Garrison Fewell - Eric Hofbauer Guitar Duo. You can hear the title track from our new CD on Creative Nation Music: The Lady of Khartoum (our musical prayer for peace in Darfur). This music, and most of our work together, features improvised guitar and simultaneously live (no overdubs) percussion, exotic bells, nomadic Afghan jewelry, prepared guitar, Afican sticks, and other common household or office objects.
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John Tchicai / Charlie Kohlhase / Garrison Fewell Trio: Ramana Maharshi is a Tchicai original from the trio CD, Good Night Songs (a live 2-CD set on Boxholder).
Llanto del Indio: a South Amercian folk song recorded at Birdland Jazz Club with the Trio plus Cecil McBee on bass and Billy Hart on drums. unreleased as yet...
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The Variable Density Sound Orchestra. Spectronomus is the first track from the new CD on Creative nation Music, featuring Roy Campbell Jr. on trumpet, flugelhorn and flute, Achille Succi, bs clarinet and alto, Eric Hofbauer, guitar and percussion, John Voigt, bass, Miki Matsuki, drums, and myself on guitar, prepared guitar, percussion and fisherman's bow. My son Alex is a drummer and and plays percussion on two tracks.
The VDSO's soon-to-be-released recording has expanded to a nonet, adding Steve Swell, trombone, Dmitry Ishenko, bass and Kelly Roberge on tenor.
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Garrison Fewell Quartet: Hearing Things is the first track from my CD, Red Door Number 11 on the Italian Splasc(H) label. It's available on cdbaby.com and features pianist George Cables, Attilio Zanchi, bass, Gianni Cazzola, drums.
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John Tchicai's Five Points (Nubop): The track, One Long Minute, is a tune by drummer Ches Smith. While playing several dates around NYC, we recorded this new collective quintet in Brooklyn (... the Five Points!) w/ myself on guitar, percussion and bow, John Tchicai, tenor, Alex Weiss, alto (and producer), Dmitry Ishenko, bass and Ches Smith on drums.
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Garrison Fewell / Umberto Petrin / Achille Succi Trio. Another rare combination of intergalactic talents, Umberto currently records on ECM and Achille needs a gps device to locate his gigs at any given moment. Marvelous rapport with an unusual instrumental aura.
Influences
Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, Sun Ra, Lester Young, Ben Webster, Charles Tyler, Derek Bailey, Jim Hall, Lenny Breau, Kenny Burrell, Jimmy Rainey, Anthony Braxton, Roscoe Mithchell, Muhal Richard Abrams, J.S. Bach, Karol Szymanowski, Krzysztof Komeda, John Coltrane, Bud Powell, Mississippi Fred McDowell, John Hurt, Rev. Gary Davis, Charlie Christian, Bill Evans, Horace Silver, Afghan classical music, Bismillah Khan, Ali Akbar Khan, Claude Debussy, John Tchicai, Johnny Dyani.
From a featured interview in Downbeat magazine, June 2009
GARRISON FEWELL Delta-Silk Road Journeys
These days, travelers searching for peaceful destinations would hardly place Iran and Afghanistan at the top of their lists. But in 1972, with the Vietnam War raging and social unrest in the headlines at home, 18-year-old guitarist Garrison Fewell left Philadelphia for what was then a much more placid Middle East. He spent a year in the region, playing music with locals and even working as a disc jockey in Kabul, Afghanistan.
"I was on a path to discover the world and see what other cultures were about," Fewell said from his office at Boston's Berklee College of Music. "Kabul was a beautiful town with tree-lined boulevards and great musicians. If you went to a local tea house and just hung around, you could jam with people playing tabla, rubab, dutar, all kinds of instruments."
Memories of those jam sessions reemerged during the recording of "The Lady of Khartoum" (Creative Nation), Fewell's duo recording with Eric Hofbauer. Although the recording was spontaneous, it grew out of a year of regular meetings for beer and conversation.
"Whereas a lot of free jazz guitarists come from a rock perspective," Fewell said, "Eric plays acoustic jazz guitar which appeals more to my folk background."
