MandoMorphosis
Empty Sea Studios,
Sat. January 16th, 2010

Producer and musician Scott Schaffer brought together seven veteran acoustic musicians, all of them top-flight performers on multiple instruments including mandolin, for the project "MandoMorphosis." The result of this collaboration was a fine album called 2010, reviewed in the Victory Review by Nancy Vivolo. On January 16th, four of the musicians from this ensemble played a CD release concert at the intimate Empty Sea Studios. The concert was sold out, and deservedly so. (A party of folks who had driven down from the San Juan Islands but hadn't bought their tickets in advance from Brown Paper Tickets had to be turned away.)

Orville Johnson, Matt Sircely, Michael Connolly, and Scott Schaffer put on a lively two set, fifteen song show that blended elements of Appalachian, Irish, and Brasilian music with contemporary bluegrass and jazz improvisation, performed on two, three, and four mandolins, with dobro, fiddle, and standard and tenor acoustic guitars.

I enjoyed precisely what Scott emphasized in our interview after the show, the group's ability to "run with" each other's "unique contributions" and do so "in real time." This requires musicians with keen, attentive ears for what the others are playing from moment to moment, and fast hands able to respond instinctively to what is going down. All of these performers have those gifts in abundance, and their combination made those of us there to hear them perform into keen listeners, too.

In the January, 2010 Victory Review article "Searching the Cutout Bins," I mentioned the Rounder album Mandolin Abstractions by David Grisman and Andy Statman. They also were interested in music "composed spontaneously in the studio as it was being recorded." MandoMorphosis performed three free-form improvs during this show. We tend to associate composition-in-performance with ensembles such as Oregon and the Kronos Quartet, on the one hand, and on the other with the Grateful Dead and its offshoots, such as Phil Lesh and Friends. It is a delicate art not easy to pull off. Nonetheless, all three of the tunes they invented on the spot at this show worked.

As I wrote in an article on Brasilian chôro music for our December, 2009 issue, virtuoso performers such as Jacob do Bandolim and Yamandú Costa not only interpret their tradition, they MAKE music. Such performers don't bother taking sides between "popular" and "classical" traditions, but rather revel in both as "composer-performers" willing and ready to arrange and improvise upon all of the music they've grown up with and loved. The gifted pickers of MandoMorphosis come ready to "make music" in this sense. They aspire to the casual precision of Garcia and Grisman, and they certainly have the chops to go there.

Their fans will hope to hear more from them.

Interview with MandoMorphosis

As I approached the stage after their concert, Orville Johnson was holding forth on a trip down the Mississippi River with banjo master John Hartford, a mentor and friend from paddlewheel steamboat shows back in the day:

[Orville Johnson] I played on the same paddlewheel steamboat that John Hartford trained on to get his pilot's license. Back around 1973-74, our boat was hired to be the steamboat in "Huckleberry Finn." So we had to go to Natchez, Mississippi, which is where they were shooting the film. Usually our home port was Peoria, Illinois on the Illinois river. But we had this movie gig, so we had to go down to Natchez, Mississippi, and come back from Natchez. So on that particular trip, because we were going to do this job, we had no passengers on this boat. So we went from Peoria, Illinois to Natchez, Mississippi with just the crew members on the steamboat.

It took us about four days to get there, and it took us about seven days to get back, coming back up against the current. So we ended up spending ten or eleven days traveling the whole length of the Mississippi River on the steamboat with just the captain and the crew and the people in the band. We played a lot, y'know, and we had a lot of musicians come by, and of course John Hartford was on the boat all whole time. When he wasn't learning to be a steamboat pilot, he was around picking all the time. So that was a wonderful experience, the whole thing.

Mark Twang's mercurial humor and willingness to dive in and pick anything at all with agile-fingered friends are evident in this group. It would be fun, I thought, to hear MandoMorphosis perform "Got No Place to Go," a lovely, laid-back cut from Hartford's tasty 1972 album Morning Bugle with guitarist Norman Blake and jazz bassist Dave Holland. Soon the other members of the group ambled over, and we began talking about Empty Sea Studios as an intimate venue for acoustic players:

[VR] You said that when you first came in here and saw this place gutted, and the stage just going in, your first thought was that this project looked a little nuts. Did you think then that this thing was ever going to happen the way it did tonight?

