Tag: Chris Thile

For Chris Thile, Instrumental Music Excels in the Cracks of Language (2 of 2)

Posted on by Editor

Chris Thile has always woven religious references into his songwriting, but never so much as on Laysongs. Recorded in solitude in an old church with just a mandolin and a sound engineer, the new album offers lyrics that question our impulses and references that span the Bible (“Ecclesiastes”), Hungarian composers (a take on Bartok’s “Sonata for Solo Violin, Sz. 117: IV. Presto”), and bluegrass legends (a cover of Hazel Dickens’ “Won’t You Come and Sing for Me”) in service of a higher truth.

Here, in the second installment of a two-part interview, BGS catches up with Thile about co-producing an album with his wife, finding inspiration in good wine, and why great instrumental music should emulate a warm dinner conversation.

Read the first half of the BGS Artist of the Month interview with Chris Thile here.

BGS: Your wife, [actress Claire Coffee], co-produced this album with you. What did that lend to the final product, and how did it influence the process?

Thile: Pretty much since we met, she’s graciously been my unofficial editor. It was high time to just formalize that. [Laughs] When you’re doing something like this — a pure solo record, no overdubs, absolutely nothing between me and your ears — it really helps to have someone involved who is absolutely 100 percent unimpressed with you. She has heard every one of my tricks and can see straight through them, can hear straight through them.

As an actor and someone who’s made a lot of film and television, Claire cuts straight to the chase: “Is this meaning something? Does one and one equal two here? Are we starting somewhere and ending somewhere — and how is the ride between those two points? Are we engaged? Is this clear enough, and does it ever get too painfully clear? Are we leading the witness, are we telling people the punchline before we give them the setup?” I can really gild the lily when left to my own devices. Musically, I can sort of be the guy in the theatre, like, elbowing you — like I’ve seen it six times and I’m like, oh, you’re going to love this part! And so Claire, I think, is so good at being like, “Hey. Don’t do that.” [Laughs]

And perhaps, also, letting you know when it’s warranted.

Right. Sometimes I won’t pull the trigger on what would be a really interesting decision because I’m worried that I’m just swinging too hard. I sort of gingerly put the idea of doing the fourth movement of Bartok solo violin sonata. Thinking, well, this is kind of a bridge too far. I sent it to Claire like, “What if I learned this on the mandolin?” and she was like, “Absolutely. Do that. That’s gonna be amazing.” Which was just so shocking to me! I thought I had probably lost my mind. [Laughs]

It was also her idea to put it after “Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth.” I mean, I feel like everyone thinks they’re gonna get a big ol’ chance to exhale after “Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth,” and instead… I mean, think of it like these Peloton instructors: You think, “Surely, surely this is it. Surely this is the hardest I’m gonna have to go.” And they’re like, GIVE ME FIVE MORE ON YOUR RESISTANCE!!

I feel like it’s that kind of move, going from “Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth” to the fourth movement of the Bartok sonata. It’s as if the demon in “Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth” just took my mandolin from me. But that’s the kind of perspective someone who loves you—but isn’t taking any of your shit—can help you with, especially someone who also has a deep and wide skill set that is compatible with mine. It was so fun to work with her on that.

You’ve always got multiple projects going. Is there anything you learned specifically from performing in groups and making music in that atmosphere that you feel gave you an advantage when you set out to record an album alone?

The accountability — the musical accountability, artistic accountability — that you feel in a collaborative context is noticeably absent in a solo context, so you need to pick up the slack there. You need to start roleplaying those people in your life who hold you artistically accountable. Thank God I had Claire involved in this project, but on the deep I-dotting and T-crossings that you encounter at every step along the way of the record-making process, I would also assume the role of an Edgar Meyer or Gabe Witcher or a Sara Watkins. I’d tease out a little fake conversation between myself and them, all by myself in the practice room. “In what way am I not being clear enough right now? In what way am I being self-indulgent right now?”

There are so many things that you learn from the people around you. But there are also things that you can learn in the silent retreat of making music solo. There are things that I can take back to each of those projects — things I can take back to Punch Brothers, or Nickel Creek, or the Goat Rodeo Sessions — that I think could be illuminative in those contexts.

Do you enjoy talking about religion outside of your art?

People have such strong feelings about religion. You wanna bust open a conversation, bring up God — like, in a real way. People are gonna quit mincing words and they’re gonna start talking about shit. I love that. I really love talking to people about that kind of stuff, from wherever they are. I find it endlessly instructive in my own journey. I find someone’s total disinterest in it just as interesting as total interest in it. If I bring up God and you’re like, “I don’t wanna talk about that shit, come on,” then I love you for that. Let’s go with that. Let’s talk about that.

