"Loretta's almost operatic alto and Curtis' rich tenor form a lush, polished and varied vocal blend. The pair's instrumental interplay is equally compelling, with Loretta's harp textures dancing in and around Curtis' deft guitar and mandolin lines."
.....Dirty Linen
Review of "Just My Heart For You"
Curtis & Loretta
"Curtis & Loretta’s just-released seventh album is replete with wonderful new songs by Loretta as well as traditional American, Irish and Yiddish songs. Loretta’s songwriting just gets stronger and stronger! Some years ago I reviewed their album, Gone Forever, and was particularly moved by the title song, which dealt with her father’s long decline with Alzheimer’s. This new album contains Can You Take Me Home? which tells the story of her mother’s ten years as his caregiver at home as the disease took its toll. It’s beautiful, and I was smiling through tears at the very touching ending. Also included is Loretta’s Angel of Bergen-Belsen, a powerful song describing Luba Tryszynska’s incarceration at age 23 in that concentration camp and how she took in 54 children who had been driven out into the snow to freeze. She rescued the children and through theft and bribery gathered the supplies that kept all but two of them alive through the war at huge personal risk; a true hero, Luba eventually found safety in America where she lives in Florida.
Loretta’s voice is full of heart. Just My Heart For You starts with two love songs and the very amusing Somebody I Could Sue, a song about personal responsibility and how people duck it. Among other offerings are a sweet version of Tum Balalaika sung in Yiddish and English; American traditional songs I Had But Fifty Cents, Ain’t No Bugs on Me, and a nice rendition of Stephen Foster’s Hard Times Come Again No More. Curtis’s strong voice carries A Health to the Company, Banquet Table and Lutefisk for Supper (with a kazoo obligato by Loretta). On the many cuts they sing together, the harmonies are spot-on, as is their unison-an-octave-apart singing on She Moved Through the Fair.
Molly
Between them, this talented duo plays Celtic harp, guitars, shakers, kazoos, pennywhistle, melodica, mandocello, mandolin, and clawhammer banjo. Joining them on various cuts are Peter Ostroushko on fiddle, Sandy Njoes on bass, Sera Jane Smolen and Lori Smart on bowed cellos, and Bill Philipp on banjo & accordion."
Portland Folklore Society Newsletter (March/April 2006)
.......Meryle Korne
“Husband-and-wife team Curtis Teague and Loretta Simonet are living treasures of the Twin Cities folk scene, with a body of music rich in lovely harmonies and delicately wrought mandolin and harp. Though there’s plenty of traditional material on the duo’s new “Just My Heart For You,” it’s Simonet’s originals that are the real lifeblood.” ...The Onion, Minneapolis, Feb 2006
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City Pages (Minneapolis / St. Paul)
May 1, 2002
Review of "Sit Down Beside Me"
Curtis & Loretta
BEST OF THE TWIN CITIES 2002
BEST ACOUSTIC PERFORMERS
"Curtis & Loretta are as good an argument as any for the preservation of a space within the current acoustic scene for, you know, folk music. Not that there's anything wrong with coffeehouse singer-handwringers or collegiate rockers with mandolins. And not that space shouldn't also be made for Indonesian gamelans, Nordic roots, or anything else. It's just that the perfect, ringing Celtic harmonies of Loretta Simonet and Curtis Teague represent one of the purest and most accessible pleasures in local music. And the duo's latest album, Sit Down Beside Me (Haymarket Music), provides a perfect showcase for the lyricism that a longtime couple can discover with vintage traditional instruments (Teague on mandocello, Simonet on Celtic harp). Forgoing the duo's fine originals, Sit Down is a collection of traditional songs from the British Isles, sung with confidence and feeling. The tunes are restorations as surely as the vintage instruments upon which they're played, but if subjects such as whales or heartbroken maidens don't particularly speak to you, the voices recalling them will. "
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Dirty Linen (U.S.)
October/November 2000
Review of "Gone Forever
Step back in time with me, if you will. The year is 1957 and we're in some smoky gin joint with some characters luking in the shadows clutching fiddles and six-string acoustic guitars. Any album that opens up with a rousing "One- Two-Three-Four" gets my vote straight away for chutzpah. Curtis and Loretta sing of sailors, cigarettes, and minstrel boys and they do it all in traditional settings with sparse instrumental backing and perfect harmonies. Favorite spins are the old stalwarts: "Banish Misfortune" and "Carrickfergus."
T.J. McGrath
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John 'O Regan - Broadcaster / Freelance Journalist, Limerick, Ireland 1994
"IT'S WHERE YOU HANG YOUR HAT" attends more to the American side of their output. Mostly original material with covers of Woody Guthrie and the almost American Leonard Cohen. Its oldtimey/country and folk strains provide good time music par excellence. Woody Guthrie's "Deportee" still aches as does "Elza and Branko (The Siege of Sarajevo)". "Bird on a Wire" shows their comfortable harmonies and the downhome presence of the title track and "Dance in the Hallways" makes them serious talents. It's Where You Hang Your Hat has good songs, well chosen covers and hardy self composed songs. Like a big warm overcoat it's worth slipping into and basking in its warmth.
Curtis & Loretta's music comes straight from the heart. The husband and wife duo's extraordinary harmonies and proficiency on a parade of stringed instruments create an alluring frame for their poignant original songs, and carefully chosen traditional pieces from the British Isles, America, and beyond. The current menagerie includes Celtic harp, mandocello, mandolin, guitars, clawhammer banjo, and National steel ukulele, plus a bit of kazoo, harmonica, and shakers.
They rack up 40,000 miles a year, crisscrossing the country to deliver their own unique brand of folk singer/songwriter music. They've shared billings with Jez Lowe, Vassar Clements, Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie, Anne Hills, Greg Brown, Holly Near, and Bill Staines, to name just a few.
I edited my profile with Thomas Myspace Editor V4.4 (www.strikefile.com/myspace)
Hi Curtis & Loretta: SO happy you found me here in cyberland... I miss you two! We just don't run into each other often enough, I think it's been at least 5 years now... All is well in my little corner of the world. Hey, check out my husband Charlie's invention at myspace. com/charliechadwickfoldingbass or foldingbass. com. It's really amazing! We just launched the business after he spent several years working on it.
Are you going to folkalliance? I will be there, hope to see you. Have safe journeys. love, Laurie
Hey Ho Curtis and Loretta! It's nice to see you here on Myspace! Thanks for the add request and AYE! We are friends already :) Best of luck to you and good fortune! Hugs! Merlyn & Harry
