Spring 2008
Features
Columns
- Fiddle Tune History: The Black Sloven, by Andrew Kuntz
- The Practicing Fiddler: Harmonized Scales, by Jim Wood
- Bluegrass Fiddling: Classic Vern & Ray, by Paul Shelasky
- On Improvisation: Understandable Theory II, by Paul Anastasio
- Cross-Tuning Workshop: GDAD – Esker Hutchins, by Jody Stecher
- Cross-Canada Fiddle Tour: Nova Scotia’s Keith Ross, by Gordon Stobbe
- Irish Fiddling: Creating Your Own Setting, by Brendan Taaffe
- Reviews
- Fiddle-toon (cartoon)
- (“Accompanying Traditional Fiddle Music” will be back in the next issue)
Tunes in this Issue
- Gaptooth, by Casey Driessen, Béla Fleck, Bryan Sutton
- The Roshven Fiddler, strathspey by Fergie MacDonald
- Farquhar & Hettie’s Waltz, by Farquhar MacRae
- Groove Merchant, by J. Richardson, adapted by Jeff Fairbanks; as played by Christian Howes
- Col. Pickering’s March to Lexington (Fiddle Tune History Column)
- The Black Seven (Fiddle Tune History Column)
- The Black Sloven (Fiddle Tune History Column)
- Cumberland Gap, transcribed by Jody Stecher as played by Esker Hutchins (Cross-Tuning Workshop)
- The Star of Munster, transcribed by Brendan Taaffe as played by Kathleen Collins and Gerry O’Connor
- Jeremy’s Hornpipe, by Keith Ross
- Carroll County Breakdown, transcribed by Paul Shelasky as played by Ray Park
Article Excerpts
 Photo: Laura Crosta
Casey Driessen: “New Time” Fiddler
By Peter Anick
The vitality of folk music has always depended on two kinds of musicians –– those devoted to preserving it as it was played in the past and those determined to push its boundaries while respecting its roots. When it comes to old time and bluegrass fiddling, twenty-nine year old Casey Driessen has already established himself as one of the most innovative players of his generation. He is a pioneer of the use of the five-stringed violin and a guru of advanced “chop” techniques which allow the fiddle to double as a percussion instrument. His recently released 3D CD, his first feature recording on Sugar Hill Records, is a wild ride through some of the new musical territory that Casey has been carving up with his bow. With its lush overdubbing of multiple fiddle tracks and artful arrangements that run the gamut from dreamy airs to rocking blues, this album may well be the “Sgt. Pepper” of fiddle music.
I ran into him at one of his old haunts, the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival, where he was appearing with the Sparrow Quartet, a “next-generation” string band fresh back from a cultural ambassadorship in China. Between his Sparrow show and his solo workshop entitled “The Fiddler with Red Shoes,” we somehow managed to find a quiet spot on the hill to get a sunburn while discussing Casey’s evolution into one of the fiddle’s most respected boundary-pushers.
Casey: I started with Suzuki back when I was five and a half or six years old. My dad played banjo, pedal steel, some guitar. I didn’t necessarily choose fiddle like some people choose instruments. My dad played the heavy instruments like pedal steel and banjo and didn’t want me to have to carry that stuff around. He also thought it would be good to have a fiddle to play some tunes together. So I got into music through my folks. This was up in Minnesota. For a couple of years I was doing classes with Suzuki and did a couple of books that they had. But at the same time, my dad was also teaching me some fiddle tunes –– “Boil them Cabbage,” “Old Joe Clark” –– easy things to start out with. I’m told that the kids in the Suzuki class that I was in wanted to learn the tunes my dad was teaching me. So it wasn’t working out after a little bit and I just continued to take lessons with him.
Did he play fiddle?
No, but he knew music and could figure out enough to be able to teach me. He translated a bunch of tunes from music to tab fingerings. I did read some music and I still do, but I read this tab for a long time. That works fine for fiddle tunes but as I started to get into more complex material it didn’t serve the purposes any more. That was how I started out. It was all home taught. One of the funny stories about it is that I was bribed with baseball cards. We had a list of things and I had to practice a certain amount and I would earn something for it. I remember if I practiced three days in a row, I would get a pack of baseball cards.
So you got plenty of positive reinforcement for practicing.
