Bill Frisell has teamed up with bassist Tony Scherr and drummer Rudy Royston for a series of Trio performances taking them outside DC tonight and to Chicago tomorrow. "Few jazz musicians have acquired the stature and respect of guitarist Bill Frisell," says DCist, crediting "his intensely personal sound" and "the range of timbres and colors in [his] palette." The Chicago Tribune says that, for The Best of Bill Frisell, Vol. 1: Folk Songs, the most recent Nonesuch release from this "guitarist extraordinaire ... some of his finest recordings have been assembled." The album "plays like the missing link between avant-folk guitarist John Fahey and jazz legend Miles Davis." Time Out Chicago calls him "the quintessential proponent of true roots music—embodying the ever-diverging genealogy of American music from blues and country through the outer reaches of improv heroics."
Bill Frisell has teamed up with bassist Tony Scherr and drummer Rudy Royston for a series of Trio performances taking them outside Washington, DC, tonight, to The Barns at Wolf Trap in Vienna, Virginia.
"Few jazz musicians have acquired the stature and respect of guitarist Bill Frisell," says DCist's Sriram Gopal in a preview of tonight's event. That comes, in part, from "his intensely personal sound, something for which every musician strives, but few attain such a recognizable voice as his ... [T]he range of timbres and colors in Frisell's palette allows him to explore a wide range of emotion."
Frisell tells Gopal of the connection among his Trio partners, Scherr and Royston. "It’s like a conversation when we play," says Frisell. "I don’t feel at all like it’s a back up band."
Read the article at dcist.com.
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Chicago Tribune music critic Greg Kot says that Frisell is one artist who doesn't shy from the term so often used to describe him: "uncategorizable." That even given the unifying principal behind the most recent Nonesuch release of this "guitarist extraordinaire," The Best of Bill Frisell, Vol. 1: Folk Songs.
Kot says "some of [Frisell's] finest recordings have been assembled" for the collection, "which plays like the missing link between avant-folk guitarist John Fahey and jazz legend Miles Davis. The tracks include beautifully sparse readings of Hank Williams and Carter Family songs, as well as Frisell originals that sound like ghosts drifting in from Appalachia."
The guitarist that Kot goes on to describe as "a master of space and atmosphere" brings his Trio to Chicago Friday night for two sets at the Old Town School of Folk Music. Joining them for the occasion, and for Saturday night's concert at the Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, as special guest is Nashville singer/songwriter Sarah Siskind.
Read Kot's article at leisureblogs.chicagotribune.com.
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Time Out Chicago's Areif Sless-Kitain says "the adaptable guitarist is the quintessential proponent of true roots music—embodying the ever-diverging genealogy of American music from blues and country through the outer reaches of improv heroics." Sless-Kitain cites the new Best of collection as a reminder of Frisell's ability to make sense of all those different strains and the guitarist's previous release as proof of still more: "Sure, the Seattleite could quietly suffer being called “jazzy” for the rest of his days, but he’s far more ambitious," the writer exclaims. "Case in point: last year’s epic suite History, Mystery, a perfect example of that prowess ... Sparing, never showy, the 58-year-old six-stringer drifts between sober reflection and meditative waltz." Read the article at chicago.timeout.com.
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