“Within a week of meeting each other, we began mapping musical ideas and plans to record an EP,” cellist Kaitlyn Raitz says of her first encounter with fiddler Ben Plotnick, before they even lived in the same city.
The term mapping is spot on. Each of the ten original songs on Kaitlyn and Ben’s first full-length offering unlocks a different musical world. Oliver the Crow navigates effortlessly between the gravitas of chamber composition, the longing of folk music, the near dreamlike quality of atmospheric sound art, and above all, pop music’s candy-sweet escape.
Kaitlyn and Ben’s chameleon-like ability to skip between genres stems from their roots as classically-trained performers (Kaitlyn has a masters degree in classical cello from McGill University and Ben has performed as a soloist with the Calgary Philharmonic) but also from their love of bluegrass, gypsy jazz, everything from Hank Williams to Prince. Raitz is a founding member of folk duo Bride & Groom, tours with The Bombadils and has performed everywhere from Carnegie Hall to the Station Inn. Ben is a primary member of the JUNO award-winning folk string quartet, The Fretless, and has contributed to hundreds of recordings as one of North America’s elite fiddle players.
One thing is certain: Oliver the Crow cannot be defined by genre, and yet is timeless, indelible. Kaitlyn and Ben have mastered the art of anchoring a folk song in epic pop sensibility, and it is so fun to hear them smash all the rules.
It’s not classical music — it’s disreputable classical music.
We know what the rules are. We just like breaking them. We’re here to create art, and our one purpose is to move people, to change their lives a little bit in the way only art can, and we don’t let propriety get in the way of that. We shrug at labels. We throw aside convention for convention’s sake and relentlessly pursue the music that makes us shout, grin, laugh or cry. Everything else is just details.
We love instrumental music. And too often, instrumental music is a beautiful and talented lady confined to a luxurious but dreary castle. Our mission is to storm that castle and rescue that lady, placing her beside us on a valiant steed and riding off to conquer someplace a lot more aggressive — say, the sweaty heart of Mexico City or the gritty streets of the Lower East Side. Her dress will probably get dirty, her hair might get messed up, she will whoop and cheer in decidedly unladylike fashion, and she will have the time of her life.
In the end, we love music, and we play it like someone’s going to take it away from us when the show is over.
Qawsaan (two bows) is a contemporary string duo hailing from the Middle East featuring the violin and the cello in an approach that has never been heard before.
Palestinian cellist Naseem Alatrash and Iraqi/Jordanian violinist Layth Sidiq are graduates of Berklee College of Music and have been playing together for more than 10 years! They have toured the world together, playing in orchestras and chamber ensembles and right now, as a duo. Their aim is to use the exciting combination of violin/cello and combine different styles of music, shattering stylistic stereotypes through improvisation, original compositions and arrangements.
”Bringing Layth and Naseem together on stage results in a passionate performance that combines deep musical traditional influenced by Arabic and Western classical music and contemporary jazz, in an association which highlights their unique instrumental skills. Their music is an exceptional experience for any listener.”
(Berklee Mediterranean Institute)
Maeve Gilchrist has taken the Celtic harp to new levels of performance.
Born and raised in Edinburgh, Scotland, and currently based in Brooklyn, New York, Maeve‘s innovative approach to her instrument stretches its harmonic limits and improvisational possibilities. She is as at home as a soloist with an internationally renowned orchestra as she is playing with a traditional Irish folk group or using electronic augmentation in a more contemporary, improvisatory setting.
Maeve was the first lever harpist to join the faculty of the iconic Berklee College of Music in Boston, where she taught for five years before switching to a visiting roots department artist this spring. Also an in-demand composer and arranger; this year, Maeve premiered her first concerto for lever harp and symphony orchestra and is currently working on a number of commissions including a string quartet for Irish harp and string quartet to be premiered in Scotlandin the spring of 2018.
Using Quebec’s vibrant living music tradition as a springboard for musical innovation De Temps Antan forms a power trio catapulting audiences headlong into the future French-Canadian music and culture.
It takes a special blend of musical talents to revisit and revitalize traditional music with equal measures of reverence, humor, Joy, natural ability and breathtaking turn-on-a-dime instrumental virtuosity. Welcome to the musical world of De Temps Antan!
Since 2003, Éric Beaudry, André Brunet (Celtic Fiddle Festival) and Pierre-Luc Dupuis have been exploring and performing time-honored songs and melodies been fine tuned and adapted to the needs of each generation. Using fiddle, accordion, harmonica, guitar, bouzouki and foot percussion (among a number of other instruments) these three virtuosos blend boundless energy with the infectious ‘joie de vivre.’ With De Temps Antan you will enjoy a musical event unlike any other.
In their first self-directed film, Dark Nights Golden Days, Oshima Brothers tell the story of their lives as artists and siblings. They depict a world torn apart by climate change that’s consoled by people and art. The film is a visual album that pairs with the sequence of their new record, Dark Nights Golden Days. Sean and Jamie explore the joys of the nature (rivers and coasts, mountain tops and horizon lines, wildflowers and wilderness) that they enjoyed growing up in Maine. The visual album dances between themes of addiction to technology, lost love, climate change, and life’s many simple pleasures. The film welcomes viewers into the deep imagination of the band, mixing gorgeous northern drone footage with green screen action scenes built into 3D animated spaces and scenes from around New England.
