Displaying items by tag: mandolin

On the surface, Tim O’Brien’s career seems maddeningly eclectic. But over the years, he’s become a subtle master at mixing the primary musical colors into his own distinct sound. You hear the numerous influences in every note, yet each and every note is uniquely his own.

The Wall Street Journal has characterized O’Brien’s work as
"classic-sounding material stamped with his own perceptive personality."

It has been four years since his last solo recording, but between collaborations with Darrell Scott, the recent Grammy winning recording with Jerry Douglas’s Earls of Leicester, and the rebooting of Hot Rize, he’s barely had time for a shower. Still, somewhere in O'Brien's vivid imagination, the seeds of Pompadour began to sprout, and the fruits of his recent wanderings, music making and worldly observations have blossomed into eleven exquisitely varied, true-to-life and above all musical tracks.

Grammy Award winning multi-instrumentalist Sam Bush doesn't seem old enough to be a musical legend. And he's not. But he is. Alternately known as the King of Telluride and the King of Newgrass, Bush has been honored by the Americana Music Association and the International Bluegrass Music Association. "It's overwhelming and humbling," Bush says of his lifetime achievement award from the AMA.

In Tim O’Brien’s music, things come together. The uncanny intersection of traditional and contemporary elements in his songwriting, his tireless dedication to a vast and still-expanding array of instruments, and his ongoing commitment to place himself in as many unique and challenging musical scenarios as possible has made him a key figure in today’s thriving roots music scene – and well beyond it.