it’s a great song. We love to sing it and play it.

Dr. Kent: And the sound is absolutely awesome. It’s driven by a banjo in it. Who’s playing the banjo?

John Abrams: Oh, that’s Brandon Green. He actually, he played banjo with us last year and he’s a fantastic musician, and he recorded the part with us when we did the single last summer.

Dr. Kent: That’s wonderful, and tell me about this, the core of this group, of course, you’re the Abrams Brothers, and a cousin. Are you guys all still together then, in the group?

John Abrams: Yeah, yeah. James and I are the brothers, he’s 16 and I’m 18 and we grew up playing bluegrass music, and we certainly love that. That’s our accord, and also gospel music, we have a lot of reaching gospel. But this is actually a very, as you can probably already tell, it’s a very family oriented thing. We’re actually the fourth generation playing roots and gospel music in our family, on the road actually, the fourth generation on the road. So that’s a pretty exciting tradition to carry on. And we’re joined by our cousin Eli on the bass and our family travels with us on the road. Our grandparents, they help drive the bus and cook and clean and cut our hair and run the merchandise table, and we have a great thing going, we’re really excited about it.

Dr. Kent: So they must be all pretty pumped that this thing is happening on CMT on Monday?

John Abrams: Yeah, it’s really exciting. We’re just really glad that we can bring our roots and bluegrass music and take it into a contemporary setting and have it recognized by other people in the industry, and also the fans and people who listen to it. They’re, they seem to be relating to it, and we really appreciate our generation latching onto a great tradition, but just kind of packaged in a newer way.

Dr. Kent: So tell me about the three of you. Who does what?

John Abrams: Well I’m John Abrams, I’m 18, I play, I play acoustic guitar and electric guitar and also I do a lot of the lead vocals, and some harmony singing. My brother James plays a lot of fiddle, a little bit of guitar, and he’s a 16 year old, and he does a lot of the singing as well And then we’re also turned by our cousin Elijah, he’s 18 and he plays the electric and upright bass. And we have a drummer. Ethan Myers, and a banjo player whose name is Nick Picianini, and that’s pretty much everyone that goes out. We’re also joined by our producer, Chris Brown. He produced the album Blue on Brown that we put out a little over a year ago. He plays keys with us on the road sometimes. So we kind of have a, I guess you could say a bluegrass, rock, country group that goes out together, and that creates the Abrams Brothers style.

Dr. Kent: And I wanted to play a song here, if you want to wait on the line, because the album Blue on Brown was what drew me to you in the first place. I’m a huge Arlo Guthrie fan, as you guys obviously are as well. This is an album of Dylan and Arlo Guthrie. Tell me about that album, Blue on Brown.

John Abrams: Yeah, we’re just, we’re really excited to be able to record a whole bunch of great material, great songwriting material. Both of them are fantastic writers. And we originally were just going to do a whole bunch of bluegrass versions of their songs, but two years ago now, a little over two years ago we met our producer Chris Brown, and he produced the Mild Man Tribute To Steve Goodman album, actually, for the Goodman family. And of course the song City of New Orleans is on that. We recorded the song by Steve Goodman, City of New Orleans, which certainly was an Arlo Guthrie hit as well. And we met Chris because of our mutual affection for the song, and he lives just near where we live, on Molt lsland, just off of Kingston, Ontario, which is our home town. And we connected with him, and ever since we’ve been making music together. So that’s kind of the story of Blue on Brown album, but all those are great songs, and we’re really excited to be able to perform them and carry them on in the Abrams Brothers way for a generation that might not have been exposed to them.

Dr. Kent: Well, if you want to hang on the line, I’d love to listen to the whole track of City of New Orleans. It’s about five minutes, so you could probably go and have a snack and then brush your teeth and come back, but we’re all excited to listen to City of New Orleans, where it all started with this album Blue on Brown. Here we go.

