Danish National Vocal Ensemble - O Listen to the Music of Uros Krek & Else Marie Pade - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

Planning for Burial is the solo project of Thom Wasluck, emerging from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. It's Closeness, It's Easy is the long-awaited follow-up to 2017's Below The House. If Below The House was about returning home, following in the footsteps of one's father and joining a union, and leaving behind youth's wild days, It's Closeness, It's Easy embraces what comes next-the weight of all years, the quiet shifts, the reckoning with what remains. This record is many things. It captures the slow drift of time, the unnoticed shifts in a loved one-the creeping changes in mental health, the quiet pull of addiction, the kind of grief that settles in the bones rather than announces itself.At it's core, It's Closeness, It's Easy is about stepping into middle age and taking stock. It confronts the reality of living with the hand that's been dealt and searching for meaning in what remains. It speaks to loss-the crushing weight of saying goodbye to a beloved 17-year old cat, the slow-motion grief of watching friends self-destruct, the inescapable passage of time as it bears down on aging parents and the self. But it also reflects the warmth of reconnection, the kind of love that never burns out but instead deepens. The feeling of picking up where things left off, untouched by the years in between.While written over the course of two years, the recording process reflects a sense of immediacy. Rather than assembling songs piece by piece over time, the album took shape in singular, immersive sessions-less an act of construction, more an unveiling of something already waiting to take shape.Rooted in a staunch DIY ethos, Wasluck handles every aspect of Planning for Burial project himself-recording the music, designing the artwork, and performing live as a one-man band. He books his own tours, ever and independent creative. This hands-on approach has led Planning for Burial to p

The fiddle-banjo duo is as fundamental as it gets in various American folk music forms. On veteran fiddler Kenny Kosek's Twisted Sage, that is a sturdy foundation for a series of vibrant explorations of tradition-based tunes, but also a launching pad for leaps beyond tradition. Paired for much of the album with banjo innovator Tony Trischka, Kosek brings a sense of wonder and supreme musical imagination to the familiar and the strange alike. None of this will surprise those who have followed his wide-ranging path as a recording and concert favorite of Jerry Garcia, Willie Nelson, David Bromberg, James Taylor, Leonard Cohen and countless others, not to mention his frequent collaborations with mandolinist/clarinetist Andy Statman going back to their early folk groups in the late 1960s. Statman joins in on several pieces, including InchTurkeys in the StrawInch - that's plural - with the classic tune rendered first as a jaunty ragtime, then a fairly straight square-dance setting and finally a manic speedgrass run. Also making guest appearances are guitarist Mark Cosgrove, who joins Kosek for a duet of InchEvan's FarewellInch (a version of which appeared on Kosek's 1997 solo album Angelwood) and banjoist Marty Cutler, who teams with Kosek on InchGojira Country Breakdown,Inch a fantasia on the InchJapanese Army MarchInch from the 1954 monster flick Gojira. Other tracks range from the Moldavian InchJewish DanceInch (a version of which Statman recorded with his Klezmer Orchestra 40 years ago) to InchTexasInch (Kosek and Trischka sparring on a piece based on a 1966 field recording of Henry Reed) to tunes from the British Isles. The recordings, with vibrant production from Kosek and Edward Haber (whose Shefa Records tag is releasing this), come from both studio and live settings, twisted together in a scintillating whole.

Odense Symphony Orchestra - Orchestral Music [COMPACT DISCS] date 03/25/2003