And if I bring up God and you’re like, “Ugh, you know what? I was just praying about that this morning, I feel like the Lord brought you to me,” I’m in. Let’s go there. Why do you feel that way? Let’s go there. At this point, I have no reservations about bringing up God. It’s always been an instinct of mine to infuse whatever I’m thinking about with a little of that kind of imagery and language and thought, and so this was cathartic for me to just turn all the taps on and let it run.

You push beyond your own religious upbringing, too — you also included a song, “Dionysus,” named for the Greek god of grapes and wine. What inspired you to write about that figure?

I’m always looking for encouragement, as a human being, about human beings. We see a lot of evidence of our failings right now, and I want to see evidence of our success. Wine — the existence of good wine — is evidence of our success as a species. That is a beautiful relationship with the earth. We have occasionally exploited that relationship, but the best wine comes from the healthiest relationship with the soil. The best winemakers have this beautiful balance of science and mysticism. It sounds silly, but I find the whole thing very inspiring.

Ecclesiastes 2:24 seems like it’s along those lines, too: “Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God.” Why express that instrumentally rather than through lyrics?

Think about the last great dinner that you had with friends. Could you really, with words, describe to me why it was so great? Could you say, “And then we talked about this” or “Next, we gossiped about that”? When you walk me through that, or when I walk you through the last dinner I had, it’s gonna sound trite. And yet, there was something holy about it, you know? Maybe there was a new person that you sat next to, and you got a little light into a different corner of life that night. But could you say with words what that was? I don’t think you could, necessarily, say what can be so transcendent and transportive about a great dinner with friends. That’s where instrumental music excels — in the cracks of language. What language is incapable of properly expressing, instrumental music steps up and says, “I got this.”

Photos: Josh Goleman

Chris Thile Considers His Community and Christian Upbringing in ‘Laysongs’ (1 of 2)

Posted on by Editor

For a while, Chris Thile might have been the busiest man in bluegrass. The former public radio host has snagged four Grammy awards and a prestigious MacArthur “Genius Grant,” all the while maintaining his status as a founding member of Punch Brothers, the Goat Rodeo Sessions, and Nickel Creek, collaborating with plenty of other Americana firebrands along the way. But on his latest album, Laysongs, Thile slowed down.

A solo album in the truest sense — it’s just Thile and a mandolin, after all — the album was recorded by engineer Jody Elff at Future-Past, a studio housed in an old church in Hudson, New York. The setting was a perfect match for the religion-influenced album, which ranges from the biblical passages of Thile’s Christian upbringing to mythological ideas about gods and gathering from the Greeks and the Romans. Below, in the first of a two-part interview, BGS caught up with Thile about recording the new album, finding inspiration in memories from his adolescence, and the dearly missed joy of a packed concert hall.

BGS: You recorded this album in a church in upstate New York. What did that atmosphere lend to the album, whether purely sonically to the recording or more generally as inspiration?

Thile: That was such a stroke of luck in a time that felt like it was a little thin on luck overall. [Laughs] We were weathering the earlier stages of the pandemic in Hudson, New York, and someone told me about a church right in the middle of town that had been converted into a studio. I went and checked it out and played a few notes in there and absolutely loved it. It’s not the most awe-inspiring church, but there were stain-glassed windows and very odd paintings that all brought me right back to my childhood.

I never attended a grand, elegant church growing up. This was still a beautiful church, but it was helpful that it wasn’t, y’know, St. Patrick’s in downtown New York — that it had a whole lot of that whole human-beings-just-trying-to-do-the-best-with-what-they-have kind of a vibe. Getting to be there was really helpful in terms of getting into character for the songs that I was recording. So much of the record comes from solitude… Actually, the solitude of the pandemic felt a lot like the solitude of spending one’s adolescence in a church pew.

What do you mean by that?

I spent so much of my adolescent time in church wondering if I was the only person there who was doubting the existence of God, or who couldn’t not think about how attractive the girl two pews over was. “Wait, I’m going to hell now probably, right?” Or, “Wait, is there hell? What is going on?” The pandemic thrust me and a lot of other people that I know back into that sort of lonesome, existential monologue: “Has every single choice I’ve made up to this point been wrong, perhaps?”

