Search - David Grisman, Andy Statman :: New Shabbos Waltz

Master mandolinist David Grisman and clarinet virtuoso Andy Statman, in a long-awaited follow-up to Songs of Our Fathers (1995), have again combined their shared Jewish heritages. That both men are veterans of the "newgrass" and folk scenes comes across in the Appalachian-like swing of the title selection and their collaboration sounds unforced and mutually sympathetic throughout. Statman's honking, shrieking clarinet, with its echoes of past masters like Giora Feidman and Dave Tarras, soars and swoops along, just this side of spoken language. Grisman's plangent yet mellifluous plucked strings are miracles of flawless technique and taste, and he is periodically joined by Statman on the same instrument. The duo are assisted by studio drummer Hal Blaine and Enrique Coria on acoustic guitar, both of whom also appeared on Songs of Our Fathers, plus noted slide guitarist Bob Brozman and Grisman's son, Samson, who ably sits in on bass. Highlights include "Oifen Pripitchik" (On the Hearth), a sweetly melancholy 19th-century Yiddish song, and the Chassidic niggun, "Ani Ma'amin" (I Believe), composed by Rabbi Ezriel Dovid Fastag in a cattle car en route to the Treblinka death camp-- it later became a survivalist anthem sung in other such hell-holes. --Christina Roden