(music)

Dr. Kent: That’s a great tune, it’s called City of New Orleans. Of course, that’s a famous tune by Steve Goodman that was covered first by Arlo Guthrie, and this is a version that was recorded by the Abrams Brothers. The label is UFO Music, United For Opportunity is the name of the label, and it is their work that they did with all sorts of amazing musicians. And Arlo Guthrie, who most famously said that, “They’re too young to sound that good,” and we’re going to get John back on the line, John Abrams, and that’ll take just a second for that. And then we’re going to listen to another track from the album, which will be called Gotta Serve Somebody. The album is, of course, both Dylan songs and Arlo Guthrie songs, and the album’s called Blue on Brown. We’re having a little bit of technical difficulties, hold on just one minute. And do I have John on the line?

John Abrams: Hello? I’m here.

Dr. Kent: Hey there, John, how are you doing?

John Abrams: Good, how are you guys?

Dr. Kent: We lost you for a second there, that’s our fault.

John Abrams: Hey, yeah.

Dr. Kent: But we listened to the whole track of the City of New Orleans. Great tune. Not the easiest song to play the first time you pick it up.

John Abrams: Sure, there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of chords in that one, but we wanted to learn it exactly how, really, we listened to Arlo Guthrie’s version cause of course it was our tribute to Arlo Guthrie, but you know, it’s just, it’s one of those timeless songs, one of those memorable songs. It doesn’t matter which generation listens to it, as long as you bring it into that new generation in context. This is just one of those timeless songs, and I just, I really think a timeless song the way it’s written, the way the melody is, is a timeless song (inaudible) for years and years.

Dr. Kent: How do you compare these Bob Dylan and Arlo Guthrie songs to, you know, Cold Play? Do you guys just pick up on great music and say, “Let’s try this one?”

John Abrams: I’m sorry?

Dr. Kent: Do you just pick up on any kind of music and say, “Hey guys, let’s try this one,” like the, you know you played the Cold Play song at the beginning, Viva La Vida. These are Dylan songs and Arlo Guthrie songs. What won’t you guys try?

John Abrams: Oh yeah, no, that’s a great question. We like to try all kinds of different styles of music and different songs from different genres. And to us it’s all about taking a song and the writing and what was done before and bringing it into our sound, in the Abrams Brother’s music. And that’s certainly that combination of bluegrass and the contemporary styles, like rock and country. So yeah, the Viva La Vida song, the City of New Orleans song, these are less covered than us doing our own version of the song that’s already been (inaudible). Actually, the Viva La Vida song didn’t become a hit on our album of all original material, but we’re working on that now, songs that we’ve (inaudible). So we’re excited about that conversation.

Dr. Kent: That is fun, yeah, and there’s nothing better than kicking it off with a CMT appearance, that’s on Monday. So folks should check out on CMT and see if they can see the Abrams Brothers. Otherwise, you know, there’s a lot of places people can find out about you. Where can folks go online?

John Abrams: Yeah, you can go on www.abramsbrothers.com and we’re also on Facebook, MySpace, I think on Twitter now, yeah, I know we’re on Twitter now, and YouTube, and we like to update those all the time and try to keep in contact with everybody. So yeah, and eventually it will be up, the brand new website will be up in the next couple of days with the base for video and we’re really excited about that. So you can check us out again at www.theabramsbrothers.com.

Dr. Kent: And how about, what’s your take, I mean, it was a horrible day yesterday for music. You know, I grew up hearing Michael Jackson. What your take on the passing of the King of op?

John Abrams: Yeah, I mean, you know, I haven’t been watching the news a whole lot at all, but just, I’m hearing about his passing last night. I mean, he had incredible talent, and it’s a real loss because he was a, left a legacy of fantastic song, memorial songs and good music. So yeah, he will definitely be missed around the world, yeah I think we’re all pretty sad.

Dr. Kent: Well, it’s been a pleasure speaking to John Abrams, the Abrams Brothers on a ride, a ride to the top, I think. They’ve got a great sound and some amazing tunes, I can’t wait to hear their new album with original tunes. The sound on Viva La Vida is amazing, and we’re going to listen going out to another song from their Blue on Brown album. It’s called Gotta Serve Somebody, of course, Bob Dylan song. And than you so much for chatting with me, John.