I’m sure there were times I didn’t like practicing but there was a card I needed for my collection, so I’d practice a little bit. There was one time when if I practiced ninety days in a row, then I got a full set! After a while I saw improvement from practicing and then I didn’t need the incentive of baseball cards. I was probably around twelve at that point. I was going to some [fiddle] camps on my own and I would meet up with my folks at a festival nearby.
Was your dad playing at the festivals?
No, we would just go to jam. We used to come to this festival [Grey Fox] a lot and festivals in the Midwest. We’d come to camp and it wasn’t so much about seeing the shows as about hanging out in the campground playing music.
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Did you learn theory mostly on your own?
Quite a bit. I went to Jamey Aebersold’s jazz camp for a couple of years. I would come from these things with stuff that I would work on for a year. Rather than taking consistent lessons, it was more about collecting information and then trying to apply it until I needed some more.
What did you do for your bowing hand?
I didn’t do as much active stuff for my right hand. Kreutzer’s got a book with forty-two studies for classical violin and there’s one exercise with twenty-five different bowings that you do with the same notes. That frees up your hand quite a bit. If you’re in a predicament, there’s some way that you’ll be able to get out. I think jamming actually had a lot to do with bowing for me. On the spot improvising –– you’ve got to make it work somehow! I’m always playing with a metronome when I practice, too, which I think probably helped the bowing. But I was always horrible in orchestra –– I was the guy with the bow going in the other direction. It was difficult for me to read bowings. Reading the notes was enough!
I notice you hold your bow with the thumb under the frog.
Yeah, I started out that way from Suzuki. As a fiddler I ended up continuing with it. Then when I got into orchestra in fourth grade, the orchestra director told me I had to switch. So reluctantly I did switch for about a year, maybe two, but I wasn’t very happy with it. I went to a fiddle workshop at Winfield, Kansas, and Mark O’Connor was at that workshop and the question was, “How does everybody hold their bow?” He said, “I hold mine like this” [thumb underneath the frog] and I saw that and thought if he can make all that stuff happen with all the control that he has doing that, then I see no reason why I can’t switch back to this because it feels better to me. There’s also this exercise I learned at Berklee College of Music. The metronome is at 80 and you take three octaves with two notes per bow, then three notes, and so on, keeping the bow the same. You really get to know a scale and separate what you are doing here [left hand] from what you are doing here [right arm]. You’re also changing strings in odd places. I still use that when I’m learning new scales. I guess I’m pretty methodical about working on stuff.
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When did you decide to make a career of it?
I guess it was a result of deciding to go to Berklee –– I must be going to pursue music if this is what I’m going to college for. I was doing shows with my friends up in Boston and before my last year of college, Tim O’Brien called me to join a band he was putting together for Steve Earle and the Bluegrass Dukes, which was Darrell Scott, Tim O’Brien, Dennis Crouch, Steve, and myself. I was twenty at this time. So I moved down to Nashville for the summer between my junior and senior year of college to live there while I did this gig and check out Nashville to see if it was a place I’d like to come back to. As a result of doing that, I got to know some folks, so during my last year of college I was also playing gigs down with people in Nashville. So I kind of had a foot in the door rather than just going straight from college.
When did you start developing your own take on music? Your fiddling has a lot of characteristics that are pretty unique.
I’ve always been interested in different music, any sort of music. In high school, if there was a song writer, I was going down and plugging my fiddle in and trying to play along. Guys writing tunes and playing blues and rock stuff. Jazz tunes. I wanted to figure out how to make the fiddle work in anything. But this first band that I had, Minor Bluegrass, we didn’t have a mandolin player. So I started playing rhythm in that band, doing the chop for the mandolin in the middle of the bow. Then it turned into sort of bouncing the bow on the 16th and 8th notes in between, keeping the emphasis. I was excited about this rhythm thing going on on the fiddle. I thought, hey, this is pretty cool! And then somebody said, “Hey, you should check out the Turtle Island String Quartet.” So then I listened to that and I met Darol Anger a summer or two later and here I find that he’s been doing this for years and years and already has this technique down. I learned what he was doing and borrowed some of that. Then I’d go back to Berklee and I’m playing with a bunch of funk musicians and playing R&B music, and I’m listening to slap bass players and drummers with different grooves. My stuff develops as a result of the music I’m listening to, so it’s going to have its own flavor to it.