[Scott Schaffer] Well, I knew Michael a little bit before the project, and I knew if he said it was going to happen, it was going to happen. I didn't think it was going to happen on this scale, and with the immediate success that it did. I mean, it's remarkable.

[Matt Sircely] When I came back here for the first time since he renovated the place, I really had no idea what to expect. I didn't know where he'd put the stage, and I couldn't imagine how he'd fit forty-five people in here. It's just amazing. It's really great that people can be up close to acoustic instruments in a listening environment, so close that you could feel the wind shaking.

[Orville Johnson] It's a really cool venue.

[VR] I was fascinated by the way you improvised tunes from scratch in performance. That's not an easy thing to pull off.

[Scott Schaffer] One thing I can tell you is, I've done that in the past with great results. I just kind of put people together, maybe lay down a few ground rules, and let the musical chemistry work itself out.

[VR] When you've got this much musical skill on stage, I expect that it makes it easier for the musical chemistry to go somewhere.

[Scott Schaffer] You know that's true, but it's also a state of mind. It's more than just the skill. We've got some great musicians, including the people who weren't able to come tonight because of geography, who also added their own unique elements. Really, what I like about this project is, we each have pretty deep roots in folk and blues and jazz and other familiar areas, but everyone is a little bit different. People bring their own original elements, and when you put these people together, great things can happen.

[VR] I'm curious about the influences on this music, especially the pieces you improvised on stage. I've seen Oregon do that. It was lovely to hear you guys decide that you wanted to do that, structurally, for part of the set. Who are your models for that kind of work? Whose music comes into your ears?

[Orville Johnson] I'm just listening to what other people are doing. This thing that we're doing depends upon listening to the music, you can't really do it without listening. And paying attention to the other musicians in that way is a respectful, thoughtful way of playing.

Having a lot of free improvisation sort of forces listening. Y'know, learning stuff is cool, having arrangements and practicing and making the music sound a certain way. But when you've played something a lot of times and you've got this part you're supposed to play, you sometimes get to a place where you're not hearing the rest of the music. You know, you're just playing what you're supposed to play, and you're not really getting in that place where you're really hearing what people are playing.

[Matt Sircely] And there's so many things happening at once that you have to listen -- you can't just think about it -- you have to listen in a really intuitive way.

[Michael Connolly] I think the same way. It's really, that type of music, that sort of free-form improvisation totally depends on listening to the other players. So you kind of get ideas, you know, you give out a few ideas, but you get a lot of ideas from what the other players are doing. So it's kind of a musical conversation, in a way. That's sort of what I'm thinking about when I'm doing it.

[VR] You're all fierce listeners, and it sounds delicious while you're doing it. This is clearly something you really wanted to do, to get the musicians responding to each other. Scott, you enlisted seven mandolin players from across the United States to record an album called 2010. How did you choose the players?

[Scott Schaffer] I wouldn't say that I "picked" the people. I just started talking to some people who I thought might be interested. And then, for example, Matt introduced me to Orville, who I hadn't met previously. I was looking for people who had the type of musical sensitivity that they could engage in a process like that, which probably isn't for everyone. But for the right, I was looking for the right combination of people, and I knew that the first time we got together, there was some really nice chemistry here.

[VR] How does the diversity of backgrounds among the players contribute to the sound that you're getting here?

[Scott Schaffer] I think the CD illustrates that there's just a vast range of backgrounds that people bring. There's really a lot of diversity here, and you can hear it come out in different ways on different cuts. I think that each individual person in MandoMorphosis has a really diverse background, so there's a sense of expansiveness in what might come out any time we play something. One thing I learned is never to expect anything, because you'll always be wrong. (laughter)

[Orville Johnson] Low expectations, no disappointments. (more laughter)

[Scott Schaffer] No, I didn't have "low" expectations. I would say that when we went in to record the album, we didn't have many rules. We had a few tunes with structure, but we also just decided that from time to time, we're just going to press the record button and see what happens. Some of those pieces ended up on the CD, and were really surprising and interesting things because we didn't premeditate them. I thought there were great moments in the studio where things just spontaneously happened.

