Outlaw appalachian "oldtime" fiddle music (a blending of Irish/English melodies with blues influences) played by veterans of the Southern festival circuit.

15 MP3 Songs
COUNTRY: Bluegrass, COUNTRY: Traditional Country



Details:
Bad Dog is a modern old-time string band that formed by the chance meeting of four musicians at a fiddlers convention in Virginia. It could have been the full moon, or the half empty jar of whiskey or just the sheer joy of playing music at 2 a.m. with your feet in the mud, but everyone present recognized the magic in the music that whirled around us. We were all playing from a deep respect for the traditions of old-time music; (after all, we were sitting right in the very mountains where those traditions were formed) but we were also playing the music "our way", true to our own experience, time and place.

Fiddler Andy Williams cut his musical teeth in the legendary music scene of Lexington, VA in the 1970s, where he played and learned with such players as Bruce Molsky, Chad Crumm, James Leva, and Dave Winston. He was a founding member of the seminal old-time string band Plank Road with some now familiar band mates: Al Tharpe, Brad Leftwich, and Michael James Kott . Almost thirty years later, Andy plays in a driving rhythmic style that is impossible to categorize, and he is one of the best old-time fiddlers playing today.

Mark Olitsky plays banjo with the group. A highly original player who was recently described by an Old Time Herald reviewer as a "virtuoso" of the instrument. Mark plays his fretless banjo with total disregard of what is commonly thought of as the "constraints" of the instrument. Melodies, counter-melodies, cross-rhythms, poly-rhythms...it's all in there. Mark formed The Able Brothers band with Bob Smakula and Kevin Enoch (of famed Enoch Banjos)in the eighties and most recently recorded with jimmyjohnnyjoe a band that features Joe Thrift of the Red Hots and Donna the Buffalo and Debra CLifford of the Lonesome Sisters.

Leo Lorenzoni plays guitar in the band and adds just the right touch of punchy yet subtle bluegrass influenced guitar to keep the rhythm constantly moving and interesting. Leo has been playing guitar in bluegrass and rock-n-roll bands for decades. His light touch and clear, warm tone on the instrument is instantly recognizable in live performance or on record.

Jason Sypher rounds out the band on the double bass and brings a wide range of musical experience to the low end of Bad Dog. Living in New Orleans for six years, he performed and recorded with Clarence Gatemouth Brown, Little Freddie King, Coco Robiceaux, Irma Thomas, C.J. Chenier, Eddie Bo, Ernie Cato, Kermit Ruffins, The Howard Fishman Quartet and Butch Trivette. Now based in Brooklyn NY he plays Oldtime, Bluegrass, Klezmer, Romanian gypsy music, Flamenco and anything else he can get his hands on. His precussive, melodic style of bass playing gives the music a long-legged groove that helps give Bad Dog its distinctive sound. He currently performs and records with various ensembles in the New York area as well as jimmyjohnnyjoe and acclaimed Yiddish/Gypsy/Jazz ensemble Nikitov from Holland.