In general, when you’re playing, you stay pretty close to the frog, which is not that typical among fiddle players. Did you just get used to playing there from your rhythm playing or have you always done that?
I’ve always tried to use a full bow and holding the thumb down here, you’ve got a little more bow that you can use. At some festival, somebody told me I had a stiff wrist and I needed to work on that. The way I did it was I practiced just playing in one part of the bow. Just trying to use my wrist or use my fingers. It’s not as pretty a sound and it makes things difficult having the weight, but that was one way I started to try and loosen these elements up. Just play tunes there [at the bottom of the bow] for a little bit. But then with the chop things, when you try to play little lines in between, you’re already here [at the frog], so you’ve got to keep playing there so you can be right there for the rhythm. I think as a result of that I feel pretty comfortable [there]. There’s a certain sound that you get. It’s more punctuating. It’s a good way to give more energy or emphasis on certain notes. You get a crunch there. I notice I bend my pinky back when I’m doing the chop things so that I have something to push against. Otherwise it feels like my hand is going to slip off.
So is your chop technique pretty similar to Darol Anger’s, then?
I think it’s basically very similar. There’s one thing that’s happening for me that young fiddlers have been interested in –– a triplet thing that happens. The bow hits the strings and you feel it wants to bounce a little. I’m drawing it towards myself, dragging it on the strings and it kind of pulls and bounces there and it’s a matter of learning how to control how many [bounces] it does. You can do it in both directions. I think that’s something that’s unique to my playing.
And then you work a lot of melody into it.
Yeah, chords, bass lines, I think about it like a guitar player might strum to back himself up. I practice a drum groove. Where is the kick drum hitting, where is the snare hitting, what kind of pattern is the high hat doing? I know I can’t do all those things but maybe I can grab the essential elements of those to get a certain kind of groove.
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For the rest of this interview, and Casey’s arrangement of “Gaptooth,” subscribe to Fiddler Magazine!
For more information, including sound and video samples, visit Casey’s web site at www.caseydriessen.com. Thanks to Molly Nagel of Sugar Hill Records and Ellen Giurleo of Full House Promotions for their assistance in arranging this interview.
[Peter Anick, co-author of Mel Bay’s “Old Time Fiddling Across America,” plays fiddle with the Massachusetts bluegrass band Wide Open Spaces (www.wideospaces.com).]
 Photo: Courtesy Hettie MacRae
A Highland Gentleman: The Roshven Fiddler
Farquhar MacRae
By Shona McMillan
Google “Farquhar MacRae” and little information will be found pertaining to this fiddle and box player from Roshven. Yet, in 2000, his funeral at Glenfinnan was one of the biggest ever seen as hundreds of people traveled from all over the Scottish Highlands and Islands to pay their respects to this most remarkable man. As a musician, he was not recognized as a prolific writer of tunes or as a formal teacher of students. Nevertheless, in Scotland’s traditional music scene, his name is synonymous with Highland music at its best. So, for this kindly, generous, fondly remembered man, it is fitting that his legacy is not to be found in the factual, emotionless listings of the Internet but rather in the living musical legacy which he gave so freely to others. From village hall dances to the largest of traditional music concerts around the world, the love and passion for music which he knew and instilled in the young is itself now being passed on for the benefit of subsequent generations. Many of today’s internationally acclaimed West Highland musicians recognize his influence in their most formative of musical years.
Iain MacDonald of Roshven Records relates, “Growing up in Glenuig, I knew Farquhar since childhood. He had a significant influence on my musical upbringing and was the first person I ever played with professionally… A quiet, gentle, self-effacing man, he would be surprised at the huge influence he has had on so many and the high regard in which he is still held today! He was a consummate musician and a consummate gentleman.”
As a boy who taught himself to play by ear in a remote part of the Highlands, Farquhar grew up to become a man internationally respected for his music. So, how does his story begin?
Not long after the turn of the last century, the MacRaes –– Duncan MacRae from Faddoch, near Dornie in Kintail and his wife Mary, a game keeper’s daughter, from Crianlarich –– moved to Roshven. Working in farming they set up home in Moidart and raised five children: Donald, Dougie, Katie, Farquhar, and Peggy.
