I use acoustic guitar, voice, original sculptural percussion instruments made from metals, woods, recycled and found materials, and a revolving roster of guest artists from a variety of musical neighborhoods in my performances and recordings.
Influences
Influences include so many of the musicians and artists I have known or heard or performed with over my lifetime from folk, jazz, classical and eclectic disciplines, but the big influence is daily life in this world.
Sounds Like
Review, Stephen and the Talk Talk Band:
Technically speaking, "Outsider Art" is art produced by the unschooled and or insane. Technically speaking, Stephen Cohen is neither. The apparently sane Portland-based performing artist, composer, visual artist and songwriter uses acoustic guitar, voice, original sculptural percussion instruments made from metals, woods, recycled and found materials to create records of quiet beauty. Cohen officially studied trombone and holds a Bachelor's Degree in Art from the University of Oregon. Still, the formal definition of Outsider Art is often stretched to include such as Stephen, and there is no doubt that his music shares many of the intriguing traits of the genre: a child-like aura, a hand-made quality, and unfiltered directness.
"It's My Story" begins with a spoken voice introducing a, well, story, over a haunting acoustic guitar figure. Cohen's own voice comes in over the storyteller's, singing, "It's my story, it's my story, you can take it, please don't leave it." Mandolin, bouzouki, drums, and lap steel are added; different voices enter telling fragments of other stories with Stephen singing the refrain over them. The total effect is one of the most emotionally affecting recordings I have experienced in a long time. Cohen's singing voice recalls Randy Newman and John Martyn without sounding quite like either. His guitar playing channels the simpler elements of Ry Cooder and Cooder-influences Lightnin' Hopkins and Joseph Spence. Taken together in a tune like "It's My Story," it adds up to a definitive depiction of the desperate human need to communicate. It is art devoid of pretension.
More sound sculptures than songs, the tunes on this CD share qualities with Cohen's actual sculptures of percussion instruments and guitars, to wit: warmth, whimsy, and an unexpected depth. A narrator talks about surviving a slide down a mountain in an avalanche and it evolves into--what else--a slide guitar piece. Other pieces revolve around talk, war, politics, love, and children. Stephen has done weekly music groups with severely disturbed children, and the combination of love, patience, and deep caring that must be required for such an undertaking infuses his music.
We live in an age where everyone can make a CD, and nearly everyone does. Just when I despair about the landfill this produces, I discover a CD like Stephen & The Talk Talk Band. This work likely wouldn't have been produced in an era of record company gatekeepers. And in the pre-internet/website days, I probably wouldn't have found it even if it had appeared somewhere on vinyl. I have done my best to describe it but you need to experience it. You will either "get it" or you won't. If you do, you will be the richer for it.
-Michael Ross, Puremusic.com (from http://www.puremusic.com/60cohen.html )
I am a performing and recording artist, composer, guitarist, visual artist and award-winning songwriter. Please go to the blog entries above to read more and link to my other web sites. And you can go to the video section of this myspace page to see some interesting performance clips from the past and to the photo section to see some of the fictional and real instruments I use and create as well as recent children's performance photos.
My 2006 CD, "Here Comes the Band", is a children's album, suitable for adults, and vice versa. It includes a 20 page illustrated booklet with paintings and drawings by Portland, Oregon Blackfish Gallery artist Christopher Shotola-Hardt. In my 2004 CD, "Stephen and the Talk Talk Band", I asked all the guest musicians to tell a story before they left the studio, and I layered some of the stories they told in some of the music.
My first album, on vinyl, "The Tree People", recorded in a studio in the woods near Eugene, Oregon in 1979 with my acoustic group of the same name and originally released in vinyl, has been rediscovered around the world and reissued as a CD in 2006 by Tiliqua Records of Tokyo, Japan. Tiliqua will be reissuing a second Tree People album from 1984, "Human Voices", in 2008. Guerssen Records of Catalonia, Spain will be releasing a limited-edition vinyl reissue of "The Tree People" in 2008. And my solo guitar piece from "The Tree People", "No More School", is included in a collection of acoustic guitar music, "Wayfaring Strangers: Guitar Soli", released in January, 2008 by The Numero Group of Chicago. So what else is new? I went in to the studio and recorded 9 solo instrumental guitar pieces, and I am now releasing the results in an all instrumental acoustic guitar album called "Stories without Words". You can hear one of those guitar pieces, "Story without Words" in the audio section above. And the most exciting news: The Tree People are now rehearsing weekly and performing live again!
Hi Stephen, We are considering relocating to the Portland or Salem areas of Oregon. Trying to research it a little. Any thoughts? Your music is beautiful! Jeanne
Hi Stephen, Thanks for adding me. Excuse Me President is a great tune! Good to see you on the LWW site. Peace from Canada, Avard #53 & #60 on LWW www.neilyoung.com
Hello Steven,
Thank you for the add request,
It's a pleasure to meet your acquaintance and listen to your amazing tunes!
All the best to you and your musical endeavors in 07,
We're honored to be your friend,
Hi-ya Stephen,
I've been enjoying your different records for a number of months now and "It's My Story" ranks amongst my favourite songs of the past couple of years!!!
Majestic music!
WE WANT MORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
All the best,
-jaak-
Stephen--I'm highly grateful for your very kind comment. I've enjoyed sitting here listening to your music--thanks for the time out of mind. Best to you--Josh
Really dig "Here Comes the Band". Great sounds and artwork - and even instructions to make instruments! Truly a work of art. Thanks for making us a part of it.
Hello Stephen! Thanks for the request; it was a real pleasure to find your great and inspiring songs and sounds. Thank you, I really enjoyed this music.
I'd love see you live and check out your instruments. Very creative stuff! Thanks for adding us.
I've changed the songs on our profile, stop by and have a listen.
Hello Stephen and thanks for the request. I was immediately grabbed by your music - very nice - would like to here more. Very creative, interesting, and quite beautiful.