John Abrams: Thank you so much. It’s been a real pleasure, and hope you enjoyed the songs.

Dr. Kent: And everybody tune in on CMT on Monday, and see if they can find the Abrams Brothers.

You have a great day.

Dr. Kent: You too. Now let’s listen to Gotta Serve Somebody by the Abrams Brothers. Here it is.

Posted by admin | Filed Under Pop, Bluegrass, TRANSCRIPTS, Folk, MUSICIAN INTERVIEW

Jessica Lovell | The Lovell Sisters

September 10, 2009 | Comments Off

Interview with Jessica Lovell [21:56m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

There is a word often used when describing rising Americana stars The Lovell Sisters: Passion. It’s what these three young women—Jessica (23), Megan (20) and Rebecca (18)—feel when they step on stage to perform. Passion is the fuel that feeds their writing and arranging, and it colors every note they play and sing on Time To Grow, their forthcoming new album.

Time To Grow features five original songs, including two award-winners; the title track, “Time To Grow,” is a finalist in the 2008 International Songwriting Competition, and “Distance,” a Grand Prize Winner in the 2008 John Lennon Songwriting Contest. Rebecca was prompted to write “Time To Grow,” a colorful description of life on the road, after her discovery of the finger-style guitar playing of Kelly Joe Phelps. When asked about the story behind “Distance,” Rebecca says the chords and melody came in a flash while the lyrics took months to refine.

As their audience grows, it diversifies, too. “We were exposed to a broad spectrum of genres growing up and now draw from a wide variety of musical influences,” says Rebecca. “We try not to limit ourselves. We listen to everything.” When Megan seeks inspiration for her dobro playing, she is just as apt to turn to the work of electric guitar greats like Derek Trucks and Mark Knopfler as any of her acknowledged predecessors and peers in country or bluegrass.

With Time To Grow, The Lovell Sisters share their passion for music with their fans, with their colleagues, and especially with each other. “All three of us have different personalities, different strengths and weaknesses,” concludes Megan. “But we take care of each other, and our various strengths help lift each other up. As sisters, we’re very much on the same wave length and I think people can really see that in the way we interact on stage.”

Posted by admin | Filed Under Pop, Bluegrass, Folk, MUSICIAN INTERVIEW, PODCAST

Darol Anger | Fiddle Virtuoso

September 5, 2009 | Comments Off

Dr. Kent: Now, my next guest on the show is Darol Anger, he’s known as one of the best fiddlers in the country for a long time now He was a member of the Turtle Island String Quartet, an amazing group of musicians. They cross over from classical music to folk music to all sorts of things. We’re going to listen to one song from him called Love On Three Levels, and after that we’ll talk to him live.

(music)

Dr. Kent: What a beautiful song from Darol Anger. That song is called Love on Three Levels. And now I have Darol live on the show. Welcome to the show.

Darol Anger: All right, I’m glad to be here.

Dr. Kent: Tell us about that tune, Love on Three Levels.

Darol Anger: Yeah, well, it was dedicated to somebody who I was with at the time, and we had a place that actually had three levels, so I decided to write a tune that had three sections, and had a lot of three-type rhythms. I decided to throw every three I could in.

Dr. Kent: You have such an amazing background, you know, when you started talking about numbers there, so many of the tunes that you’ve done and that the Turtle Island String Quartet, of course, and all these projects you’ve done have crazy rhythms and this and that, but they all sound beautiful or crazy fast, and this and that. And it’s only when someone tries to go and play it that they realize how difficult some of that stuff is.

Darol Anger: You must be a musician then, huh?

Dr. Kent: Yes, indeed. Yes. I wouldn’t even try to… But how’d you get your start with doing some of the more I guess crazy stuff? There’s straight time fiddle playing, and you’re certainly great at that, but how did you get into some of the more difficult stuff?