Born in 1925, Farquhar’s early life was very different from life in Roshven today. Recalling this time, his sister Peggy MacRae, just a few years younger, speaks of their life in “another world.” “There was no electricity, no hot or cold running water, and to get to nearby villages, we had to walk four miles over the hills to Glenuig or take a boat for six miles to Lochailort. Not until 1967 did the road open.”
Peggy recalls three or four scattered houses in Roshven, all occupied by people working the land. However, such a physically demanding lifestyle also had benefits. Living off the land gave people the deepest appreciation of their environment, its changing weather and seasons. Socially, there was a tremendous sense of community. When work was done, people enjoyed their time free from cell phones, email, Internet, and TV. For Farquhar, his time was all about the potential for music –– to hear new tunes, and to learn and develop these into sets to play with others. Peggy remembers him as a young child, playing a small two-row piano accordion. There was music in the family on their mother’s side and a cousin in Inverness, Dougie MacDougal, was a particularly good box player. Yet from Roshven, Inverness was the other side of Scotland. Peggy suggests it is likely that the initial musical interest sparked in her brothers was from a local musical family, the MacKenzies.
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As the siblings grew, so too did their appetite for playing, and from this the Roshven Ceilidh Band was born. Considering the geographical challenge of their starting point, their motivation was impressive. To go to dances they had to walk for miles over the hills and, after playing, return again on foot. At local halls, the drums would be already set up for Peggy. Farquhar, with equal ability on accordion and fiddle, would play the button box while his brothers played the fiddle. Peggy and the three boys, with their musical instruments strapped to their backs, would hike back and forth to the different venues. In time, Farquhar also picked up the pipes and could “knock out a tune” on the piano. Music from such a talented family made for an entertaining if unpredictable event. Crossing the hills in rain, sleet, snow, and gales would play havoc with their time-keeping but dancers would patiently await their arrival. If a late start happened it was only likely to result in a later finish, perhaps at three or even four o’clock in the morning.
As another young person growing up in Moidart, Fergie MacDonald would enthusiastically attend these dances. Today, he recounts many humorous stories from this time. In one, Fergie remembers watching the MacRaes leading a hall packed with dancers as water dripped around the musicians’ feet, their clothes soaked by an earlier downpour.
Within this community, Farquhar’s musical ability flourished. The creative strengths he gained from others he contributed back through his playing. As a young adult, Farquhar was a great inspiration and encouragement to those around him. For example, Fergie MacDonald was about nine or ten when he first heard Farquhar play the box and states, “Farquhar was the one who gave me the music bug.” From about age twelve, Fergie would go to dances, sit beside the stage and “soak up Farquhar’s every intonation and interpretation.” Over time, Fergie would be passed the box, given wee shots, and encouraged to play. As Fergie’s ability grew, professional bookings were undertaken and thus began a musical relationship which would span nearly half a century. They performed at special gigs abroad and all over Scotland, at every fiddle and box club. Fergie fondly remembers these days, and the conversations they shared in the car after each gig. At the start of each journey, Farquhar would settle himself in his seat, ready to enjoy a wee smoke on his pipe and begin the countless stories they would share, so that the long journeys were as enjoyable a passage of time as the gigs had been. Fergie later composed “The Roshven Fiddler” for Farquhar.
Fergie explains that Farquhar could convey to those around him his personal love for the culture, Highland music, songs, and tradition. “On the violin, Farquhar had an almost magical way of playing and reaching his audience –– his playing would stir the soul. One of the greatest Northwest fiddle players I have known, a unique player and absolute Highland gentleman. Farquhar should be recognized posthumously for the contribution he has made throughout his life to Scotland’s traditional music.”
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Farquhar was known for playing reels with a gentle, fluid grip on the bow, and jigs with graceful speed and precision. He was associated with tunes such as “Mrs. MacPherson of Inveran” and “Donald MacLean’s Jig” and, unusual for a traditional player, he also learned to play in different positions. Iain MacFarlane of Blazin Fiddles relates, “Farquhar was my next door neighbor for many years, a great example of a ‘Highland Gentleman,’ who lived for his music. I will always enjoy the special memories I have of his tremendous ability on the fiddle, so apparent when he would play tunes like the ‘Mason’s Apron’ with all its variation in first, second, and third positions.”