The sort of strange dialogue that we have with ourselves late at night started reminding me of those weird dialogues I would have with myself in church. I could well imagine at 16 years old sitting in this pew at Christian Community Church in Kentucky. I could well imagine there was a little angel and devil on my shoulder kind of duking it out. The centerpiece of the record, “Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth” is very much a grown-up version of that feeling—but you know, also, how grown-up, really? I’m 40 now, and so much of the time, this felt like a rebirth right back into adolescence, smack in the middle of the most awkward period of our lives.

I loved being in that church for all those reasons. It was so easy to put myself in the headspace I was in when I had written the lyrics or when I discovered the power of those songs that I didn’t write that are on the record. It just lent a certain weight to those performances.

Why did it feel like the right time to approach religion specifically here? Was there anything you felt you had to tread carefully around?

If there’s a silver lining of this whole incredibly disorienting and distressing affair, it’s the chance to gain a little context: to have been forced to take a massive step back and to take a look at our lives, whether we wanted to or not. One of the things I saw, in the midst of missing the community that I’d inserted myself into, was that community often ends up acting in ways that are similar to my experience of organized religion.

How so?

A lot of people who grow up with religion and veer away from it at a certain point are veering away from what they — what we — perceive to be a poisonous exclusivity, or habitual exclusionism. I think that’s one of the main turn-offs for my generation on organized religion. You start meeting people who aren’t welcome in the flock, and you start wondering why. Having taken a step back, I see the same kind of exclusionary behavior in my current community. If you take a look at your own community, it’s probably full of people who think a lot like you do, and who feel very similar to the way that you do about whatever’s going on right now, and who live in a very similar way. I worry that we, as human beings, are trading one messed-up thing for another messed-up thing.

I adore community. I love it so, so much. For instance, the Telluride Bluegrass Festival: I feel like those are the high holy days of my acoustic music-making community, and to be deprived of them is so painful. You feel cast adrift, untethered. I can’t wait to get back and I’ll never take that for granted again. But I also want to go back there with my eyes wide open as to whom I have habitually not welcomed into that community. What barriers am I being a part of unknowingly placing between people and that community that I love so much? And what harm is that doing that community?

Tell me about how that harm appears on the record.

There’s a lot in the record about coming together, but there’s also a lot in the record about our compulsive need to compare ourselves favorably to other people. In an effort to feel better about ourselves, we look for someone to feel better than. That’s what “Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth” is about. I took a look at this thing that had been a big deal for me in my adolescence, The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, and I was wondering: What would those demons be up to with me, right now? They would be preying on this compulsive desire to feel good about myself. One of the easiest, dirtiest ways to feel better about yourself is by looking at someone else and going, “Well, I’m better than that guy.”

In “Laysong,” the lyrics mention “drown[ing] out the enemy.” It made me wonder what it is that you consider the enemy — maybe it’s this comparison trap, maybe not — and how you drown it out.

When I wrote that lyric, the enemy was he or they that would talk loudest regardless of whether they had the best idea. “I’m gonna say whatever I have to say louder than anyone is saying anything else, and therefore it will be all that’s heard, and the discussion will be on my terms.” That felt like the enemy. And at that moment, in that lyric, I had to write it. It fit with the shape of the melody. The idea of drowning out the enemy — I couldn’t shake it, even though it’s not what I believe to be right. [Laughs] Hopefully you can get a sense of that in the performance, that it’s coming from an angry and not altogether balanced place. In that moment, I was pursuing the idea of drowning out the enemy with beauty, with restructuring, with anything, really. Let’s get a love song, let’s get a hard-times song, anything but a song about the front page of the newspaper.

The record starts there and ends with the Hazel Dickens song, “Won’t you come and sing for me.” When I get back into the concert hall, there’s no way I’m not ending my solo set with that song, the performance is going to be sincere—especially at the end of all this solitary music-making. [Laughs] But “Laysong” is very much like an altar call for the record. “Here’s what we’re gonna discuss.” Who knows where we’re gonna come out? I know that when I listen to a record, there’s a collaboration that starts there. I would love to imagine that happens when people listen to my records, too—that it starts a conversation. I can’t wait to feel that in the concert hall. No piece of music is done until you [the audience] hear it. And I am so dearly looking forward to that completion of this little bit of work.

Editor’s Note: Read the second half of the BGS Artist of the Month interview with Chris Thile.

