Search - Joshua Bell, Edgar Meyer, Sam Bush :: Short Trip Home

The first legitimate crossover CD ever

10/13/1999

(5 out of 5 stars)

"You heard it here, folks. I am a classical fan who, like most other classical fans, shrinks away from the mention of the word "crossover" like it's got the plague. Being classically trained in violin, and taking great joy in blasting the fans of Vanessa-Mae, the announcement of Joshua Bell, Edgar Meyer, Sam Bush, and Mike Marshall collaborating on a folk/classical/bluegrass fusion CD was quite a shock to me, initially. Heck, I didn't even know who Sam Bush And Mike Marshall were. Bluegrass? That conjures up in my mind an image of a banjo-pickin', overall-wearin' geezer with bad dental hygeine, sitting on his wood porch somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Or at least, that's what I used to be like until I heard this CD. This CD is simply amazing. Meyer's compositions are a joy to listen to- they do justice to all the genres they touch upon and exude a joy and warmth in a way that only folk music can. And something happened to me. I started tapping my foot along to "Hang Hang" and suddenly realized that I could get to like this kind of stuff. I rushed out to buy tickets to their concert. I had a blast. Nowdays, a few bars of "Short Trip Home" and "If I Knew" slip their way into my practice time, in between the Mozart and Mendelssohn music. The melodies are absolutely unforgettable and instantly addictive. Now, I am seriously considering taking up folk fiddling. All this, from a girl who used to say that hell would freeze over before she ever played "fiddle". And all because of this CD. This CD has done what crossover CD's are supposed to do: expand the horizons of the listeners with innovative and beautiful music. Hey, if I got converted, anyone can. Buy this CD. I mean it. BTW: my apologies to all bluegrass performers and fans everywhere: I will never, never, EVER make fun of you folk or your genre again."

Great Music for Adult Sensibilites

09/06/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"In a country where adults are starving for music that is not bland pop, that is nonetheless accessible, and that is aimed at adult sensibilities, the sales rank of this recording disappoints me. Hopefully this review will help to do something about the sickness that results from the lack of substance being tube-fed to us by the music industry. Too much truly great music is commercially stillborn for failure to fit a niche within the narrow range of radio formats, or for failure to be safely classified as one genre or another. Have you ever wondered where they get those great musical interludes on PBS or NPR? Quite often the answer is this ensemble, or some portion thereof in yet another great and genre bending band. Sam Bush is known to many as a long time member of the traveling virtuosos that were New Grass Revival, and Marshall can play mandolin with anyone. Neither could be called a mindless picker by anyone but a closed-minded clod. There is a depth and discipline to their bodies of work that would make any cultured person take note whether or not their source genre, bluegrass, appeals to a particular person's sensibility. On this recording, they alternate between solid foundation rhythms, melodies that will stay with you like a winter's remembrance of sun on your back, and beautiful harmonies. However, those of you who have never seen the country from anything but a car window need not fear. I'm not much of a country fan, and this is not a bluegrass recording. Meyer and Bell on, respectively, bass and violin, bring the sensibilities of modern classical music to bear. The recording includes thoughtful chamber compositions, but it is not really a classical recording. There are several songs that are most akin to one genre or another, but this recording defies description as anything but one of the most stirring, fundamentally original, thoroughgoingly American voices to have ever spoken. You can hear the simple and sometimes mournful echoes of Scottish and Irish immigrants from times as distant as the nineteenth century, and listen as these voices blend with the less structured, less melodic, and more troubled voices of our own times.If you are someone who digs in every musical crevice looking for something fresh and tasteful, this is a musical truffle. I own a large collection of music. Nothing is played by me more often than this. Some songs, like "BT", are on play lists that consist of bouncy and upbeat amalgams of folk and jazz, others are on my lists for rainy days spent with a cup of tea and a good book. If you buy this recording, you will know why the book is often set aside. This is a recording that sometimes warrants turning off the lights and looking over the water, allowing both to absorb me."

Another Edgar Meyer Masterpiece!

Bob Zeidler | Charlton, MA United States | 06/17/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This album can be predicted to be a chartbuster for some time to come. The reasons are obvious to all fans of Edgar Meyer (among whom I count myself): His ability to "mix it up" with rhythmic glee, using strings alone as the driving pulse, his way of putting together themes and harmonies for chamber strings, typically in a contemplative way, that recall the chamber music of Bartok, Kodaly and Janacek, his unequaled skill as the leading contrabassist of our time, and, most prominently for those classical music lovers who are looking for "interesting and fresh" crossover music, his unmatched skill in writing down music lines for nonimprovisational classical string players that sounds fully improvisational.This last point cannot be overstated. For both Yo-Yo Ma elsewhere and Joshua Bell on this disc, Meyer has created music that has the freshness and immediacy of improvisation without actually being so. The piece de resistance on this disc is of course "Death by Triple Fiddle," and I expect that this track will keep the album on the charts. But it is actually the more ruminative tracks, such as the title tune and "If I Knew," which I personally favor, largely because everyone in the group is much more in his element in these. Truth to tell, after repeated hearings of "Death by Triple Fiddle," the sense I get is that Sam Bush and Mike Marshall are great fiddlers in their own right, and Josh Bell's lines in this (virtuosic as they are) eventually start to wear thin because he can't quite get into the swing of the whole thing. It is as if the correct "feel" for hot-licks newgrass fusion as envisioned by Meyer et al is something that needs to be acquired at an early age, as would also be the case for the proper feel for jazz or the blues; it is not something is readily picked up by an already-mature artist.In a thematic sense, this album is at the intersection of two earlier Meyer albums, "Uncommon Ritual" (with Marshall and Bela Fleck, the "Bartok of the banjo") and "Strength in Numbers" (with Bush and Fleck, as well as that fiddler par excellence, Mark O'Connor, and Jerry Douglas on dobro. If "Short Trip Home" catches your fancy, you owe it to yourself to try these two earlier endeavors, because the riches are deeper and longer lasting. They are both available at Amazon.com.A parting note if you are thinking that this as the first legitimate crossover CD ever: It's a nice thought, but the facts speak otherwise. More than twenty years ago, the late, great flutist Jean Pierre Rampal made an album with Claude Bolling, playing Bolling's "Suite for Flute and Jazz Piano." This album was on the Billboard charts for nearly ten years! And even that album may not have been the first ever, particularly if one is to include any piece of classical music that makes the "top ten." But I'm glad that this Edgar Meyer work has opened doors for you. He has a way of doing just that, and in fact did it for me."