essential OM recordings

[tannisroot]

hello,
are there any good CDs featuring octave mandolin?

[JPL]

John McGann's OM book comes with a CD that is quite listenable. Lead OM in one speaker, rhythm OM in the other.

Long & Compton's new CD "Stomp" has some excellent OM work, including the title track which is an OM solo, although the OM is not played on every track.

I like Tim O'Brien's "Traveller" which has a few OM/zouk tracks.

[otterly2k]

I'd add to that list...

Aly Bain / Alle Moller - Fully Rigged
Dervish - most anything
Dan Beimborn - Shatter the Calm
Roger Landes - Dragon Reels

this is just what was floating on the top of my head this morning... I may add more later...

oh, yeah... anything with Andy Irvine playing...and the combo of Andy Irvine (various mandos) and Donal Lunny (zook) in Planxty is phenomenal. It can be hard to untangle the parts until you've listened to this a lot... it complicates matters that Andy plays a mandola, but often with a capo, and sometimes there's also a guitar in the mix. There's an awesome concert video of their 2004 reunion concert that I just got to watch (thanks, Steph, and it's on its way back to you shortly) which is really inspirational, and helps put visual cues to the sounds that have become so familiar.

I'd also say that once you get some basics under your belt, there is no need to limit your listening to stuff that is OM/zouk-centric... there are a lot of both mando and guitar parts that can be played on OM. I also learn a lot from listening to fiddle tunes of a wide range of genres.

KE