Photos: Josh Goleman

Artist of the Month: Chris Thile

Posted on by Editor

Chris Thile found solace during the pandemic in a church — more specifically, a remodeled one that now houses Future-Past recording studio in Hudson, New York, where he and his family were temporarily living in the summer of 2020. “I went in there to look at the space and instantly felt so at home,” Thile said upon announcing his new album, Laysongs. “I loved the amount of sound around the sound. I had two sonic collaborators on this record: the tremendous engineer Jody Elff and that church.”

With a suggestion from Nonesuch Records’ Chairman Emeritus Bob Hurwitz to make a record that was both spiritual and a snapshot of the pandemic, Thile decided to pursue the idea, putting together six originals and three covers with only his voice and his mandolin. In April, he introduced the project with the lead single, “Laysong.” As he noted, “It is a lifelong obsession of mine, even post-Christianity, what the impact of that kind of devotion to any organized religion is.”

Laysongs offers the three-part “Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth,” which was inspired by C.S. Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters; a song Thile wrote about Dionysus; a performance of the fourth movement of Béla Bartók’s Sonata for Solo Violin; “God Is Alive, Magic Is Afoot” based on Buffy Sainte-Marie’s adaptation of a Leonard Cohen poem; a cover of bluegrass legend Hazel Dickens’ “Won’t You Come and Sing for Me;” and an original instrumental loosely modeled after the Prelude from J.S. Bach’s Partita for Solo Violin in E Major. Thile’s wife, actor Claire Coffee, serves as co-producer.

It’s the latest creative endeavor from the MacArthur Fellow, whose exceptional career spans far beyond his solo work. From Nickel Creek and Punch Brothers to a pair of Goat Rodeo albums and the much-missed Live From Here series, Thile remains one of acoustic music’s most visible figures. You can read part one of our Artist of the Month interview here. Read part two here. Meanwhile, enjoy our BGS Essentials playlist, a tip-of-the-iceberg hint at the remarkable breadth of this masterful musician.

Photo credit: Josh Goleman

WATCH: Nickel Creek Return to “Helena” for Their Livecreek Experience

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Of all the good news that has come out of 2021 so far, none might be sweeter than the news that Nickel Creek has been re-joining forces to write and perform music again. On the final two Sundays of February, the band hosted two livestream concert events called “Nickel Stream: A Livecreek Experience” via Mandolin.com.

Not missing a step or forgetting a lyric, the trio’s performances were immaculate and reminded audiences why Nickel Creek is a special band. In this video of “Helena,” they exercise the signature spice that has always marked their music, taking their listeners on a journey that grows and evolves until its frenzied end. Sara and Sean Watkins together with Chris Thile effortlessly create beautiful, entrancing music, no matter the context and to hear fresh renditions of some of Nickel Creek’s beloved material is welcome anytime here at BGS.

 

Sara Watkins Finds a Dreamy Rhythm With ‘Under the Pepper Tree’

Posted on by Amy Reitnouer

The Schinus molle — more commonly known as the California pepper tree — can grow up to 45 feet high and 50 feet wide, producing small yellow flowers and rose-colored berries, and bringing shade to everything within reach. For Nickel Creek originator Sara Watkins, the pepper tree brings about memories of family, youthful fun, and inspiration for her latest record, Under the Pepper Tree. Produced by Tyler Chester, the 15-song album is a personal project for Watkins, including songs from her own childhood alongside a few original compositions. Reuniting Nickel Creek, I’m With Her, and a range of guest performances, she tackles favorite songs such as “Pure Imagination” (from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory) and “Blue Shadows on the Trail” (from The Three Amigos).

BGS caught up with Watkins from her California home to talk about the inspirations behind Under the Pepper Tree, and the experience of making a record like this during the COVID-19 pandemic.

BGS: Was the making of this album a different experience from those you’ve done in the past?

Watkins: Yeah, and not just because we did it during COVID. That was a huge appeal in working with Tyler Chester — he can play so many instruments so well. His musicality comes out on each instrument really well. Other than that, I knew early on that it would be necessary for the songs to weave together. As I was collecting these songs, realizing that so many of them are kind of dreamy and mellow, I wasn’t dealing with the typical balance of “up” songs, “down” songs, “sad” songs, “happy” songs, the way those things can affect the sequence of a normal album. Because of the nature of this material, a lot of the songs had a similar dreamy quality, so I thought by connecting them all, that would let the album kind of drift along, and hopefully sweep you up in a way that might not happen if they were all just 15 individual tracks. 