The Maine-based indie duo released their 17 track album Dark Nights Golden Days in spring of 2022. Music has always been a central part of the brothers’ lives but for the past decade so too has filmmaking, having already created over 30 of their own official music videos.
On Dark Nights Golden Days the brothers have crafted a richly layered sound that is at once retro and metro, spacious and intimate, lush and loud. The music very much reflects the duo’s DIY approach. Sean and Jamie wrote and sang all the songs and played nearly all the instruments, and Jamie also produced, recorded, and mixed the album. During the filming process Jamie directed, edited, filmed, and produced while Sean focused on casting, costuming, choreography, and filming.
British bassist, Charles Berthoud (pronounced BEAR-too), is changing the way we think about the bass guitar. Already being recognized as one of the masters of the two-handed tapping technique, he plays the bass like a piano, accompanying himself with multiple parts. He even co-authored an instructional book, Two-Handed Tapping, before graduating Berklee College of Music with highest honors. Now, he has two extraordinary solo albums under his belt, reminding listeners that there are still new frontiers to be explored in popular music. If Charles Berthoud is the one to chart this new territory, then music lovers are in good hands.
Haas Kowert Tice asked the question, what if? After forging their own brand of roots music—one grounded in timeless tradition, crafted by top-shelf musicianship, and performed with jubilant comradery—what if this trio of America’s finest string players became a quartet?
Brittany Haas (fiddle), Paul Kowert (bass), and Jordan Tice (guitar) own the sweat equity of a decade spent stoking the fires of their passion project. Haas, whose 2004 self-titled release instantly became the touchstone for a generation of old-time fiddlers, has since lent her sound to Crooked Still, Live From Here, Michael Daves – and David Rawlings, where she plays alongside Kowert, well known as Punch Brothers’ virtuosic bass player. Tice is a rare guitar player whose music showcases his unique identity and a particular knack for tune-writing. Haas Kowert Tice was a special road they could travel together.
Their 2004 album You Got This displays a breadth of acumen and ambition rarely heard on a band’s debut. Norwegian dance rhythms astride traditional Appalachian folk, bluegrass woven progressively into fundamental notions of jazz and chamber music. But for all their success, they found themselves grinding hard through recording sessions for a follow-up record. “I felt like we were missing an element,” says Kowert; “the sound was incomplete.”
Enter Dominick Leslie, the versatile mandolinist whose rhythmic sensibility has made him ubiquitous on the acoustic music scene (Noam Pikelny, The Deadly Gentlemen, Brotet). They had all already known each other for years. The trio wanted the rhythmic backbone he offered, and another plectrum to balance the dueling bows of bass and fiddle. His addition thickens the sound and tightens the groove, opening new creative doors. In short, Leslie is a great fit.
Reborn a foursome, they recut the music for the next album. The release of Unless, in reality Hawktail’s debut, is certain to confirm that this quartet has found its wings. “It feels as though this is now a whole band capable of doing anything,” says Haas.
The Jason Anick Quartet is an ever-revolving group of some of the best young jazz musicians in New England. The group performs uniquely arranged standards along with founding member Jason Anick’s eclectic and soulful compositions.
The group got together in January 2012 to begin recording Anick’s second album as leader, Tipping Point (February 18, 2014), blending Anick originals that openly incorporate the influences of mainstream jazz, classical, new acoustic music, Gypsy jazz, swing, and hard bop with a wide-ranging swath of jazz classics.
“Jason Anick’s sheer joy in playing is evident from the first track on his new recording, “Tipping Point”. While tipping his hat to one of the forefathers of Jazz violin, Stephane Grappelli, Jason maintains his own distinct voice – especially in his own compositions. Equally gifted as a musician and composer, Jason attracts new listeners to the violin and mandolin. “Tipping Point” is an uplifting and refreshing project deserving of countless repeated listenings” – Regina Carter
Jordan Tice is a musical seeker of the most dedicated sort. Listening to the breadth of his discography, which includes 7 projects as a solo artist and 6 as a founding member of the string band, Hawktail, one will hear this dedication at play. Equally virtuosic as a flatpicker and fingerstylist, and with a casual vocal style, Tice conjures ingredients from far-flung worlds with ease which has earned him glowing press from such outlets as NPR and American Songwriter and taken him to stages such as the Telluride Bluegrass Festival and the Ryman Auditorium.
His performances call upon the repertories of American and British Isles folk, bluegrass, blues and pop-oriented songs, and though his earlier releases are instrumental in focus, he has been carefully honing his craft as a singer-songwriter in his most recent work. This includes his Motivational Speakeasy (produced by Kenneth Pattengale of The Milk Carton Kids) and Badlettsville projects which make it easy to confuse his originals for timeworn chestnuts. Having filled the roles of guitar ace, sideman (w/ Aoife O’Donovan, Andrew Marlin of Watchhouse and David Rawlings), songwriter and student of American music for the better part of his life, Jordan’s songs are enriching for all manner of listeners, from guitar fanatics to more casual fans of Americana music. He delivers performances that are not weighted by any one area of his prowess, allowing listeners to join his world of candor, wit and ineffable facility with comfort.