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In the locality of Moidart, there were many fine musicians who influenced Farquhar’s music and, at thirty-one, it was an eye opener for him when he met left-handed fiddler Angus Grant. Brought together through their work on Inverailort estate, Farquhar confided his surprise when he learned that Angus had adapted his fiddle for left-handed playing. Farquhar explained that he was totally left-handed and had struggled to play in a right-handed fashion.
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Similarly in music, he enjoyed the opportunities which playing awarded him. At home he was delighted to meet visiting musicians such as Alasdair Fraser and Buddy MacMaster and through invitations abroad he enjoyed meeting the people and musicians there. As a fiddle competition judge, Farquhar was especially proud to be invited to the Highland Games at Grandfather Mountain in North Carolina. There was also a side to him which could take great delight in achieving the unexpected. Whilst attending the Grandfather Mountain games, he entered a Jew’s harp competition and surprised everyone when he won!
Throughout his life, Farquhar worked hard at what he did and had many plans for retirement, including the making of a CD. Yet suddenly, at one very typical gig, everything was to change. During the last waltz, playing next to Farquhar on stage, Angus Grant and the rest of the band became aware that something was changing in Farquhar’s playing. The tune finished, the audience not even knowing that anything was wrong, and an ambulance was called and Farquhar was rushed to the hospital. Just into his seventies, tragically, Farquhar had suffered a stroke and would never be able to play music again.
After the terrible shock, the immediate community rallied round, the young playing many benefit gigs and ceilidhs to raise a tremendous financial contribution which went towards a vehicle for Farquhar to get around in. In the years which followed, Hettie took Farquhar in his wheelchair all over the area to various gatherings and musical events so he could get out and be with his friends. Not embittered by the loss of his music, Farquhar displayed characteristic strength and dignity and continued to enjoy the tunes, companionship, and craic of the younger players.
Angus Grant describes the day he last saw Farquhar, on the field at Glenfinnan Games. Surrounding Farquhar in his wheelchair was a small crowd of people, many young, all laughing and talking with him, pleased that he was there. Sadly, just a few days later, Farquhar died of a heart attack.
Reports estimate that as many as 800 may have attended his funeral. Tourists must surely have thought that some great Highland Chief had died when Farquhar’s coffin was finally taken to Glenfinnan Games Field, the scene of so many earlier happy events and sporting achievements. Angus Grant recalls, “On the shoulders of the young bloods his coffin was carried for one last time in a lap of honour around the Games Field. Then a sporting cup, bearing his name, was filled with whisky and passed round the coffin bearers to take a drink to his name.”
In August 2000, Farquhar was laid to rest in the small graveyard in Glenfinnan on the shores of Loch Shiel. The musical gathering which followed his passing continued for days and, appropriately, celebrated the life of this remarkable Highland gentleman, Farquhar MacRae, the Fiddler from Roshven.
For the full text of this article, as well as the tunes “The Roshven Fiddler” by Fergie MacDonald and “Farquhar and Hettie’s Waltz” by Farquhar MacRae, subscribe to Fiddler Magazine!
[The author wishes to thank Hettie MacRae and Peggy MacRae, Iain MacDonald, Fergie MacDonald, Angus Grant, Iain MacFarlane, Allan Henderson, Iain MacMaster, Murdo Morrison of Radio Mod, Roy Carbarns, Stan Reeves, and from the School of Scottish Studies, Cathlin Macaulay, Caroline Milligan, and Andrew Wiseman.]
[The photographs accompanying this article is copyright of Harriet (Hettie) MacRae and should not be reproduced in any form without her written permission.]
[Shona McMillan is a fiddle-playing photo journalist and artist living in Edinburgh. Shona learned to play the fiddle by ear with Edinburgh’s Shetland Fiddlers Association and players such as Aly Bain before receiving a scholarship from Alasdair Fraser to learn in America with Willie Hunter from Shetland and Buddy MacMaster from Cape Breton. In Canada she guested with the Waterboys before journeying to Ireland with Martin Hayes and continuing to learn from players John Sheahan of the Dubliners, Steve Wickham of the Waterboys and Gerry O’Connor of La Lugh. Shona can be reached at shonamcmillan@yahoo.com. For more information, please see her myspace page at www.myspace.com/delfiniproductions.]