Before going in to record the project, we did a bit of a practice swing, just to see how the sequence might work together. We made some changes to the sequence and adjusted the transitions accordingly, so that everything went together as well as possible. This is the first time I’ve sequenced an album before going in to record, and I really enjoyed the result and how it affected the process throughout. It’s definitely something I’m going to bring with me into my future projects, even if I don’t do it exactly the same way. I’m going to consider it very seriously before starting records. 

How did getting to be home during the pandemic influence your day to day, and outlook on this album?

If affected it completely. I don’t think I would have made this record without the experience of just being home, and realizing that I needed some kind of rhythm, needed something that would tell me that today was passing. I’m new to being home, the way that all musicians are. That, combined with having a toddler now, was a new experience. The first couple years of being a mom I was on tour, and the rhythm of tour life is built into the work, the way that most people’s jobs provide a rhythm for their life. I think a lot of [musicians] were discovering that we needed to create those rhythms, by taking morning or evening walks around the neighborhood, by spending more time making meals or cooking, or doing whatever it is that helps cycle you in to the next part of the day. 

I was digging through my old record collection, and I would listen to five a day, and decide whether or not I wanted to keep them or whether I was done with them. A big part of me creating Under the Pepper Tree with vinyl in mind was because of this wonderful freedom that it gave me to put on a record and not have to make a choice for a while. I could just listen to it and not have to worry what song came up in the algorithm next, or decide whether or not I wanted to skip ahead. That freedom of just making one choice and being able to go about the rest of the things that I needed to do, it felt really liberating, like a kindness that I could do to myself. 

That also played into why I wanted to make this album with record listening in mind. It works great on digital too, but I imagined it being an A and B side. If you only listen to side A, you can get a full arc and it can send you into dreamland. And if you want to listen to it altogether, that’s another experience. 

Like with Nickel Creek on “Blue Shadows on the Trail,” were any specific guests important to certain songs?

“Tumbling Tumbleweeds” with Aoife [O’Donovan] and [Sarah] Jarosz, my I’m With Her bandmates, was just as important, because I really wanted both of those bands on this record. I feel like this album in a lot of ways celebrates this time in my life, and the music that I grew up with. For me also, it was an incredible way to get those two bands together on an album, because they’re both so meaningful to me, and have played such huge roles in my life, and in my growth and development as a person, as a mom. So it was incredibly meaningful to get to have them on it. 

All of the players on the record mean a lot to me, but I really also loved having Davíd Garza on this record, who is a dear friend. In particular, he plays this beautiful solo on “Moon River.” There’s a song on Emmylou Harris’ record Roses in the Snow when Willie Nelson comes in with a guitar solo, and then it sounds like he just goes away. When I first heard that record — I think it was in my early 20s — it was pretty informative to me about how a lot of times musicians can be known for one or two things, but they might not often get asked to just be a musician on somebody else’s record. I just love that [Harris] didn’t get Willie to sing on it, she got him to come in and play a guitar solo. That was really eye-opening for me, and changed the way I thought of playing with people. 

On “Moon River,” I specifically had that moment in mind where Willie comes in and plays a solo and goes away, and so Davíd graciously agreed to be my Willie Nelson on this song, and he does a wonderful job. 

Having a couple of original tunes on the record, what was your process behind writing something that incorporates naturally with these classic songs?

I felt like there should be a spot for fiddle on this record. I knew that I wanted to have an instrumental on here, and I knew that I wanted to write it. It was important to have a little break in the lyrics. It was great to expand my childhood story with the title of the [instrumental], “Under the Pepper Tree.” That has very personal weight to me. A lot of instrumental titles are pretty arbitrary in my experience, but this was an opportunity to share a little bit about my own childhood. 

There’s a tree that I spent a lot of time growing up with, playing in and imagining in. There are several very important pepper trees in my life. One of them is at my aunt’s house, where my grandma used to live. There were two huge family reunions under that pepper tree. I just remember running around with my cousins, playing tag, listening to my aunt’s laugh, all that stuff. It’s a really beautiful thing, and I think that had a natural place on the album. 

The other song [“Night Singing”] was a poem that I wrote, that eventually fell into a guitar part. Originally, I thought that this record would be a lullaby record, but my goal for the record changed. It was to make something a little more deeply transitional for people of all ages. But “Night Singing” is a true lullaby, for my daughter, for myself, and for my friends. 

Do you have any specific plans you’re looking forward to taking on when we climb out of this pandemic? 