[Michael Connolly] You hear a lot of little magic moments that no one knew, we couldn't have known, that they were coming. But a couple of people took the lead at the same time, and their leaps went to compatible places. It's kind of a surprise, and you're hearing it get composed in front of you, which is cool.

[Orville Johnson] It's fun and it's amusing, you know? Which is one of the great things about music. I mean a lot of it is all serious and all. But it's really great when you're all playing together and improvising like that, and then something just sort of happens where you all just play the exact right thing together. It just cracks you up, it makes you smile, it makes you laugh, which is the good part.

[VR] Orville, how does the music you are playing in this project contrast with what you do with your Kings of Mongrel Folk?

[Orville Johnson] Well, when Mark [Graham] and I do our Kings of Mongrel Folk thing, that's all composed. We don't just start playing, we play songs and pieces that we've written. The free-form improvisation for the Kings of Mongrel Folk is our bulls**t between songs. (laughter all around) The songs are all set.

[VR] Matt, you really love Django Reinhardt and Gypsy jazz. Has any of that found its way into this project?

[Matt Sircely] In the free stuff we did? I don't think there's a direct connection. By nature, this is a unique experience. I'm into lots of different types of music, different traditions. The group I play with that references a lot of Django is Hot Club Sandwich. It's not a very strict Django Reinhardt...

[VR] Not a doctrinaire thing.

[Matt Sircely] Yeah. It's not a very strict representation of Django's music, necessarily. True, there is a huge improvisational element that references Django's music, along with other great string improvisers from that era. But it's also completely different from what we're doing here.

I think that during the course of an improvised piece, we're finding out things about the other person that we didn't know before. You hear little hints come from somebody else. Like tonight when Michael and I started off on our last improvisation, where we--

[Michael Connolly] That was very Bach-y.

[Matt Sircely] Yeah, I was going to say, because we were talking about Bach in the car yesterday. And I think that we ended up playing something that was--

[Michael Connolly] fugue-y.

[Matt Sircely] Yeah. (laughs)

[Michael Connolly] I used to play orchestral clarinet. I went to college for that, and then I did a 180 turn at the last minute. But I spent a fair amount of time playing in symphonies when I was a kid, and it definitely rubs off on me. Like I hear that coming out.

[VR] Michael, you play a number of instruments in demand at Irish music seisiúns, including fiddle, uilleann pipes, tin whistle, and harp. Are you able to add an Irish tinge occasionally on this project, for example when you're playing fiddle?

[Michael Connolly] You wouldn't think of Irish traditional music as having a high improvisational component. There is improvising, but it's very, very restricted, much more restricted than a lot of American music that descended from it. So the improvisation is like, oh I'm going to use a slightly different ornament this time through the tune, or I'm going to change rhythmic pulse in this. However, my phrasing on the fiddle definitely bleeds over from Irish music. It's hard to get rid of certain things. (smiles) So you definitely hear little left-hand ornaments that are from Irish music.

[VR] Orville Johnson, as a youngster, you sang in a Pentecostal church?

[Orville Johnson] Yes, I was raised in the Pentecostal church.

[VR] And you play a mean dobro now. Do you feel a connection between the native energy of the roots music you play today, and the energy of that sanctified church music?

[Orville Johnson] Well, you know, the thing that comes from that in my musical playing is, that when I was a kid and I went to that church, the only thing I really liked about it was the singing. You know, soon as I was a teenager and I could get away from having to go to church, I did (laughter). But I always loved the singing, and it was the kind of singing that is "sanctified," you know, it's fervent singing, it's not like singing in a choir. It's like everybody sings whatever they feel like singing, and if you feel like "Praise Jesus, hallelujah, hosannah," that's what you sing. It's about the spirit of the thing.