Darol Anger: Well you know, I grew up at a time when the Beatles were very popular. In fact, I got into music because of the Beatles. So that kind of ruined me for any kind of traditional, period, supposedly pure kind of music style, I think. Just growing up in that kind of aesthetic. And I’ve just always been interested in stuff that was interesting to me, you know. I’m just interested in a lot of things. I love all kinds of music, and to me it doesn’t seem that weird. I just try to make it so that it’s beautiful, you know, that you can listen to it without having to worry about how it’s all constructed, but if you really want to get in there, if you want to get into it, you can.

Dr. Kent: And you’ve played with some people that would make most fiddle players just absolutely drool. From legendary Stephane Grappelli to Mark O’Connor and Bela Fleck and then of course Vassar Clements who passed away a couple years ago.

Darol Anger: Yeah. it’s been an incredible education.

Dr. Kent: The violin is such a tiny little instrument, but it can do so many different things.

Darol Anger: It’s one of the most flexible instruments that is made. You can see it’s spread to all parts of the world, you know, just about every culture. Even the East Indians use the violin in their music now, it’s amazing. Something that was invented basically 400 years ago in Italy has spread all over the world. That sort of tells the story right there about how flexible and how you can just pretty much do anything with it. I love it. And I have been really, incredibly luck to play with all these people. I guess David Grisman and Tony Rice really were the guys that really taught me the most at first about music and playing music and stuff like that. Playing in David’s band was incredible, and he was very generous with his knowledge. He kind of stuck with me when I was struggling, cause I wasn’t that great a player when I first got on with him, and he had faith in me and let me develop at my own pace, which was as fast as I possibly could, but it still seemed like forever, trying to get up to those guys’ level. And who knows if I even am yet, but it’s been an amazing, amazing trip. I feel incredibly lucky and I was just in the right place at the right time.

Dr. Kent: And what’s so interesting about David Grisman’s groups and those is that they can pick extremely fast on some crazy tunes, but he and a lot of that generation of players, they can really do melodies, you know, they can slow it down and play the tune.

Darol Anger: Oh yeah, that’s been such an important thing for me. And that’s something you aren’t necessarily going to get at first. I think many young players are kind of in a stage where they’re just adding stuff and I think it’s a necessary stage, you know, that people just instrumentally try to do more, and just add to their repertoire, and it’s not necessarily, the time, to focus in on the essence, the melody. I guess I’m kind of in a place where I’m starting to carve away at everything that doesn’t sound like me in my playing. It’s an interesting time where I’m actually working on eliminating stuff, rather than adding. I might go through another period of adding, you know. I certainly just recently have been really interested in Swedish and Scandinavian string band music. There’s this group called Vasen, great, amazing Scandinavian players. And that seems like I’m going to be adding a lot of stuff there, you know, but right now I’m just carving away, trying to get at the melody.

Dr. Kent: What projects are you working on right now?

Darol Anger: Well, I’m in Berkeley, California and I’m going to be playing a couple shows at the original Fillmore auditorium with the Yonder Mountain String Band tonight and tomorrow night. I’m really looking forward to that. Those guys are just some really great people. They’re very creative, exciting musicians, and it’s going to be fun. For some reason they seem to just love me, and I’m happy to be part of their world. That’s good, I’m just kind of sitting in with them. And then next week I’m going to be teaching at a fiddle camp in Big Sur, California. That’s south of Monterey, down on the coast there, and it’s going to be a beautiful place. I’m going to be working with the great Irish fiddle player Liz Carroll and Bruce Molsky, and the Clarridges, I don’t know if you’re familiar with Tristan Clarridge, six-time Grand National fiddle champion who plays cello with Crooked Still.

Dr. Kent: Oh, I have heard that. Yep, I’ve heard him play. And Liz Carroll is an extraordinary player, she played with, what’s the name of that group, Solas, was it?

Darol Anger: She had possibly played in Solas for a short time. Liz is actually one of the few fiddle players who I get scared to take my fiddle out of the case around her. She’s amazing, you know. But I’m used to being a little scared.

Dr. Kent: It’s funny that yeah, it would be fun to watch all the fiddle envy going on backstage between all the fiddle players.

Darol Anger: Oh, yeah.

Dr. Kent: No, but I think you’re all underpaid enough that you all respect each other, right?