This fall, my brother [Sean Watkins] and I are going to do some touring behind our Watkins Family Hour album brother sister, which came out a year ago now. We weren’t able to tour it, but a lot of the dates we had for last fall have been rescheduled for this fall, 2021. We have some dates on the books starting in August, which is kinda hard to believe! So this fall we’ll be able to do some in-person shows, and I’m really looking forward to it. 

I feel very stopped up in terms of creativity, because we wrote the brother sister record, recorded it, and put it out, and haven’t really been able to celebrate it with an audience. Then I put together Under the Pepper Tree, recorded that, released it, and I haven’t been able to do shows for it. There’s been writing for other projects, but I honestly feel a little bit stopped up creatively. I think I just need to perform some of these songs, and get them out of my body, so that I can put more stuff in. As alienating as this whole thing has felt for us, and as isolating as it has been, there has been to some degree a shared experience, and the universality of that has been reassuring at times for me. 

Sara and Sean Watkins, as Watkins Family Hour, are coming to Colorado in March 2022! Grab your tickets here.

Photo credit: Jacob Boll

LISTEN: Ryanhood, “Appy Returns”

Posted on by Editor

Artist: Ryanhood (Ryan David Green & Cameron Hood)
Hometown: Tucson, Arizona
Song: “Appy Returns”
Album: Under The Leaves
Release Date: April 16, 2021

In Their Words: “I love instrumental music, having grown up on electric gunslingers like Joe Satriani and Eric Johnson, and later becoming infatuated with acoustic masters like Béla Fleck and Chris Thile. While most of our repertoire features vocals, we’ve been peppering our live concerts with instrumentals for years. I came up with the main theme for this one in a green room, just before a show back in 2016. I continued to tinker with it for years until I realized the main motif had some similarities to another instrumental of ours, ‘Appy Jam,’ which is a staple of our live set. I decided to lean into this resemblance and make it a full-blown sequel, referencing some of the rhythmic motifs and phrasings from the original, but taking the listener on a whole new journey. What made the song especially challenging to write was the fact that getting together to play-test it wasn’t always possible due to COVID-19. So I used music notation software to make ‘digital versions’ of each of our parts. This allowed us to practice playing the song (with our digital counterpart) for a couple of weeks before going into the studio and cutting our guitars together.” — Ryan David Green

Photo credit: Taylor Noel Mercado

Chris Eldridge, Molly Tuttle, Chris Thile, Bryan Sutton – Toy Heart: Remembering Tony Rice

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

In the final chapter of Toy Heart’s three-part tribute to Tony Rice, host Tom Power speaks to several musicians who have been inspired by Tony Rice throughout their career, pickers and artists through whom Tony’s music will certainly live on.

LISTEN: APPLE PODCASTS • SPOTIFY • MP3

On episode 3 of Toy Heart: Remembering Tony Rice, MacArthur “Genius” and Punch Brothers frontman Chris Thile tells a story about a jam with Tony Rice backstage that changed his musical life. Chris “Critter” Eldridge (pictured), also of the Punch Brothers, talks about the time he spent living with and learning from Tony — not just about music, but about life. Guitarist and singer-songwriter Molly Tuttle speaks about Rice’s influence on her guitar playing and how she sees his music living on even through musicians like herself, who never knew him personally. Finally, in-demand Nashville guitarist, session player, and sideman Bryan Sutton talks about recording with Tony and how he learned to be himself thanks to Tony Rice’s example.

Editor’s Note: Hear Thile at timestamp 01:58; Eldridge at 33:17; Tuttle at 01:03:17; and Sutton at 01:21:09

Photo credit: Jeromie Stephens

Remember When Dolly Parton Took a Bluegrass “Shine” to This Rock Anthem?

Posted on by Editor

The queen of country music is celebrating a milestone birthday on January 19. Her majesty, Dolly Parton, turns 75 this year, and to celebrate the music that has won awards and our hearts alike, we’re deep-diving back to the distant year of 2001. Like Dolly herself, “Shine” comes from a record that was born in mid-January — one that features a little bit of everything, from original compositions and old traditionals to cleverly reimagined cover tunes like this one. That diverse album, Little Sparrow, earned a pair of Grammy nominations and a win for her vocal performance on “Shine.”

Although this 1993 rock radio staple was originally recorded by Collective Soul and written by its lead singer Ed Roland, Dolly and the all-star backing band in the video give the song a fresh breath of bluegrass energy and acoustic attitude. It’s a seemingly unlikely cover, yet Parton pulls a unique bluegrass diamond out of what seems like a through-and-through rock and roll song. Upon Little Sparrow’s release in 2001, Parton stated, “I’ve been trying to think of how I can sing it without all the rock stuff; it sounds spiritual and all that, and the melody lent itself well to some bluegrass harmonies. I figured we’d kick it around and if it didn’t work, we wouldn’t put it on. But it worked out great.”

