East flatbush blues

[Perry]

I am surprised that no one has commented on Andy Statman's new CD. I just got mine so I am still absorbing it. There are some great moments on there. Part of the what makes it interesting is the guitar-less trio format. Is it the work of a madman or just some crazy picking?

[jmcgann]

Ah, you are asking me? I've been a huge fan since the mid '70's.

Andy is one of my all time favorite musicians regardless of genre or instrument. A truly unique player who happens to be IMHO the world's greatest mandolinist, bar none. Not to mention the fact that he embodies the spirit of Klezmer and traditional Greek music, to name two, having learned directly from the sources (Dave Tarras). His clarinet playing is as incredible and expressive as his mandolin, too.

Of course, if you want someone who knows the Monroe Tradition, look no further-Andy learned not every Monroe solo available on LP, but also any live tapes he could get his hands on- by the age of 15 or 16!

Andy says "chords put you in too much of a bag" When he was in the Wayfaring Strangers, Tony Trischka and I would hold each other's (instrument) necks while Andy soloed- he only wanted bass and drums...which is the format he's been mostly playing in for the past, oh, almost a decade or so.

I had no problem shutting up and listening to him go...it was a privlege to share the stage with the ultimate mando Jedi!

I guess he's my Chris Theile #

[John Rosett]

i completely agree with john. to me, andy statman is not only one of the greatest mandolinists of all time, but one of the greatest musicians of all time. no other mandolinist makes me think about music and it's spiritual roots like andy does, no matter what instrument he's playing.
i played east flatbush blues for a friend that i used to play in a jazz group with, and he payed me the ultimate compliment by saying "now i understand where your playing comes from". i've been a big fan since i heard andy's playing on barrel of fun by country cooking, and his music just gets better and better.
i can only say andy, please give us more!

[MandoSquirrel]

I'm with John & Mandorose; if it has the name "Andy Statman" on it, there's not really anything left to say.

[SternART]

Andy was killer at the Mandolin Symposium this year.....from his heart direct to the instrument, a rare immediacy of expression....like he was
channeling...too fast and intuitive to involve thinking about what he was doing. I bought the CD there and have been listening to it, hey
how 'bout that Rawhide!!! or Bluegrass Stomp!!! I recall Mike Compton enjoyed Andy playing the Roots Waltz...really captures the flavor of some
of Mike's pre BG stuff on Stomp. I'm not sure what ol' Bill would say..but I say "Incredible!"

[Jeff A]

I love the CD. He is so into what he is doing, that he moans when he is playing. Its not in tune and not humming along, but pure moaning. At the Symposium the moaning was a surprise for me as I had not had much exposure to him and never seen him in person. On the CD, most of it is either edited out or he toned it down. Bluegrass, Jazz, and Klezmer mixed together from the fingers and mind of Andy. Amazing combination.

[Elliot Luber]

I just can't want until he releases the CD with Richard Thompson. They're both favorites of mine.

[Perry]

Wow....Richard Thompson and Andy Statman. That should be an interesting combo. Do you know any specifics on this project?

[Don Grieser]

Well, East Flatbush Blues just arrived in my mail today. It's all I've been listening to since I got home from work. Since no one has really tried to put into words what's going on with it, I thought I'd try. Now I'm someone who's pretty well rooted in the Monroe style, but I appreciate great jazz as well--Coltrane, Miles, and now the Andy Statman Trio which includes Jim Whitney on bass and Larry Eagle on drums and percussions.

The album kicks off with Rawhide, but this is not Monroe's Rawhide. This is a raw hide that is being processed and tanned. The hair is coming off and the leather is starting to look real refined. It's obvious that these musicians have studied this tune and know it from the inside out. Even the drum solo sounds like Rawhide, and when Andy comes back in after the drum solo, the tune shifts into a whole higher gear in a way not dissimilar to the way it does when Monroe took his last break on the tune.

Andy and crew then hit Bluegrass Stomp and really play it as a blues. Andy's playing shows that no one can touch him in pure virtuoso playing, but he never loses the blues emotional content of the tune. Again the drummer and bass player show they understand where this tune lives and just make it a killer blues tune.

The third cut is Arkansas Traveller, with just mandolin and hand percussion. It is perhaps the most outside of the fiddle tunes he plays--the most difficult for me to hear the original melody. Stellar playing though.

The band takes on Golden Slippers on the fourth tune. Andy again shows his virtuoso playing style. Musical ideas seem to sprout full grown from his heart to his hands. The bass player plays a tremendous melodic version of the tune for his solo as does the drummer. Andy takes it home full tilt, with plenty of style and great explorations of the melodic motifs that abound in the tune.

Roots Waltz, a Statman composition, is the fifth tune, and it's here that the band really hits its stride. It's like they paid some homage in the first 4 tunes, and now they get down to real business. The tune starts with mandolin and percussion. When the bass comes in, it all ties together. Andy's tremolo is unmatched as is his ability to pull tone. Again the bass player pulls off an incredible solo as well. This is such a beautiful melody and it's played with great feeling.

