The Infamous String Dusters  

November 6, 2009

Friday 9:00pm

Detail:

 THE INFAMOUS STRING DUSTERS  W/ JUNIOR LEAGUE BAND 

All successful creative endeavors thrive on change. The Infamous Stringdusters career is no exception. But just as many things have changed since The Stringdusters’ inception in 2006, the essential elements have remained the same. And now the progressive sextet is more focused than ever on exactly what makes them unique: the musical integration of six individual musicians into one visionary sound.

 

While critics have loved to declare the band newgrass torchbearers, this group is actually a broad melting pot of American music. Backgrounds range from training in classical and jazz to hard rock to stints backing country legends and high lonesome heroes.

 

When the group first emerged in 2007 there were immediate accolades—IBMA awards and a chart-topping debut record. But the group—Andy Hall (Dobro), Andy Falco (guitar), Chris Pandolfi (banjo), Jeremy Garrett (fiddle), Jesse Cobb (mandolin), and Travis Book (upright bass)—was viewed as a collection of Nashville’s most sought after young guns getting together for a super jam.

 

Now after spending nearly 200 days on the road together for the past three years, The Infamous Stringdusters have become a “band” in the truest sense of the word. It has taken hard work and determination on a range of stages from Telluride and the Ryman to city clubs and European cafes, but the group has turned a corner. This is no longer just an outlet to showcase individual instrumental wizardry. Instead the six members have become a single musical entity focused on original material and a collective spontaneity that makes each live performance completely unique.

 

“The more we play, the more everyone’s deep musical influences become a part of the whole band,” says Book. “With this group the well runs deeps, and when this band is at its best we’re developing a new sub-genre of acoustic music. We definitely have a communal thing going on and the music is falling in line with that.”

 

To make any band with six members work, it’s essential to check egos at the door. There are certainly times for individual expression, Pandolfi and Garrett each released critically hailed solo albums earlier this year, but The Stringdusters predominant skill is distilling the myriad influences into one voice and in turn taking acoustic music to places it has never been.

 

“When we started we relied on our abilities on our instruments to carry us,” says Hall. “Now we have a band sound. There’s new maturity and element of trust that’s taken us beyond the introverted focus of the individual members. We’re writing music together and that translates to a better listener experience.”

 

The band recently retreated to the hills of Central Virginia to record their third album for Sugar Hill Records. Look for the album to be released in the spring of 2010.

 

William Waikart

 

When Will was a child he got his head stuck between the automatic sliding doors of a local hardware store. It was during this traumatic experience that he decided he should probably take up the drums. Many years and musical endeavors later Will received a bachelors degree in Music from George Mason University. After graduating will laid on his couch for a few months until he was approached by Lissy and eventually joined Junior League.

Lissy Rosemont

 

Born and raised in Atlanta Georgia, Lissy Rosemont came to Washington DC to pursue her graduate degree at Georgetown. Lissy grew up with three distinctive musical influences 1) her mother waking up the house every morning by playing hymns on the piano 2) her father waking her up in the middle of the night to sing his favorite Hank Williams tunes to his buddies and 3) her family's fiddler's festival in Union Grove, NC where she has been performing or watching her father perform since she was a child. Alison Krauss's "Baby Now that I Found You Collection" was in constant rotation in her Atlanta home, coming out of every sibling and parent's room, and is considered (along with Pearl Jam) the largest influence on Lissy's love of vocalists. In 2000, after high school graduation, Lissy and three Georgia friends followed Pearl Jam around western Europe and the Southeast on the "Binaural" tour, confirming her deep love for rock music and poltical activism. In college, when Lissy was introduced to Bela Fleck, Lissy bought a banjo at Ben Harper's mother's folk music store while visitng a friend in LA, though she didn't begin official lessons in music theory and picking until 2006. While working as a federal employee at the National Institutes of Health, Lissy was briefly in the "Rosemont Family Reunion", an americana obscura rock band based out of a co-op housing basement in DC's Columbia Heights. When the band decided to split in November 2006, she and her now fellow Junior Leaguers begat this band. Lissy still performs with her father, Hal Beaver and Blackgrass, at Union Grove every memorial day in North Carolina. 

 

Martin Thomas

 

Martin grew up in western Pennsylvania where his parents tried to make him learn to play the violin and piano. Unfortunately, they didn't realize that he was destined to play second base for the Pittsburgh Pirates and needed to devote his time to baseball practice. They also made the mistake of keeping a Pete Seeger song book in the house, and were forced to abandon all hope when he picked up a harmonica. He also likes riding a bike and annoying people with a banjo, though not yet simultaneously. 

 

Sadie Dingfelder

 

Sadie was initiated into the terrifying world of improvisation when, in 2004, she was recruited off her front porch to play with a bluegrass band. Though she's been playing classical violin since age 10, it took many on-the-house drinks to get her onstage without the comfort of sheet music. More recently, members of Junior League have helped ease the transition by being very supportive and also by making concerned faces in Sadie's direction to indicate that she has a solo coming up. 

 

Elias Cohn

 

Elias Cohn hails from lovely Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where he grew up listening to his father's finger-style delta blues, ragtime, and gospel guitar arrangements. After receiving his first Jimi Hendrix album at the age of 12 he promptly demanded an electric guitar for his next birthday and spent the next 5 years mercilessly treating his friends, family, and neighbors to blistering renditions of Red House and Voodoo Chile. Upon moving to Colorado, he started writing, performing, and recording with two brilliant singer-songwriters, Alaina Mulawka and Caitlin Ryan, who brought him back to his acoustic blues and country roots. Several years later, Elias headed eastward to Washington D.C., where he began playing bass in a local cover band and jamming in the old-time sessions which his housemate and landlord--Junior League member, Martin Thomas—periodically held in his living room. Before long, Elias found himself busking on a street corner in Brooklyn with several members of Junior League. His family and friends have been trying to figure out what happened to him ever since.