Christian Howes: Jazz Fiddle Revolutionary
By Peter Anick
If there are still any skeptics about the viability of the violin as a bona fide jazz instrument, Christian Howes is on a one-man mission to convert them. Drawing on his top-notch classical chops, his well-honed improvisational instincts, and life experiences well beyond the typical suburban violinist’s, Christian’s edgy and soulful solos tap the full range of the violin’s expressive power.
A “Yamaha Performing Artist,” Chris is equally at home on electric and acoustic violins. He has toured with ex-Miles Davis saxman Bill Evans’ Soulgrass group, which has been developing a new fusion of jazz and Americana. He was nominated for a Grammy for Best Latin Jazz Album as a member of Dafnis Prieto’s Absolute Quintet. His 2004 Jazz Fiddle Revolution recording with Nashville’s Billy Contreras demonstrates how two unaccompanied acoustic fiddlers can belt out powerful funk, bebop, and blues, with one fiddle comping while the other solos. And he leads his own band, blending everything from classical to rock into an eclectic, electric mix. It’s no wonder that Matt Glaser calls him “the incredible hulk of the jazz violin.” Put a violin into the hands of this down-to-earth, Midwestern philosopher and anything might happen –– and usually does.
I met up with Christian in Detroit at the ASTA (American String Teachers Association) conference where he was offering several clinics on improvisation. With his strong classical background, he connected easily with the string teachers in the audience and it was clear that his passion for playing music was matched by a knack for teaching it. Our interview was equally animated as he recalled his early flirtation with classical music, a college education interrupted by the lessons of life in prison, and the subsequent discovery of his true musical calling.
Christian: My folks were singers, vocal majors at OSU (Ohio State University). They put me into Suzuki violin when I was five, so I did that... Violin lessons –– that was the one thing my parents always made sure they had money for… When I was about thirteen or fourteen, I went to Chautauqua (Summer School of Fine & Performing Arts) for a couple of summers, and that was a notable experience in my life, because there was this girl named Ruby, a year younger than me, and she just played so beautifully, it’s hard to say if I was really in love with her or the playing. She played the Bruch [violin concerto], and hearing her play and rehearse with the orchestra, I remember thinking that’s what I wanted to do –– be a classical concert violinist. Back at that time, it was the break dancing period, and I was into break dancing. I had this light blue sweat suit –– they used to call me “the smurf” –– and I remember walking around the grounds with this big boom box on my shoulder blasting Lalo’s “Symphonie Espagnole” or the Bruch violin concerto, all the romantic violin concertos. So I was really identifying at that moment that this is what I really wanted to do. That’s when I really started self-motivated practicing, up to three hours a day sometimes… I started to get the first chair in all the orchestra auditions and competitions, and the teachers started saying that they heard a maturity in my sound and a musicality emerge in my playing. I never thought I was the most technically gifted, but I had a sense of musicality –– I was really interested in phrasing. I was really philosophical about it, how you’d make the phrases work, how you’d make music sound like real music and feeling.
Around that time, in high school, some of my friends got guitars, basses, and drums and started rock bands. So I started playing bass in a band, started playing guitar a little bit. I always stress that to kids –– if you get a chance to play bass or electric guitar in a band, you should do it. It’s so easy if you play violin. It’s a big confidence booster, ’cause then you have this lexicon that you can share with the regular people, the non-classical geeks. It occurred to me that my friends who had just taken a couple of guitar lessons all of a sudden were jamming along with Jimi Hendrix records… I remember thinking at that time, there must be some deficit within me, that I wasn’t very creative. You know, I had practiced all these hours and all these years but there was something different between my ability to play classical music on the violin and my friends’ ability to just jam creatively, even though they hadn’t had much training.