So that's what I think I learned from singing in the church when I was a kid, and I think that comes out in everything that I play. The dobro especially, because the dobro has a quality, because of the slide and not having frets, that you can phrase as if you're singing, you can phrase in a vocal manner. So when I'm playing the dobro, what I'm actually trying to do is sing, but make it come out of an instrument. I do that with everything I play, but I probably accomplish it the most when I'm playing the dobro, because there is such a connection between the sound that you can make with that and the sound of a human voice. You know, I play a lot of instruments, and a lot of people think of me as an instrumentalist, but I think of myself always as a singer.

[VR] Even on a project like this, where there's not very many vocals?

[Orville Johnson] Yes, but still everything I'm playing is a product of my thinking, the way a singer thinks to create phrases.

[VR] Matt, you've worked with David Grisman on a project, yes?

[Matt Sircely] On a couple different things. As a teaching assistant, mostly. I wrote liner notes for one of his albums.

[VR] Grisman, in addition to being a famous musician, is also a mandolin scholar, of course. And you've also written for the Fretboard Journal and for Strings.

[Matt Sircely] Yeah, I put together an article on the founding of the David Grisman Quartet. That was all a collection of direct quotes.

[VR] Does your work as a music writer help you to clarify what you want to work toward as a performing musician?

[Matt Sircely] Well, I think that the amount of effort that I put into writing a music article must certify me as a complete music fanatic. (laughs) I believe that it's important to show a musician the respect of getting really, really into their music when writing about them. Getting into their story, getting into everything I can about them, for at least a couple of weeks. Which means listening to their music on repeat, listening to and transcribing a hundred thousand words of interviews. I've done articles on many great players -- Grisman, Statman, Wade Mainer, Lee Stripling. Writing about them has had a huge influence on my music.

[VR] I actually thought during some of your jams of that album Mandolin Abstractions that Statman and Grisman did in the early '80s. There's some wonderful improvs on that.

[Matt Sircely] We talked about that album as we were getting the idea for this project together.

[VR] Really?

[Scott Schaffer] Yeah, I picked that up when it came out [in 1982]. That was one of those recordings where I said "Wow." In my mind that was a breakthrough, because I'd never thought of the mandolin as doing things like that.

[VR] There's a cut on there "Two White Boys Watching James Brown at The Apollo" which knocks me out every time I hear it.

[Matt Sircely] Actually, that tune was very influential on me before I played the mandolin, when I was a D.J. on the college radio station. I spun it all the time. It was on a compilation [New Acoustic Music] that I found it in the trash at the radio station.

[VR] Yeah? (humming the R&B vamp that Grisman plays).

[Matt Sircely] I got really into that tune. Started playing the mandolin a few years later.

[VR] Michael, you've performed in situations ranging from symphony orchestras to Irish dances in bars. Do you enjoy blurring the dotted lines between classical, popular, and folk genres of music?

[Michael Connolly] I do. I think the classification in general is something that happens after the fact. We classify records in record stores, and we develop programs to teach classical music and jazz, but few people really will tell you that they are strictly one thing. You know, we're exposed to different, nobody grows up in a cultural vacuum any more, where we only hear one type of music. And even if you make a formal study of it, it's really hard not to have it [all] rub off on you.

[VR] Well the internet does the opposite thing. It opens up a lot more opportunities to hear different genres than people used to have.

[Michael Connolly] Yeah. When I was learning Irish music, there were not actually a lot of people who played it in Memphis. It was great for being immersed in blues and bluegrass, but Irish music I actually learned, I heard the people that I wanted to sound like mostly from the internet, more than I had a community in Memphis to learn it from. When I moved to St. Paul, I was actually immersed in that community. I brought some bluegrass with me to St. Paul.

[VR] Did you record this project here?

[Michael Connolly] No, we recorded it at Garey Shelton's studio in north Seattle. Garey Shelton is a grammy-winning engineer who does really, really fine work. If you look at album credits from northwest bands, you'll see his name pop up over and over again. He's on a bunch of Danny Barnes' records.

[VR] What projects are you hoping to do here at Empty Sea Studio? In your recent interview with our Mike Buchman and Ron Dalton, you mentioned the Toy Box Trio.

[Michael Connolly] I just finished doing the project with the Toy Box Trio, an ensemble of toy piano, tuba, and concertina, a really interesting group. I'm also doing a project for the Americana singer-songwriter Jeremy Serwer, doing his full-length album here, and I'm doing a piano-driven album for singer-songwriter Travis Hobrla.

