bobmanonriver
02-26-2002, 10:29 PM
Hey folks:
First time I have posted to your gathering, but just wanted to give a few notes about the two Nickel Creek sets and the marathon Chris Thile/Mike Marshall and friends set at the Wintergrass festival in Tacoma WA. Wintergrass is a world-class non-profit organized festival--fine, mature, but still adventurous in its ninth year. Nickel Creek appeared there last year as well, and reports are that they really tore the place up.
And they certainly made an impressions on festival goers this year.
The first set started at 6pm, in the Convention Center room. It consisted mainly of material from the album. The energy level in the room was very high both from audience and performers.
The festival organizers tried to set things up so that folks would only be able to see one set by Nickel Creek and one by Old and In the Grey, a revival of the bluegrass supergroup from the early seventies featuring Peter Rowan, David Grisman,
and Vassar Clements. There was some ticket exchanging going on, so many of us did get a chance to see Nickel Creek twice.
The second set in the church was much more subdued, filled with some preview material from the new album (Don't tell Allison said Chris) as well as some things from Chris and Sean's solo offerings. Their first encore featured a totally unplugged number.
The Fox was an encore for both shows and was very different on each occasion. The first had one Subterranean Homesick Blues chorus and the second seemed to feature Sara more and didn't have that section.
The Marshall/Thile show was moved from the ballroom to the main convention floor. It was scheduled to get underway at midnight and started at about 12:15 or so. They spent an hour playing originals, jazz covers, and even a JS Bach Goldberg Variation with Marshall playing Mandocello for the right hand part and Thile playing the left. We are sure that if JS Bach had had a mandolin, he would have written for it. said Marshal. Exclusively. Thile added.
After a strange interlude where Mike and Chris played behind a juggler, the second half of the show featured trios with some of the greatest mando players, ever Jonathan Reischman, 13 year old Mark Stevens, Ronnie McCoury, Tim O'Brien and David Dawg Grisman with all seven playing together on a couple tunes for a 2:30 AM finale.
Word is that some of the concert will appear on an album Marshall and Thile will release sometime this summer.
I came away from this mandolin madness with the the impression that Chris Thile is indeed one of those very special musicians who has the potential to make a major impact on and beyond a musical genre. He is bringing a new vocabulary to the acoustic music scene as Grisman, Sam Bush and others have done.
Elsewhere at the festival, I encountered a set by a master fiddler from Bozeman Montana by the name of Bethany Dick. Chris is featured on a tune on her first album. I think her music would appeal to many on this list. You can check out more
at http://www.bethanyrecords.com/
Regards,
bobmanonriver
First time I have posted to your gathering, but just wanted to give a few notes about the two Nickel Creek sets and the marathon Chris Thile/Mike Marshall and friends set at the Wintergrass festival in Tacoma WA. Wintergrass is a world-class non-profit organized festival--fine, mature, but still adventurous in its ninth year. Nickel Creek appeared there last year as well, and reports are that they really tore the place up.
And they certainly made an impressions on festival goers this year.
The first set started at 6pm, in the Convention Center room. It consisted mainly of material from the album. The energy level in the room was very high both from audience and performers.
The festival organizers tried to set things up so that folks would only be able to see one set by Nickel Creek and one by Old and In the Grey, a revival of the bluegrass supergroup from the early seventies featuring Peter Rowan, David Grisman,
and Vassar Clements. There was some ticket exchanging going on, so many of us did get a chance to see Nickel Creek twice.
The second set in the church was much more subdued, filled with some preview material from the new album (Don't tell Allison said Chris) as well as some things from Chris and Sean's solo offerings. Their first encore featured a totally unplugged number.
The Fox was an encore for both shows and was very different on each occasion. The first had one Subterranean Homesick Blues chorus and the second seemed to feature Sara more and didn't have that section.
The Marshall/Thile show was moved from the ballroom to the main convention floor. It was scheduled to get underway at midnight and started at about 12:15 or so. They spent an hour playing originals, jazz covers, and even a JS Bach Goldberg Variation with Marshall playing Mandocello for the right hand part and Thile playing the left. We are sure that if JS Bach had had a mandolin, he would have written for it. said Marshal. Exclusively. Thile added.
After a strange interlude where Mike and Chris played behind a juggler, the second half of the show featured trios with some of the greatest mando players, ever Jonathan Reischman, 13 year old Mark Stevens, Ronnie McCoury, Tim O'Brien and David Dawg Grisman with all seven playing together on a couple tunes for a 2:30 AM finale.
Word is that some of the concert will appear on an album Marshall and Thile will release sometime this summer.
I came away from this mandolin madness with the the impression that Chris Thile is indeed one of those very special musicians who has the potential to make a major impact on and beyond a musical genre. He is bringing a new vocabulary to the acoustic music scene as Grisman, Sam Bush and others have done.
Elsewhere at the festival, I encountered a set by a master fiddler from Bozeman Montana by the name of Bethany Dick. Chris is featured on a tune on her first album. I think her music would appeal to many on this list. You can check out more
at http://www.bethanyrecords.com/
Regards,
bobmanonriver