17 is the title of the sixth track. I'm positive that this album was recorded with just the three musicians playing together, and there's probably no punching in or click track or Pro Tooled fancy editing. This is a real performance. The playing on this tune is just out of this world. It's one of my favorites.

The title track, East Flatbush Blues, is a blues. It starts with mandolin and the bass doing a great walking line that just flows with with the mandolin, the way 2 people who play a lot of music together know where each other is going. The drums come in and the groove grows ever deeper. Moaning the blues.

Track 8, Sweet Potato, is an uptempo fiddle type tune with a great uplifting melodic hook. Andy plays it with great verve; you get the feeling that he's playing it like he means it. Even in the Coltrane-like flights of notes.

Track 9, Uman, may be the masterpiece of the album. It starts with bowed bass, and the minor melody the comes in on the mandolin seems to be rooted in the Jewish religious music that is central in many of Andy's clarinet recordings. It's pure spirit being made manifest in music. Each player feels it and brings their whole heart to the piece. It's hauntingly beautiful and just perfectly executed, including the surprise uplifting shift in tempo at the end with the reprise of what sounds like some of the melodic motif of Sweet Potato.

Track 10, The Memphis Jacques, is another bluesy tune and at slower tempo. It includes some incredible bowed bass. The band seems so locked in to each other dynamically in this tune as well.

On track 11, the band goes back to a traditional fiddle tune in Old Joe Clark. By this time, they've established that they can and will do what they will with any tune. Andy has his mandolin cross-tuned on this one, and the band just totally cuts loose on it, taking great flights of fancy, but coming back to the melody in different ways after each flight. Andy picks up the clarinet for some free jazz in the middle of this one. It gets pretty wild and crazy on the mandolin too.

The CD ends with The Sensitive Waltz, another beautiful melody written by Andy. Andy shows again what a masterful right hand he has and an incredible tremolo. Again the tune is rooted in a minor key and played with such perfect tone and emotion. A great ending to a groundbreaking CD.

Andy Statman is a master musician, a master mandolin player the likes of which we will never see again. His music is so deeply rooted in who he is, his metaphysical beliefs, and a musical genius of the rarest sort. We need to hear more from him.

[mandolooter]

ok ok Im gonna go buy it....lol!

[Glassweb]

Don, a really great, thoughtful review of Andy's latest. A question though... obviously there are players like Chris and Mike and Hamilton who can technically play what Andy plays, but to me he has a musical vocabulary and spiritual depth that no-one else does. Would you say it's ultimately his musical roots and vocabulary that set him apart from everyone else? Thanks Don!

[luckylarue]

Love the percussion and the bass soloing on stuff like "Golden Slippers". These guys boldly go where no mandolin/acoustic trio has gone before, imo. Their interplay reminds me of the famous Coltrane quartet w/ Garrison, Tyner and Jones - incredible, telepathic communication. I could listen to Andy's tone all day long.

[Don Grieser]

Thanks, Glassweb.

I believe it's the spiritual aspect of his music that sets him apart. It's obvious to anyone who listens to him that his technical ability is just astounding. But his playing is not about that. There's a depth behind the technique that goes straight to who he is. His musical roots certainly give him his own vocabulary. If you listen to his mandolin jazz instruction series, he starts out with Monroe and he plays the Monroe stuff with a depth of understanding that rivals Mike Compton. When he moves on to blues and jazz, it's easy to see that he's spent the same time learning that vocabulary as well. And he's an acknowledged master of klezmer music so that makes a very interesting musical brew and this CD shows what he can do with it.

I can certainly understand how some people could be turned off by what he does on some of the tunes from the bluegrass/oldtime tradition. If you can get past the attitude that it's not bluegrass and hear what he's really doing, it's just pure genius. There's a clip on YouTube of him playing Rawhide with Skaggs and Cherryhomeless. It's obvious that he should have been featured a lot more--he's way beyond anyone else on stage without trying to show anyone up or anything like that. He's just amusing himself playing the tune, and while it's unlike anything anyone else plays, it's the tune nevertheless. It's great.

[Glassweb]

Thanks Don, I think you've got it right about Andy... he's coming from a high place for sure!

[AlanN]

Yes, Don, very erudite review. And coming from a manalin picker...

[Mike Bunting]

What else can be said? I agree with every positive thing written, he personifies the overused word, awesome and check out his quartet on "The Hidden Light", mostly clarinet but it doesn't matter.

[Don Grieser]

You're right about the Coltrane comparison. I don't have "Hidden Light" (I'm going to be buying a lot more of his CDs) but I do have "Between Heaven and Earth." It's mostly clarinet too, but like you said, it doesn't matter. I definitely could hear the Coltrane connection with that one. This trio is so locked in to each other, and they really understand these old fiddle tunes in ways I know I don't but wish I did.

