Jeremy Kittel and friends to showcase new tracks at the Scots Fiddle Festival
Whorls, the title of American fiddler Jeremy Kittel’s forthcoming album, suggests the intriguing spirals, circles or other convolutions in the alignment of leaves or petals, chambered mollusc shells or human fingerprints. The analogy reflects the sometimes dizzyingly virtuosic and eclectic music of his group, Jeremy Kittle & Co, two members of which will accompany him when he appears at next month’s Scots Fiddle Festival in Edinburgh, where he shares a bill with Perthshire fiddler Patsy Reid and her band.
Due out on Compass records in February, Whorls does indeed whirl, from the mercurial darting of compositions such as The Boxing
Reels or Chrysalis to a Bach Preludio given sparkling new string-band life.
The Michigan-raised Brooklynbased violinist, whose earliest introduction to “roots” music was through Scots fiddle – he’s a former US National Scottish Fiddle Champion – has assembled some fine musical company in mandolinist Josh Pinkham, guitarist Quinn Bachand (both of whom will accompany him in Edinburgh), cellist Nathaniel Smith and hammer dulcimer player Simon Chrisman. All five players throw the tunes to each other with springy panache. “They’re special,” Kittel says of his bandmates. “Each one of them is so unique and inspiring to work with and they can handle anything. They’re really intuitive, great improvisers.”
Veering between Celtic, bluegrass and contemporary styles which, he agrees, “are harder to pin down stylistically”, Whorls also sees Kittel’s first recorded foray into singing, including his own song, Waltz ,a plaintive, melancholic number with ephemeral backing vocals from Sarah Jarosz.
And Jarosz is just one of an impressive litany of names with whom the 33-year-old violinist, for several years a member of the Grammy-winning Turtle Island Quartet, has played, composed or arranged, among them Béla Fleck, Abigail Washburn, Kentucky rockers My Morning Jacket, Yo-yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
Edinburgh audiences can expect music from the forthcoming album, as well as material from his last recording, Chasing Sparks and “some of our more Scottishgrounded or inspired stuff. Because Scots fiddle, although it was in the US, was probably the first musical community that I connected with. It feels like home.”
Kittel’s first visit to Scotland was touring with a high school music group led by the American Scottish fiddler Bonnie Rideout. Much more recently, he has appeared at Celtic Connections. The Scots Fiddle Festival will be his only gig during this visit but, he says, he’ll be back.
In the meantime, apart from launching Whorls in February, he has “quite a juggling act at the moment” in terms of recording and commission-writing. Last year he was commissioned to write a piece for the finale of a concert at the Berlin Konzerthaus, marking the Yehudi Menuhin centenary. The resulting composition featured a stellar array of violinists from different traditions, from classical star Daniel Hope to US roots player Mark O’connor and India’s L Subramaniam. He now plans to record the piece, which he titled A Compass in the Tempest. The title was inspired by Menuhin’s declaration that “the violin, through the serene clarity of its song, helps to keep our bearings in the storm, as a light in the night, a compass in the tempest”.
It’s a maxim that might as suitably be applied to this year’s 21st Scots Fiddle Festival, which runs from 17-19 November. Once again based between Summerhall and the Queen’s Hall, as well as the Kittel/reid concert on the Saturday, the festival’s Friday night headliners are Highland fiddler Graham Mackenzie’s ninepiece band and the trio Snuffbox, led by the 2017 Radio Scotland Young Traditional Musician Charlie Stewart. The closing concert on Sunday features the Scots-irish-hungarian group Dallahan, along with another visiting US fiddler, Jenna Moynihan, in her duo with Scots harpist Màiri Chàimbeul.
As ever, this celebration of fiddle music also features a wealth of daytime recitals and workshops, including from Kittel, Reid, Moynihan and Chàimbeul and other participants.■