Excellence at the Sage - I'm With Her

Finally.... we have been to an event at the Sage! A friend visiting Durham noticed that the exceptionally talented Sarah Jarosz, Sara Watkins and Aoife O'Donovan, aka I'm With Her, were playing Hall 2 on Friday, 24th April. Sold! We have one of Sarah Jarosz' albums and like her sound, but were less familiar with Watkins and O'Donovan.

Right up near the ceiling, we could see down onto the stage and onto the wildly enthusiastic audience below. After a short support set (so-so, I have forgotten the guy's name but he notably played a few songs sat with his acoustic guitar held horizontal), the I'm With Her trio produced an outstanding set of around 90 minutes.

Mixing solo songs from each of their respective careers with traditional songs and instrumental interludes, they wove a super spell of folk/country/bluegrass/Americana tunes. I had lots of goosebumps!

Notable tracks: Sarah Jarosz - ' Run Away', 'Build Me Up From Bones' and 'Fuel the Fire'; Aoife O'Donovan - 'Red & White & Blue & Gold'; Sara Watkins - 'Give me Jesus' and 'Long Hot Summer Days'. We were also treated to the 'Crossing Muddy Waters' collaboration featuring all 3 on this live version (there is a video of this track on Aoife's website). 'Crossing Muddy Waters' is released on 7th May; very well recommended! The final track was an a capella version of 'Be My Husband' which will be the B-side to 'Crossing Muddy Waters'.

All 3 shared the lead roles as well as instruments - they had one each of mandolin, octave mandolin, banjo, guitar, ukulele, violin and swapped when required. Fantastic musicianship. Wish I was that good.....

Comments

Angela Hewitt Week, 14th-20th May 2012

I just received information from a friend about Angela Hewitt Week in Ottawa, 14th-20th May as declared by Mayor Jim Watson. Ms Hewitt is performing with Chamber Players of Canada on Friday 18th May; there will also be An Afternoon With Angela Hewitt on 20th May at the National Arts Centre hosted by the Canadian Friends of the Trasimeno Music Festival .

Pigeon Funk

Notes on a very random purchase. Earlier today I acquired Venetian Snares 'Rossz Csillag Alatt Sz ü letett ' purely on the basis of the language and artwork. Its certainly something different - and most definitely not pop. After a bit of searching: Venetial Snares is, according to Wikipedia, the performing name of Aaron Funk, who seems to specialise in experimental tracks in odd time signatures. Article here . The sleeve notes for this album (whose title is Hungarian for 'Born under a bad star') poses the question: what if, for just a day, we could both be pigeons? Interessant. Apparently this concept (a day in the life of a Hungarian pigeon) is non-typical of Venetian Snares sound, but one could ask, does Mr Funk do 'typical'? On first listening, the sound of this CD mixes classical/traditional Hungarian sounds and breakbeats. but aside from that? Definitely a 'listen for yourself' artist; try the website , fan site or myspace .

The Venezuelan maestro comes to Cardiff

A highly anticipated evening of entertainment for M and I, we headed to St Davids Hall to see the conductor of the moment, Gustavo Dudamel , conduct the Philharmonia Orchestra . Highly entertaining, too, and the place was pretty full, though possibly not sold out. We had anticipated the first piece to be Antonio Estevez' 'Mediodia en el llano', but a last minute change meant the first work was (I believe - the posters up in the venue were rather short on info!) Berlioz' Roman Carnival. Initially we may have been a tad disappointed but the replacement work was excellently peformed, cue many smiles. Unfortunately, the smiles soon evaporated, as the second, and for us, least interesting piece, was Mozart's Piano Concert No.17 K453 with Emanuel Ax on piano. M described Ax as mellow, I described him as dull. That may be because neither of us are really into Mozart, but compared to previous visits to St Davids Hall to see pianists Noriko Ogawa and Freddy Kempf, we really...

PrettyInScarlett

Search This Blog