As unbelievable as it may be, here is the TL;DR: Dolly won a Grammy for a cover of a Collective Soul hit. Watch the music video below and enjoy our Essential Dolly Parton Playlist in honor of her 75th birthday!

 

5 Uncommon Trad Instruments Played Like You’ve Never Heard

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

We’re all familiar with the standard bluegrass five-piece band (also a common lineup in old-time or string band music), but there are quite a few second- and third-string instruments — no pun intended — that are rarely invited to join ensembles of guitar, fiddle, upright bass, mandolin, and banjo. Dobro is perhaps first on this short list, but accordion, dulcimer (hammered and mountain), autoharp, washboard, harmonica and dozens of other music and noisemakers could be encountered alongside these acoustic staples.

The five musicians below are awe-inspiringly adept at their instruments, each considered more like afterthoughts or casual embellishments in American roots music, rarely considered centerpieces themselves. But no matter how uncommon they may be at your local jam circle, or around the fire at the campsite, after you’ve been introduced to each of the following, you’ll be craving more unexpected and uncommon sounds in your bluegrass lineups.

From bones to nyckelharpa to Irish harp, here are five uncommon traditional instruments played like you’ve never heard them before:

Simon Chrisman – Hammered Dulcimer

A familiar, towering figure in the West Coast old-time, folk, and DIY roots music scenes, Simon Chrisman is criminally underappreciated on a national or international level. He most recently released a duo album with acclaimed banjoist Wes Corbett, he has been touring and collaborating with the Jeremy Kittel Band, and he’s performed and recorded with the Bee Eaters, Bruce Molsky, Laurie Lewis, and many others. His hammered dulcimer chops exist on a plane above and beyond even the most accomplished players on the trapezoidal instrument, throwing in pop and bebop-inspired runs, reaching down to bend strings by hand to achieve particular semi-tones, bouncing along at a rate only matched by a three-finger banjo player’s rapid-fire sixteenth notes. It’s jaw-dropping, even in Chrisman’s most simple, tender melodies and compositions. This rollicking number, named for Corbett’s beloved cat, is neither simple nor overtly tender, but your jaw will find the floor nonetheless.

Rowan Corbett – Bones

Rowan Corbett is a singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and percussionist best known for his time with seminal modern Black string band, the Carolina Chocolate Drops. Also a longtime member of Baltimore-based acoustic-grunge/world-folk group ilyAIMY and a veteran of Celtic outfit Tinsmith, Corbett is something of a musical chameleon, though it never feels as if he’s just putting on genre costumes to match whatever melodic motif suits the moment. Instead he inhabits each one authentically and wholly. ilyAIMY, for being billed as a folk band, are captivating, passionate, and energetic, perhaps most of all while Corbett fronts the group. But all of his musical moxie across all of his instruments pales when he pulls out the bones — traditional, handheld percussion instruments similar to their more mainstream (if not more vilified) counterpart, the spoons.

It’s no wonder a bio for Corbett begins, “What are those and how does he do that?” Corbett’s percussion skills are precise and technical, laser-like accuracy meshed with generation-blurring soul. During a guest appearance with Rhiannon Giddens at the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, North Carolina, in September 2019, Corbett brought thousands of listeners gathered on the hillside by the amphitheatre to their feet with his bones and just a couple of bars. This improv/battle video with Greg Adams displays just a taste of Corbett’s prowess on the ancient instrument.

Amy Hakanson – Nyckelharpa

Pandemic aside, if you’ve jammed with an old-time fiddler in the past two years you’ve probably fumbled (if you’re like this writer) or charmingly tripped your way through a Swedish fiddle tune or two. Musicians like Brittany Haas and Molly Tuttle have brought Swedish tunes into their repertoires, birthing dozens of new acolytes of the crooked, wonky, joyful tunes. Many an American fan of Swedish folk traditions were introduced to them by Väsen, a genre-blending, nearly 30-year-old Swedish folk band adored by multiple generations of American musicians, thanks to their status as a favorite band of everyone’s favorite pickers. (Väsen counts Chris Thile, Mike Marshall, Darol Anger, and others among their most vocal proponents and collaborators.)

