New Album from Fiore and Polansky

courtesy of Giacomo Fiore

Last last month guitarists Giacomo Fiore and Larry Polansky released a duo album, consisting primarily of “short takes” played on electric guitars. The title of the album is from pike, citing the folk song “Sweet Betsy from Pike.” This is one of the six selections from Ruth Crawford Seeger’s 22 American Folk Songs publication of arrangements. That set is followed by Nat Evans’ “branching streams flow in the dark.” The final selection is Polansky’s “34 (more) Chords: Charles Dodge in Putney,” one of the pieces in his 8 fermentations on a sketch by Charles Dodge. Amazon.com does not seem to be aware of this release, but it is available in both physical and digital download form on a Bandcamp Web page.

Last summer, when American Bach Soloists presented their Bach Explorations miniseries as part of the annual Festival & Academy, there was a concert presenting relatively familiar compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach played on instruments other than those Bach had intended. One of those instruments was a five-string banjo; and I was reminded of Pete Seeger’s Goofing-Off Suite album, which had taken a similar approach to not only Bach but also several other composers and sources. (For example Seeger played his own take on Igor Stravinsky’s take on a Russian folk tune that had been included in the score for “Petrushka.”)

Seeger was the son of musicologist and composer Charles Seeger, whose second wife was Ruth Crawford. Listening to the opening selections on this album, I realized that Pete’s “informed playfulness” probably owed much to the influence of his stepmother. One of the tunes in this set is “The Higher Up the Cherry Tree,” which I first learned through listening to albums of The Weavers, although I cannot remembers whether it was sung by Peter or Fred Hellerman. What was important about these selections is that Ruth took a playful approach to her arrangements, and that playfulness was clear throughout the tracks that Fiore and Polansky recorded.

Things turn much darker with the Evans track. This is set against a recording of the verbal dexterity of an auctioneer. One is never aware of just what is being auctioned. However, the solemn progressions by the guitars seem to suggest an ambiguity that is as likely to refer to slaves as to farm animals. The recording gradually lapses into reverberations, which seem to bring a darker side to the auction. This piece then segues smoothly into Polansky’s own composition, as if the progressions simply continue after the auctioneer has left his post.