Thank you all so much for your kind words– I was away at an Irish session last night, waltzing with Chanteyranger and singing with the Black Brothers, then I get up this morning to all these lovely comments from you dear folks– life is good!

I am so proud of this album, I can't tell you. It was such an honor and privilege to work with these amazing singers over the past couple of years, and I am intensely grateful to them for sharing their music with me on this recording. I still can't believe I got to sing with each of them, and made such good friends along the way.

There were great stories too–

We had to cancel a recording session on Baffin Island (Arctic Canada) because the engineer went on a walrus hunt....

Peggy Seeger and I recorded our track at a house in North Carolina, where the biggest problem (aside from the sweltering heat) was to get through the singing and hand-clapping game without giggling like a couple of kids...

During a Zimbabwean recording session the singer asked me to take her 12 week old baby from her back into the other room, and she taught me a Shona lullaby to sing on the spot. In an informal moment while the baby was cooing and Julia and I were singing, the engineer turned on
the microphone to capture what became track 13.....

Because of his failing health, we brought the recording studio to Paul Pena's bedside to record Dyngyldai, a Tuvan riding song.   But thanks to the members of Huun Huur Tu and sound engineer Ted Levin, we were able to bring the steppes of Tuva into the studio by adding field recordings of the song as it was sung on horseback in Tuva when Paul was there years ago. The result is haunting layers of animals, people and instruments sharing an imaginary place and time in a traditional song...

Many more stories about recording in a Georgia swamp, working with Thai temple dancers, adventures in African percussion and chasing a song to a tiny island in the Hebrides where the last traditional singer who knew the words had just died....it was all quite a wonderful ride.

Over the next few months I'm presenting papers, doing lectures and demonstrations and teaching workshops on mouth music (along with my regular fiddle & piano concerts.) I'd dearly love to see any of you who live nearby if there's going to be a workshop or lecture in your area. Or drop me a note if you'd like to organize something.   

And if you see any of these wonderful musicians in your area for concerts, please support their shows– you'll be exposed to some amazing music from cultures you may otherwise have never heard. You can follow their links on my website to see where they'll be performing.

Let me know if you have any questions, and thanks again for your interest in this project.

love,
p.j.   


p.s. Thank you Rick, wherever you are.