[VR] Do you know where this project is going next?

[Orville Johnson] Well, let's see. (smiles) I have to go to west Seattle, Matt has to go to Port Townsend. Hard to say.

[Scott Schaffer] Yeah, as typically in this project, we don't know what will happen next.

[Orville Johnson] Yeah, that's kind of a free-form improvisation too. Wonderful to hear though, and fun.

[VR] It's a fun thing for us out in the audience, too. Good luck with it. Thanks for your time, everyone.

Set list for MandoMorphosis

Here is the set list for the MandoMorphosis CD release concert at Empty Sea Studios on Saturday January 16th, 2010. Orville, Matt, Michael, and Scott performed seated on four chairs, from our left to right on the compact stage.

Set 1:

1. "Improv #1" (all)
Orville: mandolin. Matt: mandolin. Michael: mandolin. Scott: mandolin.

They began the night with an improv on four mandolins that sounded like a cloud of crystal-winged dragonflies. This reminded me of the ensemble sound achieved by the guitarists of Guitar Craft who founded the Seattle Guitar Circle, then went on to form the Tuning the Air ensemble.

2. "Matt's Idea" (Sircely)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: mandolin. Michael: violin. Scott: guitar.

Michael's fiddling sounded at times country, blues, or Irish. Orville hit a crisp intro into a mean dobro solo. He's a real pro. Matt's own solo was brief but really tasty.

3. "A Minor Squabble" (Connolly)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: tenor guitar. Michael: mandolin. Scott: guitar.

Another cloud-like intro, followed by rapid 16th-beat syncopations in a minor key. Lots of attention to dynamics, each of them watching the others and taking cues from whoever is playing lead at the moment. The flawless recording of this song on the album brings out their fine ensemble playing.

4. "Hamhock's Razor" (Johnson)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: mandolin.

This quick one was a wicked duet between Orville and Matt. It's built on two eight-bar phrases, each of which is repeated. Matt's mandolin dances over Orville's slide until the tune becomes something like a rag. Matt claims that Orville brought this one to him two minutes before they recorded it. If he learned this riff in two minutes, the rest of us should just quit. Their window-rattling rush to a dead stop set off an explosion of applause.

5. "Cascadia Raga" (all)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: mandolin. Michael: violin. Scott: guitar.

This is the last of the seventeen tracks on the generous album. It is a slowly gathering piece stirred together from pensive strumming that gradually resolves into a monochromatic drone that spills over into a one-chord jam. In the midst of things, Matt tuned his mandolin down to an open tuning, and they wandered off, pushed along by Orville making bells ring next to his bridge. Michael's violin lead them into a bridge section, then Matt and Michael concluded with a duet, while Orville and Scott maintained the drone beneath them.

6. "CrimeDog" (Schaffer)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: mandolin. Michael: violin. Scott: mandola.

Michael played the melody on mandolin, then Orville took off into another crisp, dead-on solo. Matt then came in at blistering speed, doubling a beat that was already brisk. The 4-5, 7-8 chord change was, as Orville put it, "music that could be learned quickly," then powerfully realized.

7. "Nero's Fiddle" (Johnson)
Orville: mandolin. Matt: mandolin. Michael: violin. Scott: mandola.

The one track on the album with a vocal, by Orville. It's a foursquare Allegany mountain peace hymn with unison melody and archaic diction, no doubt written during the previous administration (a good time for one of those). The album version adds a harp part at the end that drifts from one ear to the other and back, like a moth rattling around an empty head.

8. "Ed" (Sircely)
Orville: Mandolin. Matt: mandolin. Michael: mandolin.

This gentle mandolin trio sounded Brasilian to me, like a chôro composition by Ernesto Nazareth for society dances in 19th-century Rio. But Matt Sircely wrote this graceful sixteen-bar tune for Galen Garwood's independent film Ed and Ed.

9. "Improv #2" (all)
Orville: mandolin. Matt: mandolin. Michael: mandolin. Scott: mandola.