Darol Anger: Oh, we love each other, you know. It’s just such a different, difficult instrument. I always like to say that there’s this imaginary nation of string players. We’re all kind of go through the same thing, we’re just trying to struggle to play this instrument, it’s very unforgiving and you know, we’re a community of people whose imaginary boundaries are scattered through and beyond all the other imaginary boundaries that people make up. We’re very aware of how difficult it is to do this, and are mostly really supportive and very admiring of each other’s work. Liz of course is just one of the nicest people you’d ever want to meet. And I’m actually really looking forward to getting over my fear this week, this next week, just to learn some Irish fiddle playing from her. She’s just so terrific, and she’s got a new record out with John Doyle, the guitar player.

Dr. Kent: Oh, he’s the one that makes me put my guitar back in the case.

Darol Anger: Yeah, those two together are just like a meltdown, you just think the whole world’s going to just come alive and start playing and spinning.

Dr. Kent: Exactly. Well, your music is very much admired, and I’m a huge fan of the Turtle Island String Quartet.

Darol Anger: Well, thanks.

Dr. Kent: As a classical composer, actually, that was one of my earliest introductions to some crazy harmonies.

Darol Anger: That’s great. Um, you mean, Jazz harmonies, right?

Dr. Kent: Do you still do anything with that group?

Darol Anger: You know, I see those guys a lot. I left the group, let’s see, we started the TISQ in 1985 and I left the group in ’96. But they’re still going, with two of the original members, and they’re just doing better than ever. I think the group is just amazing. So it’s exciting to have helped start something that’s become sort of an institution, you know. Or to have started something that seems to go by itself. I guess it’s something that the world needed, and now it’s continuing.

Dr. Kent: Well, it’s been such an honor chatting with you, and we’re going to listen to one tune on the way out here called Overture From the Acadian Suite. Talk about that for a second, and then…

Darol Anger: Oh yeah. That was inspired by my friend Michael Doucet, who has the group BeauSoleil. Michael is sort of a closet jazz fiddle player, and he’s quite the amazing guy in general. He came to me with some music that he got from a documentary that was made in the 30’s, which was all drawn from this amazing Cajun source material that was some of the first field tapes to be made in Louisiana. And it was turned into this movie score by Virgil Thompson. So there’s this amazing score for this movie, called The Louisiana Story, all based on Cajun music. Michael wanted to sort of turn it back into a piece that The Fiddlers Four could play. So there are two layers of digestion here that are required, you know.
So I did that, and then I wound up doing music for a documentary about that same movie. Michael did the voice-over narration soundtrack for it. So I wound up kind of adapting all that stuff, and now it’s just into another phase, it’s been through a whole cow’s stomach kind of thing. And it’s actually genuinely something really nice, so I’m kind of working on that for string orchestra, I want to develop that into something and maybe Michael and I will do solos on that, so it’s a project.

Dr. Kent: Well very cool, I’ll be psyched to listen to that with everybody else here, and I really appreciate you talking to us.

Darol Anger: Well it’s a pleasure, yeah, I hope you guys are having nice weather out there. Of course in California it’s always the same. It’s pretty fun. All right…

Dr. Kent: It’s creeping towards summer here, very slowly.

Darol Anger: All right, that’s good. We like that part.

Dr. Kent: So we can find out a lot more about Darol Anger on his website, http://www.darolanger.com, and there’s a ton of stuff on there including where he’s going to be appearing, and all his recordings and samples and all sorts of good stuff. Thank you for chatting with us today.

Darol Anger: Hey, well, it’s my pleasure. Thank you so much.

Dr. Kent: And we’re going to listen to that track I was telling you about called Overture from the Acadian Suites, he just told us about that, let’s listen to it.

(music)

Dr. Kent: That was a beautiful tune by Darol Anger, and we’ll see you next week. Pick up a good book, and we’ll talk to you next time.

Posted by admin | Filed Under TRANSCRIPTS, Bluegrass, Folk, Classical, MUSICIAN INTERVIEW, Jazz, PODCAST

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