SternART
Dec-22-2006, 9:38am
I was at the Freight & Salvage last night for the Xmas fund raiser for the venerable coffee house/ traditional music venue. Laurie Lewis was the MC. The highlight for me was getting to hear the first performance of Mike Marshall's two new pieces for mando and string quartet. His quartet was made up of the National Fiddle champ brother & sister, Tristan & Tashina Clarridge, along with Natalie and Brittany Hass. Natalie is a Julliard trained cellist who has performed with Mark O'Conner's Appalacia Waltz Trio, and sister Brittany on 5 string violin handled the viola parts, is headed to Princton. Brittany has played with Darol Anger's Republic of Strings. I think Tristan is now 3 time National Fiddle Champ and in this string quartet plays fiddle, although he has recently been cellist in the Republic of Strings. Sister Tashina was previously National Fiddle champ before her younger brother, and now plays in Due West, a Bay Area BG band among other gigs. It is amazing these young string wizards have developed under the guidance of players like Darol Anger, Alasdair Frazier, Bruce Molsky, and Mark O'Conner as well as their more formal training. Also interesting is that the Clarridge kids are home schooled and the Hass sisters started with more formal training. It wasn't that many years ago the Clarridge family slept on my music room floor after seeing Chris Thile & Nickle Creek for the first time.
We all know who Mike Marshall is, and he put together these youngsters to play his new and more formal compositions, LONG 4 page charts on stands in front of everyone, even if they aren't all masters at reading notation. The music was fabulous, one piece titled Icicle Creek, has the mandolin playing a difficult triplet accented rhythmic melody with the counterpoint of long bowed passages. Mike's arrangement for the Quartet allowed for the various voices to both stand alone, and be heard in various combinations.
The youngsters really enjoyed the performance, big smiles all around. Mike was all over his Loar & led the proceedings from the side, facing the Quartet. I had a heads up from Mike that this was happening and I'm so pleased to have witnessed the World Premier. I like this genre bending that started with Edgar Meyer, recording with both YoYo Ma and Mark O'Conner, or Edgar putting together Mike Marshall, Sam Bush, and Joshua Bell. It is interested to hear the best in any genre of music, and in this case the crossover worked. I look forward to Mike developing more of this kind of music, and also to him recording it. To see & hear the mandolin featured as soloist in this kind of format was a wonderful experience, especially from my second row seat. The Quartet played two Swedish pieces without Mike to end that segment of the show. Mike Marshall is a string wizard, he also played a Bach piece on Mandocello and played some guitar in other ensembles with Lori & Tom Rozum. Marshall's diversity of different kinds of music he performs, and his playing skills make him a singular talent. Congrats to Mike on his World Premier.
We all know who Mike Marshall is, and he put together these youngsters to play his new and more formal compositions, LONG 4 page charts on stands in front of everyone, even if they aren't all masters at reading notation. The music was fabulous, one piece titled Icicle Creek, has the mandolin playing a difficult triplet accented rhythmic melody with the counterpoint of long bowed passages. Mike's arrangement for the Quartet allowed for the various voices to both stand alone, and be heard in various combinations.
The youngsters really enjoyed the performance, big smiles all around. Mike was all over his Loar & led the proceedings from the side, facing the Quartet. I had a heads up from Mike that this was happening and I'm so pleased to have witnessed the World Premier. I like this genre bending that started with Edgar Meyer, recording with both YoYo Ma and Mark O'Conner, or Edgar putting together Mike Marshall, Sam Bush, and Joshua Bell. It is interested to hear the best in any genre of music, and in this case the crossover worked. I look forward to Mike developing more of this kind of music, and also to him recording it. To see & hear the mandolin featured as soloist in this kind of format was a wonderful experience, especially from my second row seat. The Quartet played two Swedish pieces without Mike to end that segment of the show. Mike Marshall is a string wizard, he also played a Bach piece on Mandocello and played some guitar in other ensembles with Lori & Tom Rozum. Marshall's diversity of different kinds of music he performs, and his playing skills make him a singular talent. Congrats to Mike on his World Premier.