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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (March 16, 2012)
P H O T O C O U R T E S Y O F A B IG A IL W A S H B U R N The original blend of Americana and Chinese folk returns to Portland BY SUE ZALOKAR language that rolls off her lips as fluently as her native English. You won’t find any songs written in f old-time Americana and traditional Chinese Chinese on her latest album, City of Refuge. What music were to meld and produce a flesh-and- you will find is a collaboration of a diverse “village” blood child, the result would be Abigail of players and contributors, catchy grooves, Washburn. Combining the two musical genres with electronic loops and, of course, that old-time her ethereal writing and clawhammer banjo style, sound. Washburn has established herself as one of the Washburn and songwriting collaborator Kai most unusual and otherworldly players to hail from Welch will be headlining a show at Mississippi Nashville, Tenn. Studios on Sunday, April 1. Local groups, Calico Washburn spent the first five years of her Rose and Casey Neill are also on the bill. Doors musical career touring with the all-girl American open at 7:30 p.m., show starts at 8 p.m. old-time music group Uncle Earl. She went on to focus on her first solo album, Song of the Traveling S u e Zalokar: How would you describe your music Daughter, in 2005. During the making of this to someone who has never heard you play before? album, Washburn met and developed a friendship with premier banjo player Bela Fleck of Bela Fleck Abigail W ashburn: Whew. That’s a hard one. I and the Flecktones. sit next to people on planes all the time and they Together with Fleck, Washburn helped form the say what do you do? And I say, “Well, I make Sparrow Quartet, which blended East and West music.” And they say, “What does it sound like?” I sounds. In 2006 — at the request of the U.S. usually say that I play the banjo and I sing. And government, the Sparrow Quartet toured Tibet, then I say that I speak Chinese and I sing in and went on to perform at the 2008 Olympics in Chinese. And I write lots of songs in both English Beijing. Her sound has captured the ears of Robyn and Chinese, and all of my music is very much Hitchcock and Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones. inspired by traditional music. There is also an More recently, she was a guest performer at Pete indie, folk, pop quality to what I’m doing these Seeger’s 90th birthday celebration. days and maybe a little bit of experimentation with In 2009, Washburn and Fleck married and set sounds outside of the acoustic realm. the stage for a banjo-playing heir that, if ever conceived, will surely be the grand ruler of all S.Z.: You were heading to study law in Beijing and things banjo. had not considered a musical career. How did your Her first songs were written in Mandarin, a musical journey begin? S T A F F W R IT E R I A.W.: One huge turning point was hearing Doc Watson singing and playing “Shady Grove” at a party one time near the end of college. I had been so obsessed with China. The stuff of Roman traditions that we long forgot about in our modern culture are not long forgotten there. The inertia, the sheer energy of that history and the ancestral line of tradition and culture, it is insuppressible. It is in everything, and it’s everywhere there. Even though the economy and the big city rush for wealth would try to make you think otherwise, it’s there still in a major, major way. I didn’t really know what was special about America. I couldn’t really put my finger on it, and I couldn’t find my touchstone of American greatness. When I heard Doc Watson coming out of that record player, I was like, what is that sound? Who is that? Doc Watson was from the hills of North Carolina and he played what we call “traditional American music.” I thought, this is the soul of the sound of America. This is it right here. It’s hard to tell (by listening to his music) if he’s black or if he’s white. It was so groovy because of the syncopation of the banjo and it being, actually, an African instrument. And the words that come from probably Scotland or Ireland and then found their way into Kentucky and North Carolina and started taking on different word replacements and the melodies became more mountain. It was this See WASHBURN page 5 Safety net swings The hidden Our wealth of in the balance epidemic food - most of it Homeless and housing services compete fo r shrinking city fu n d s Health care expert William Charney on medical errors unhealthy Page 3 Page 8 How to fig h t back against the food industry Page 10
