Michael Daves tours three Northeast cities this week in support of his new album, Orchids and Violence. Joining him are Punch Brothers banjoist Noam Pikelny and fiddler Brittany Haas. The tour stops at World Café Live in Philadelphia on Thursday, The Red Room @ Café 939 in Boston on Friday, and The Parlor Room in Northampton on Saturday. "Noam and Brittany are both incredible improvisers and great listeners," says Daves. "These shows are going to be full of surprises." You can watch the trio perform the album track "June Apple" here.
Grammy-nominated guitarist and singer Michael Daves tours three Northeast cities this week in support of his critically acclaimed two-disc set, Orchids and Violence, released earlier this year, and the newly released vinyl edition, Violence and Orchids. Joining him for these performances are banjoist Noam Pikelny (Punch Brothers) and fiddler Brittany Haas (Crooked Still, Haas Kowert Tice). The tour begins at World Café Live in Philadelphia this Thursday, followed by a show The Red Room @ Café 939 in Boston on Friday—which WBUR names one of 10 Boston Concerts Not to Miss This Summer—and a sold-out early set and a newly added second show at The Parlor Room in Northampton on Saturday. For details and tickets, visit nonesuch.com/on-tour. You can watch the trio give a live performance of the album track "June Apple" below.
Pikelny and Haas recorded with Daves on disc one of Orchids and Violence, along with other bluegrass notables Sarah Jarosz and Mike Bub, plus special guests including Tony Trischka. On disc two, Daves recorded the identical track list of 12 mostly traditional bluegrass songs but in a raw, electric reinterpretation, and playing most of the instruments himself. Violence and Orchids, the vinyl edition, is a single-disc mashup that interweaves the bluegrass and electric versions of five songs from the original double album, presenting side-by-side the contrasting interpretations of each song.
It's "a roots-music master class, a brilliant example of old modes reinhabited with flair," says the New York Times of the album. "To his credit, it can be hard to pick which version of a tune is best."
For this week's three Northeast dates, Daves, Pikelny, and Haas will adapt the full-band bluegrass material from Orchids and Violence to the trio format. "Noam and Brittany are both incredible improvisers and great listeners," says Daves, "so the trio format is going to allow us to be a lot more free and spontaneous with the album material ... These shows are going to be full of surprises."
To get the album, head to your local record store, iTunes, Amazon, and the Nonesuch Store, where you can pick it up on CD, vinyl, HD digital, FLAC, and MP3.
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