So I became very interested in why that was. I was kind of self-conscious about that. And I tried to become more creative. I started writing songs. I played some songs on the piano and sang a little bit –– stuff like that. Eventually I went to college and was still playing bass and guitar. I was playing bass with this old blues guy named Ronnie Taylor and one day just got out the violin and played a little bit for him and he was blown away…
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I was kind of like a hippie in my first year of college. I was seventeen and playing with these older guys in their twenties. I was in the honors dorm and I was with the orchestra, then I got hired with the chamber orchestra in town. I kind of felt like a big fish in a small pond. But where I found my place was playing bass in the classic rock bands in the bars with these guys in their twenties. And dealing bags of marijuana was how I carved out a social scene for myself. I learned the lesson of what it is to be the guy that has stuff that people want. Everybody came to my apartment. It was kind of like I had all these friends, but really they just wanted to smoke my pot. So it was kind of a dark period in my life, in a certain way…
I had kind of cleaned up right before the indictment. I had the realization, “Okay I’m out of control. I’ve got to get myself together.” But then the secret indictment came. I sobered up real quick. By law, the judge was required to give me fifteen to life. I was eighteen when this went down. I really didn’t believe it, “Come on. OSU scholarship, violin player, Boy Scouts, youth groups, leadership this, national this…” I cried profusely. I was totally devastated. And then I went to prison.
But in prison, some of the lessons I learned were really profound. I was twenty when I went in, twenty-four when I got out. Probably the biggest thing I learned was a sense of respect. I had been in a world of kids. Now I was confronted by a world of men. And I had to find my way around. What do I believe? What do I stand for, and what am I becoming? Every day, you have to take a stand one way or another in prison…. I had a violin in there and from time to time I was able to play. I learned a lot from interacting with the other convicts… I would interact with all these different groups of people in different musical situations. The ones that were serious about music, they wanted to learn from me, because knowledge is a valuable currency in prison. So I had a lot of interaction through that, and throughout that, I was learning about different cultural concepts of manhood. All these amazing stories.
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These kinds of experiences also changed my understanding of what music is. Music was a spontaneous thing that just occurred in the community. It didn’t have a thing to do with top billings in magazines and dressing up to go to the concert hall, commercialization and institutionalization and academia. Music is going to happen whether any of us have anything to say about it or not. It’s a humanizing factor, an element of humanity that just has to seep to the surface even when there is no community. Music makes people remember their humanity. On another level, it’s just something that comes out of a person. Everybody has their own way to get to the knowledge of what it is.
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So you had to define for yourself how the violin could fit into those kinds of music. Were you transcribing a lot from singers?
Yeah, I was seeing that that was possible. There’s no reason the violin couldn’t do what the saxophone does, or these singers do. I would really try to emulate Prince, or Stevie Wonder, or Aretha Franklin. To get into the essence of their sound, what makes the blues, basically. When I got out, I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to become recognized as the preeminent jazz violinist, in the sense of blues-infused jazz. For Americans, the violin represents concert halls, martinis, and bowties, the triumph of reason and capitalism. And I came to feel that I could attach myself to a nobler purpose –– by trying to really understand the blues. The biggest lesson I learned from prison is that I had to have respect for the uniqueness of every person’s experience. And the uniqueness of how people arrive at things. And that means to have respect for “the blues.”
With that perspective, once you got out, how did you pursue your musical goal?
With gusto! I had the dream and I put everything into it. I felt I had the ability and something to say as an artist, and I wanted to get heard.
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How do you get the blues across on the violin?
That’s a hard question. There are a couple of ways we can go at that question. Number one –– go to a black church service, just sit in on a service. The blues is related to African-American culture and it’s important to have enough respect to have a commitment to learn about the culture. I understand that I had a unique situation that allowed me to do that, but we have to acknowledge where this music comes from and try to explore it. That’s one way to go about it. Here’s another way –– a simple idea about the blues that we can give to violin players. At the most basic level, a twelve bar blues is just two statements. The first statement is repeated and then there’s an answer. Violinists don’t get that simplicity –– one statement over four bars, repeating that statement again with a slight variation, and then answering it. People are always trying to play all these lines and licks and pentatonic licks, and that’s not really the blues. It’s got to be a simple statement. That’s a lesson in and of itself. Play simple ideas and leave a lot of space.
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Is that what you’re thinking when you are improvising?