[SternART]

I have tickets for his SF show tomorrow night!!! If I can swing it......I might go Sunday too,
he plays in Sacramento the next night! Really looking forward to this, wonder if Grisman is in town?!

[jmcgann]

obviously there are players like Chris and Mike and Hamilton who can technically play what Andy plays...

Although they could sit down, transcribe, and play back the notes, it wouldn't be the same music .I'm not sure that they could CONCEIVE of what he plays. It's the musical content, the conception of the type of lines he plays. None of those three guys have the strong jazz background Andy has- he was a tenor sax player for a time, and a serious jazz player, not a moonlighter.

I love and respect the music of all three you mention, but I bet they'd be the first to admit they cannot play the kind of stuff you hear from Andy, not only on the new CD, but as far back as the early '70's, say on stuff like "Pike County Breakdown" from Tony Trischka's Heartlands- there has never been a mandolin player before or since who would play with that kind of harmonic adventure and rhythmic conception.

There is a big difference between playing mandolin on a jazz tune and playing JAZZ on the mandolin. There is a language and syntax unique to fiddle tunes and bluegrass, another unique to jazz improvisation. IMHO.

[Duc Vu]

Don,
Very eloquent review.
You should check out the companion release,Awakening From Above.

[luckylarue]

I got his Klezmer instructional dvd from Homespun. No mando but it's awesome just see/hear him articulate what he's doing musically. Highly recommended.

[Glassweb]

I agree with John completely. Yes, Andy's technique is staggering, but his musical mind and spirit are even more so. I was a student of Andy's back in the 70's... before he joined up with Bromberg's band. He was doing things back then that were unfathomable... even by today's standards. And he's just gotten better and better... Oy!

[Don Grieser]

Glassweb, could you tell us about your lessons? Luckylarue, thanks for that heads up. I'm adding that DVD to my list of Statman stuff to buy. Any stories about playing in a band with Andy would be welcome too, JMcGann.

[SternART]

Just saw Andy's Trio last night in SF @ the Jewish Community Center.....quite a spiritual performance, opening with about a 15 minute clarinet piece that started totally improvised & morphed into a few hundred year old Hebrew theme. He picked up the mando for the last few numbers of the set, and played it the entire 2nd set. Joined by Grisman, at the end, just after Andy had taken apart & reassembled Turkey In The Straw, from barely the melody .....to outer space and back .....to where you could tell what tune he was playing.... David & Andy started noodling like on their Mandolin Abstractions CD......and improvised a long mando conversational intro to Flatbush Waltz, and a playful version of the tune, both clearly enjoying the moment. David must feel honored to have Andy introduce him as one of his two most influential teachers. Next was an incredible Golden Slippers, in and out of focus, building up and up to a soaring climax....of way up the neck tremelo, with intense rhythmic qualities. For the encore a moving vesion of Shalom Alechem, where they each soloed after the head......and ended in harmonic bliss, as they returned to the melody. It was a spiritual ending to an awe inspiring show. The beginning set mostly on clarinet was for me a revelation, the freedom of spontaneous improvisation, the way Statman can keep making it up on the fly, developing themes, taking them apart and reassembling them....he plays directly from his heart to the instrument with a freedom seldom seen in my years of music appreciation. This inner voice speaking thru the mandolin results in a unique voice on our instrument. Andy's one of a kind talent is awesome.....add Grisman and it really was a special night! Andy, with his incredible Trio, plays Sacramento tonight.....I thought maybe I'd go again, but to be honest I'm drained & might not have the energy, I hung on every note with intense focus last night and could hardly sleep afterwards. The music spoke to my inner soul in a way that has left me totally satiated.

[jmcgann]

I played alongside Andy in the early Wayfaring Strangers days, 1997-2002 or so. There were times Matt wanted him on clarinet, and we had amazing jazz pianists like Bruce Barth and Laszlo Gardony, which made guitar a bit redundant, so I played mandolin on those pieces. Some smartass came up to me at a NYC gig and said "You've got a lot of balls playing mandolin with Andy on stage!"...but I reckon he was jealous that I could transcend my low self esteem It was as horrifying as you can imagine to try and be loose and solo with a guy like that on stage with me...but life is short and we must conquer our fears, or wind up living under a bridge somewhere...

Of course, when he played mando, I'd be back on guitar, and the experience of playing with him was wonderful. We didn't get enough of a chance to interact for my taste, as it was essentially a 'big band' (9 people). One of my best friends, Jim Whitney, is playing bass in his trio now, and he reckons he's played over 375 gigs with Andy!

I sure hope we'll get a chance to do more stuff in the future, but Andy is VERY uncompromising and I can't see him playing much music that is outside of his personal vision. He is a force of nature!