Nyckelharpa player and scholar Amy Hakanson was first introduced to the instrument by Väsen as well and in 2014 she took her fascination with the heady, engaging music to the source, to study nyckelharpa with Väsen’s Olov Johansson himself at the Eric Sahlström Institute in Tobo, Sweden. Her approach to the instrument — a traditional Swedish, bowed fiddle-like apparatus played with keys — has a storied, timeless air, even as she carefully places the nyckelharpa in modern contexts. This original, “Spiralpolska,” for instance, utilizes a loop machine, ancient droning and modern droning combined.

Sarah Kate Morgan – Mountain Dulcimer

The mountain dulcimer is simple and beautiful in its most common use, a gentle, pedalling rhythm section for languid, introspective folk tunes. Counterintuitively much more common in the hallways and hotel rooms of Folk Alliance International’s conference than IBMA’s or SPGBMA’s gatherings, this writer first encountered Kentuckian Sarah Kate Morgan and her melodic-style dulcimer among the many booths of IBMA’s World of Bluegrass exhibit hall. She was holding her own in an impromptu fiddle jam with mandolins, fiddles, banjos — all instruments much more familiar with picking intricate, free flowing hornpipes and hoedowns. But Morgan doesn’t just strum the dulcimer, capitalizing on its resonant sustain and open tuning, she shreds it. Playing a finely-tuned, impeccably intonated instrument with a radiused fretboard, she courageously and daringly dialogues with whomever accompanies her down every bluegrass and old-time rabbit hole she meets. It’s incredible to watch, not only with the understanding that most mountain dulcimers are treated as an aesthetic afterthought, but also knowing that Morgan’s prowess outpaces just about anybody on any instrument. A truly transcendent musician.

Alannah Thornburgh – Harp

Harp keeps coming up lately! And for good reason. No matter the genre label applied, harp is having a moment. We’ve kept up with Alannah Thornburgh for a few years, featuring her work with Alfi as well as across-the-pond collaborations like this one, with mandolinist (and BGS contributor) Tristan Scroggins. Living in Dublin, Thornburgh plays in the Irish harp tradition, but has toured and traveled extensively in the United States, giving her style a distinctly old-time and fiddle-tune-influenced approach. She takes on the complicated, contextual vocabularies of American old-time music with ease, almost leading listeners to believe that emulating the banjo or mandolin or executing new acoustic compositions or modern reharmonizations of old-time classics is what the harp was designed to do.

An Instagram video of Thornburgh displays a mischievous, winking arrangement of Béla Fleck’s “The over Grown Waltz,” from one of his masterworks, The Bluegrass Sessions: Tales from the Acoustic Planet, Vol. 2. An earworm of a tune well-worn and familiar to any acoustic music fan Generation X and younger, it’s not uncommonly called at some jams, but its hummable melody is secretly, deceptively, subversively complicated. Once again, Thornburgh simply smiles and pushes onward, as if reaching and pulling these intricate licks and banjo phrases seemingly out of thin air on a harp were as everyday an activity as brushing one’s teeth — or a wedding performance of Pachelbel’s Canon in D.

 

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Photo credit: Alannah Thornburgh (left) by Tara McAuley; Amy Hakanson by Amy Hakanson.

WATCH: Goat Rodeo Returns for a Tiny Desk (Home) Concert

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The Goat Rodeo was back in town in 2020, and while their stay was short, they left behind a new record for us to enjoy until their next visit. The all-star string quartet (no, not literally a rodeo) released their second album Not Our First Goat Rodeo in June, and much like the passing of a comet, audiences everywhere took it in with wonder and awe. The four visionaries that constitute the Goat Rodeo have each accomplished many incredible, out-of-this world feats, but when Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, Chris Thile, and Stuart Duncan join forces, the music made feels less like an album and more like a rare phenomenon you’re lucky to see even once in a lifetime.

This fall, NPR’s Tiny Desk (Home) concert series shared music from their sophomore release. Chris Thile acts as an emcee sharing backgrounds and insights between the three songs featured, all of which can be found on Not Our First Goat Rodeo. As in the 2011 release, the rodeo’s second coming features the beautiful vocal presence of Aoife O’Donovan on the song “The Trappings” (as well as on two other tracks not performed for NPR). Despite their brief reunion, Not Our First Goat Rodeo will surely be considered as one of the highlights of 2020. Watch the Tiny Desk performance here – and read our BGS Artist of the Month interviews with Stuart Duncan, Edgar Meyer, Chris Thile, and Yo-Yo Ma.

Photo credit: Josh Goleman