When you’re improvising, you can take an impetus from an infinite number of sources. This goes into a whole other clinic that I do about improvisation. We have this idea that the impetus for improvisation comes from certain specific things, like stylistic conventions or knowing a scale to play or knowing the chord tones to play. But those are just a few examples of infinite structures. I can be inspired by a color or the warmth that I feel from the light, or thinking about how my breakfast tasted. There are so many things. What I focus on depends on the context, but I try to listen for inspiration from the other guys in my band. If the drummer is playing real busy for a second, I might stop, for example, or if someone is playing with a triplet feel, I might imply a triplet feel, but not necessarily in the same way. I’ll focus on playing rhythmically really tight, because rhythm is a structure, regardless of the harmony. Or let’s say I don’t have any rhythm. I could justify it in another way, with harmony. Regardless of rhythm and harmony, you can give purpose to what you’re playing just by will alone. Just by being committed to it. Something in that is enough to make it music.
Do you listen back to your own playing often?
I think that is the single best way to improve. I should listen to myself every day. My mentor Bobby Floyd always has a tape recorder, every gig, doesn’t matter what it is. The single best way to improve: record yourself and listen back. When you listen back, you hear bad things –– things you can improve by simply omitting! Oh, I rushed. Okay, so I’m not going to rush any more. Oh, I played too many notes. Okay, so I’m not going to play all those notes. Oh, I played that lick that I always play, and I’m playing it too many times, so I’m not going to play that lick any more. You can be so much better just through omission, by just not doing stupid things. When we play, we have this perception of what we sound like when we’re playing, but that perception is not necessarily close to reality. But by listening back, our perception while we’re playing gets closer and closer to reality.
How do you like participating in events like ASTA? Do you enjoy talking to classical musicians about the kind of music you play now?
I do. I’ve come to see that it’s a really important thing for me to do, that I may be better as an educator than as a player, which is hard for me to acknowledge because I really like to think of myself as a performer. But I love teaching, working with classical musicians and helping people to find the freedom of being creative. I feel that as classical musicians, we grow up with this concept of ourselves that we’re not creative. We have to realize that that’s a lie we’ve been living. We have to learn that we really are creative. To watch people have those doors open up for them is a beautiful experience. To feel that I can help people, that really makes me feel like I am doing something good in my life. And that’s why I have established the “Creative Strings Workshop.” The workshop is a labor of love for me. What I’ve set as my goal is that this workshop should give people a life-changing experience. A lot of this was inspired by being at Mark O’Connor’s camps for years and seeing the total positive community that’s there, the total positive spirit of jamming. I want to facilitate that same spirit with a community of students and teachers, but with other stuff going on. It’s primarily for adults, eighteen and over. Last summer [2006], there were twenty-five participants and I booked eighteen concerts during one week. Basically, the curriculum of the camp is that all the participants choose as many of these eighteen concerts as they want and they have to go and play in these concerts, in a wide variety of urban cultural settings. So it included a jazz club, nice restaurants, the basement of an Appalachian bluegrass shop, a black church, salsa dance party, park, theater, kids’ concerts, playing avant-garde music, playing Latin jazz, playing Brazilian music, playing swing, and so everybody is getting in the mix. And we’ve got rhythm sections and tons of teachers and you’ve got so much music to learn. It’s like, “What are you going to do tonight? Are you going to be part of the Brazilian concert, are you going to play at the bluegrass jam? Then go here and get in this clinic and learn these six tunes that you’re gonna solo on tonight.” It’s super intense, not for the weak of heart! I think that there is nothing like it. I’m really excited about it.
A Yamaha Performing Artist, D’Addario Elite Clinician, and newly-appointed associate professor of music at Berklee, Christian maintains a busy performing and teaching schedule. He recently completed a recording with Soulgrass that included Béla Fleck and Sam Bush. A DVD of his Madrid concert with the Horacio Icasto Quartet was released by Arkadia Records in August. His 2008 Creative Strings Workshop will be held June 30-July 6 at Otterbein College in Columbus, Ohio. Teachers will include Billy Contreras, Rob Thomas, Bert Ligon, and a host of other instrumentalists, arrangers, composers, and bandleaders, addressing fiddle styles as well as jazz, blues, avant-garde, and other styles of improvised music.
www.christianhowes.com
www.myspace.com/christianhowesviolin
[For the full text of this interview, and Christian’s arrangement of “Groove Merchant,” subscribe to Fiddler Magazine!] |
