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Darol Anger
Primary genres: Fusion, Modern Jazz

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One of the founding members of the Turtle Island String Quartet (TISQ) (at left, in this picture with Edgar Meyer), Anger has contributed a great deal to both jazz and new age. His first project was as a founding member of the David Grisman Quintet. He followed that with a variety of projects and groups including Montreaux, the Turtle Island String Quartet, and Psychograss. His latest project is a solo album called "Heritage: New Interpretations of American Roots Music." He was kind enough to send me an advance copy, and it's wonderful. With guests including Mary-Chapin Carpenter, Bela Fleck, Willie Nelson, David Lindley, Vassar Clements, Michael Manring, and Jane Siberry, just to name a few, and Darol's arranging and playing to boot, you get some idea of just how "big" a record this is. The cover art is show below.

In the early days of the Windham Hill label he frequently contributed to other artists' projects, and established a new age sound with an interesting combination of jazz and folk styles in Montreaux. His more recent work with TISQ has left his early Montreaux sound to concentrate more on jazz with a strong sense of classical string quartet ensemble and dynamics. He also contributes his teaching skills to the Stanford Jazz Workshop (I don't know if he's there every year, but there are always some members of TISQ there.).

Not one to limit himself to the merely sane, Darol's founded Psychograss with Mike Marshall, Tony Trischka, David Grier, and Todd Phillips. It ain't bluegrass, it's Psychograss. Having seen a Psychograss concert with my very own eyes here in Seattle (as opposed to the eyes I keep in St. Louis for those special occasions), I could spend many keystrokes on superlatives and appreciative description. By hey, why waste your time on my words, when you can get it all straight from the horse's mouth. Check out the Psychograss web site for all kinds of useful, psycho, wacky information. Don't be fooled by the humor, though. Ensembles of this caliber are rare, and it's well worth your time to check them out.

For listening, I'd recommend Who Do We Think We Are? or Turtle Island String Quartet if you want to hear his quartet work, or Chiaroscouro or Tideline to hear some of his work with other folks. There's also a nice compilation of Montreaux available that has all their best songs.

Here's a sample from his album with Mike Marshall, "Chiaroscouro":

Dolphins (.AIFF format, 347K, 30 second clip)

"Dolphins" copyright Š Mike Marshall

Here's a sample from his album with Psychograss, "Like Minds":

Tree King Creek (.WAV format, 333K, 30 second clip)

"Tree King Creek" copyright Š Sugar Hill Records

Web/Email

http://www.catalog.com/psygrass
http://home.earthlink.net/~tisq/index.ie.html
http://www.ancient-future.com/quiet.html
http://www.sfm.com/dawgnet/dailybone/dg-jazziz.html
http://www.sfm.com/dawgnet/artists/DGQ.html

Email:

Discography

With the Turtle Island String Quartet:

THE TURTLE ISLAND STRING QUARTET: A WINDHAM HILL RETROSPECTIVE (1997)
BY THE FIRESIDE (1996)
WHO DO WE THINK WE ARE? (1994)
SPIDER DREAMS (1992)
ON THE TOWN (1991)
SKYLIFE (1990)
METROPOLIS (1989)
TURTLE ISLAND STRING QUARTET (1988)

With Montreaux:

LET THEM SAY
SIGN LANGUAGE

With Psychograss:

ANGER/MARSHALL & PSYCHOGRASS
LIKE MINDS (1996)

Solo or with other groups:

HERITAGE (1997)
CHIAROSCOURO (with Mike Marshall)(1985)
LIVE AT MONTREUX (with Barbera Higbie)(1985)
TIDELINE (with Barbera Higbie)