Over the last couple of decades or so, guitarist Marisa Anderson has made her bones as a brilliant interpreter of the American folk music aesthetic – whether she’s playing original material or vintage tunes, she always brings a fresh perspective. For her latest album, however, she went with a different concept. As might be guessed from the title, Anderson dug into the traditional music of Eastern cultures on The Anthology of UnAmerican Folk Music Vol.1, having discovered these tunes while poring over the Harry Smith archives.
Anderson kicks off the album with the brief but glorious “Quodlibet,” an Afghan folk song originally performed by Bäbä Qerän on the Dambura. This is a signpost for the rest of her takes on these old songs: find a way to turn these melodies performed on different, often non-standard (in the States) instruments into tunes she can play on the guitar. Again and again she rises to the challenge. Take “Taqsim for Guitar,” for example. Originally recorded in 1955 by an uncredited musician, this Syrian piece was actually performed on, and meant for, a violin. But in Anderson’s hands it becomes a beautifully wrought acoustic guitar showcase. On “Rop Koh,” she takes the dense arrangements of a Cambodian string orchestra, and reduces it to an atmospheric three-piece of electric guitar, electric piano, and pedal steel. On the Turkmenian “Pair of Duduk” and the Pakistani Qawwali “Hamd,” she uses her guitar to find the blues in music originally created halfway around the world. She ends the record with “Whistle Music,” transmuting Vietnamese whistles into an ambient meditation on electric piano.
Sometimes even the versatile Anderson can’t go it alone every time, and she invites violinist Gisela Rodriguez Fernández to add her sonorous drone to the Russian-sourced “Sarvi Simin” and the North Yemen Zar. Regardless, she takes music based on entirely different modes and scales from American sounds, and translates it into tunes that both pay tribute to the spirit of the original recordings and add her own distinctive touch as a musician. The Anthology of UnAmerican Folk Music Vol.1 is a magnificent achievement in creativity, and an absolutely beautiful listening experience.