Much of their discussion was rooted in tracing the sound of the blues through unexpected geography, from the Muslim call to prayer to microtonal Indian and Iranian music to the Moorish influence in Spanish music.. While Fewell and Hofbauer didn't enter the studio wit a concept in mind, what emerged through their use of prepared guitar and small percussion instruments made the same journey musically, connecting Delta Blues, Thelonious Monk and the Silk Road.
"On a deeper level, music spans space and time, and connects past cultures with the present," Fewell said. "The collective human imagination could appear anywhere, and any of our musical/cultural interactions can come out at any moment."
Fewell began playing guitar at the age of 10 and grew up in Philadelphia on blues and folk music. In his late teens he chanced upon Pat Martino playing on Philadelphia's South Street, which opened his ears to greater possibilities of his instrument.
After his year abroad, Fewell returned to the States to attend Berklee. By the time of his senior recital in the fall of 1977 he was already teaching at the school, where he remains a professor after more than 30 years.
Fewell's first album, with Fred Hersch, Cecil McBee and Matt Wilson, was released in 1992, nd he recorded in a relatively straightahead style for the remainder of the decade. But around 2002, he decided that he wanted to explore a more avant-garde direction, which led to work with vibist Khan Jamal and a collaboration with saxophonist John Tchicai.
"The way that Art Blakey's and Miles Davis' bands were a learning school for many musicians, working with John has had an effect on me," Fewell said. "He doesn't want you to be to comfortable with yourself, so that you won't fall back on playing something too familiar."
Another result of Fewell's explorations is the Variable Density Sound Orchestra, a larger improvising ensemble whose self-titled debut has just been released on Creative nation Music. A second recording, which expands the group from seven to nine pieces, is already in the can. The group's name refers to the fact that the large unit can be broken down into smaller subgroups at any moment during performances.
"It gave me the palette to d anything," Fewell said. "The hardest thing to do is sit down and write, and when you're improvising, if you start to judge what you;re doing then you inhibit yourself. In creative music you cannot inhibit yourself — you can't hold back and you can't hesitate. You have to jump in confidently with your first instinct."
Very creative music, nice guitar performance. I'm a Mass native myself:) We’re a new label from San Francisco CA. named Happy Note Records & we just wanted to say hi to the myspace community.
Happy Note Records released "The XMan Cometh -- Expect the Unexpected," The CD earned nationwide radio airplay and is currently available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/charlesxavier and digitally at www.iTunes.com
The Lady of Khartoum, un meraviglioso viaggio nell'anima dell'uomo. C'è la semplicità e la profondità di come parlano i bambini. Complimenti. un abbraccio
Thanks Garrison I'm listening to your music and I like very much. I hope to yet again next year. If you want to write a piece for flute and guitar ... I am always available! YES! YES! YES!
What a beautiful and refreshing... I like much the rain, It is like the sound of sky's soul. Sometimes, when it rain,I go out without umbrella and I walk without course. Thanks you for remember me. I remember you too and hope you are fine. Kisses...
DEAR FRIEND I..M SITIL, IN MY COUNTRY , IN WINTER.. IN A COLD NIGHT , THE CITY LOOKS SAD AND I ALWAYS LOOK FOR BEAUTY AND SHINE, ALWAYS...LIKE BREATH ALL MY LOVE ,THANKS FOR YOUR POETRY SEEMS
Yeah, I am doing my work here in the school, and little by little my guitar is sounding hipper :)!!
Sure, would be an honor for me. So, you are in Italy, nice! Im playing in Bolzano festival (the north) next week, then Spain, then back to Amsterdam middle july. Just let me know for studying like a devil my scales and things before :)!!!
Every time that we listen & write music... play an instrument... sing & dance... act in a play... or work in some audio/image/video engineering process... something is healing inside...
When we share it with friends... something is healing all over...
cada vez que escuchamos o escribimos musica... tocamos un instrumento... cantamos y bailamos... o trabajamos en procesos de ingenieria de audio/imagen/video.... algo se sana por dentro...
Cuando lo compartimos con amigos... algo se sana en todas partes...
El Amor puede conducir... de manera simple... todo...
