David Symons - accordion and vocals
Timothy Lang - guitar, piano, accordion
Tyler Bolles - bass
Zoe Christiansen - clarinet
Influences
Brave Old World, Guy Klusevsek, Astor Piazzolla, Naftule Brandwein, Kurt Weill, Tom Waits, Dmitri Shostakovich, Tin Hat Trio, Dan Kahn, Hasidic nigunim, David Krakauer, Charles Baudelaire, Charles Bukowski, Black Sea Quartet, Marin Nasturica, Wallace Shawn, Noam Chomsky, Ishikawa Takaboku, Marc Awodey, Stephen Goldberg, Frank London, poverty, regret, love, angst, slivovitz.
Sounds Like
Letter to Seven Days Newspaper:
VIVA LA RICH
Nothing like a little class warfare to go with your accordion [Stuck in Vermont 68, May 7].
You featured a funny and obviously talented group of musicians. But I was struck by some of the language used by the group’s members regarding the “rich.” I’m guessing, since this is a target that is politically correct to attack, no one batted an eye, but I’m curious if similar language used about other groups would be tolerated by your fine newspaper.
I think it’s important to remember that this type of blanket stereotyping is not helpful, regardless if it’s directed at gays, the rich, welfare moms, Mexicans, etc. I’d encourage the members of Inner Fire District to learn a little more about what “the rich” do for our community, including paying taxes that pay for their beloved fire department. Oh yeah, and advertise in Seven Days, too.
Chris Palmetto
BURLINGTON
Inner Fire District was founded by accordionist/composer David Symons (also a founder of the influential Vermont band, Black Sea Quartet, and an original member of Berlin's The Painted Bird) and guitarist/accordionist/pianist Tim Lang. One of Vermont's most sought-after bassists, Tyler Bolles, soon joined. In the fall of 2006, David found then 18 year-old clarinet virtuoso Zoe Christiansen playing clarinet on a bridge in Montpelier. IFD attempts to inhabit a morally ambiguous gray zone between arrangement and improvisation, despair and elation, savagery and sophistication, sobriety and inebriation, the gutter and the big lights.
ACCOLADES:
"[David Symons is] the hottest and most obsessively intense accordion player in the neighborhood"
-Seven Days.
"If Shostakovich, Hank Williams, and the Baal Shem Tov met in a bomb shelter stocked with a bottle of slivovitz and an accordion, with nothing to do but wait for the end of the world, it might sound ever so slightly like the Inner Fire District."
-Hassan Nassrallah
Carnival melodies, accordion reveries, klezmer and yiddish songs
Happening right in the midst of the Jewish festival, this concert will feature The Midnight Reverie Trio, followed by a set of klezmer and yiddish folk music by two musicians visiting from the U.S.A. - David Symons of Inner Fire District (Vermont, USA), and Shaun Williams, accordionist and tsimbl-player from the band Orpheum Bell.
hey david, what a great sound. i still think about your great expressive accordionplaying. Berlin is missing somebody like you. hope you are doing well. hope to see you another stop over in Berlin. Levante P
heya...thanks for playing on WGDR and a fun time at Langdon St.....now if we can just get the freakin' sound right!! I will be playing your music from this page on my Chanukah shows 12/9 and 12/10
In the end, commitment to creative life is a commitment to a constantly increasing relationship with the lonelier outreaches of the psyche, learning not to disrespect the smallest, not to kick aside the most tattered, learning to take in and care for "the stranger" of the psyche, the one who has the longest view from the farthest away reaches of mind, spirit and imagination. We are the only ones who can even begin to be a friend to this friendless one. Do you hear that knock on the door? Do you know the one who is standing outside waiting for you? Go see. That is my first and last advice. Go see who is there. May it, for your sake, and all to the good, be a very strange stranger indeed. Clarissa Pinkola Estes
Dear IFD, STriCat has been nominated for the people's choice award 2007 from the Dutch world music magazine Beyond. If you like our music, support STriCat and vote here! Thank you for your vote! STriCat
ps: We'll try to catch you at the SalaRossa. We will be quite busy during your week in Montréal, cause we are... hmmm... how do you say? Preproducing? Anyways, working hard on a third album. But we'll try to make it! Have fun, Zoé & Manouche
Good to hear from you David! Hopefully we can make some music soon. I'm writing some music for with accordion in mind. Let me know if and when you bring that fire truck through Boston...
Yes, I remember you. You got me hooked on Fanfare Ciocarlia, and also served as an early example of the possibility of driving around the country playing music by yourself. For the first, I owe you endless thanks. For the second, I owe you a punch in the neck.
Glad to know where you are, now. I lost your contact information almost immediately, and I've been wondering how you're doing.
You're quite the amazing accordionist -- do you still play that song you learned that day?