A second group improv ended the first set. Michael laid down a funky beat, and Orville and Matt began to scat-sing. Soon Michael and Scott joined in, and things just rolled along through various combinations of musicians to a unison ending. During the intermission, Orville remarked drily that "we try not to over-rehearse." He was smiling, and so was the audience. These guys bring their chops with them.

Set 2:

10. "Shaken Waltz" (Sircely)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: mandolin. Michael: violin.

They began the second set with a pair of trios, neither of which appear on the album. Matt commented that this one is "never more than a beat away from a waltz," and explained later that at certain points it slips from "waltz time" (with a 4+4+4 pulse underneath) into 13/8 divided 4+2+4+3 / 4+3+3+3. Whew. I'd like to try that rhythm myself some time.

11. "MC Blues" (Connolly)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: mandolin, guitar. Michael: mandolin.

Michael calls this 3/4 blues "unrepresentative of Memphis." As Matt played a percussive mandolin solo, Michael slapped the neck of his instrument in time. Then Matt switched to tenor guitar so that he could drive the rhythm. They are all fierce listeners. The slow, funky 12/8 suggested a sly reference to Miles Davis's "So What."

12. "Rencontre" (Schaffer)
Orville: lap dobro. Matt: mandolin. Michael: mandolin. Scott: guitar.

Scott then rejoined them on guitar for this tune, which he wrote for the Edge City Collective album Kosmischstrasse. Their version was used on the sound track of the film Port of Angels. As the melody descended through three and four chord patterns, I thought of the stately performance of "Icarus" by Oregon on their 1980 album In Performance.

13. "Out of the Furnace and Into the Fire" (David Tiller)
Orville: guitar. Matt: mandolin. Michael: mandolin. Scott: guitar.

A tune written by absentee mandolinist David Tiller, who played on the album but couldn't make it to Seattle for this concert. They passed Orville a guitar, then Matt hit the opening run with a wham! Soon Matt and Michael were playing double harmonies on their mandolins, and the song bounced along with stylish sass.

14. "Catfish & Crystal Waltz" (Johnson)
Orville: guitar. Matt: mandolin. Michael: violin.

Orville said that he wrote this song years ago, but hadn't ever gotten anyone to play it. It's a real waltz that doesn't appear on the album, with a sentimental melody and a 16 bar minor bridge. The second time through, Matthew played some fine country fiddle. The third time featured a lovely duet between Matt's mandolin and Matthew's fiddle. Shades of "Hotel California." Orville played solid rhythm guitar throughout, supporting them.

15. "Improv #3" (all)
Orville: mandolin. Matt: mandolin. Michael: mandolin. Scott: mandolin.

The night ended with a third improv piece on four mandolins. Matt and Michael started this one off, then Orville kicked things into a country dance beat with something like a reel on "Shortnin' Bread." Soon things were kicking along in a brisk 12/8, and they pounded through a repeated 1-b7-b6-5 riff. Michael started stomping out a percussive vamp, and the others did variations on his opening run, which built into a sound sculpture of strummed rhythms. The audience gave them a well earned standing ovation.

Afterward, Orville seemed as cheerful and wry as your favorite uncle. "We tried to record these tunes before we knew them too well." Oh, you've all got these tunes down well enough. Live and lively, these fine pickers appeared to be enjoying thoroughly the ongoing musical conversation that it was our pleasure to overhear. We'll hope to hear them do more of the same soon.

Hank Davis

• Also by Hank Davis
• Feb. 2010: "'I Can't Stand the Rain'"
• Feb. 2010: "Lincoln Crockett Q&A: Mando Cat's gone after his smile"
• Jan. 2010: "Searching the Cutout Bins for New Year's Treasures"
• Jan. 2010: "Mike Buchman & Ron Dalton @ C&P Coffee Company"
• Dec. 2009: "Follow Marco: Chôro, Villa-Lobos, and Modal Jazz"
• Nov. 2009: "She Who Knows All Your B.S."
• Oct. 2009: "Both Ends of the Rope: On Audiences and Venues"
• Oct. 2009: "Great Lake Swimmers with The Wooden Birds and Laura Gibson"
• Sept. 2009: "Politics and Popular Music"