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Review of Days and Years
March 2007
There's something comforting about listening to a CD filled with music that could have been created in any of the past five decades. "Days and Years," the debut CD by the Washington, DC-based folk band Shosho, is such a CD. Despite its exotic-sounding moniker, Shosho is actually a folk band, and its CD is filled with acoustic textures and honed-down arrangements. There are hints of bossa nova, exotica, and an occasional syncopated beat, but for the most part, Shosho sticks with a folk formula.
And why not? That formula has worked for decades and works for Shosho because it puts the emphasis squarely on singing and songwriting -- two things at which Shosho excels. The four-person band has been around for just over two years and is fronted by female singer-songwriter guitarists Tricia Khleif and Wendy Lanxner (who also chimes in on flute and mandolin). Rounding out the band is bassist Franz Kellner and drummer Bob Novak. The songwriting pair balances each other well: Khleif provides mostly humorous and political songs and Lanxner typically offers ballads and pop-oriented pieces. Both are fine singers that virtually always sound engaged with what they're singing.
Lanxner's ear-catching "Maybe" opens the CD with a deft mandolin hook and bouncy tempo. Khleif's "What's Left to Us" is an ominous, minor-key political tract that looks at both class inequality and war without mentioning specifics. Less subtle is Khleif's "Hand-Held Freedom," which boasts an anti-American imperialism lyric that seems at odds with its jaunty waltz-time tempo and flute ornamentation.
Lanxner brings to mind Rickie Lee Jones with her jazzy vocal shading on the wistful, surrealist memory piece "Gotta Get At That Day." Even more wistfulness is expressed in Khleif's melancholy "Falling Down," which marries a beautiful acoustic guitar line to virtuoso fretless bass runs.
There are hints of influences here, and it's easy enough to feel the presence of Joni Mitchell, Indigo Girls, and Suzanne Vega on some of these songs. But Shosho does a good job of forging a distinct musical personality -- not an easy feat when working with basic instrumentation. During the course of these 14 songs they successfully fuse American folk music with progressive, world-influenced ideas. The production here -- done by the band and Hyattsville's Tom Espinola -- makes the songs shine by leaving things out. The sparse, naturalistic sound is in itself bracing, because it's so rarely heard these days. Anyone who has thought that the massive compression used on modern CDs is overkill should wrap their ears around "Days and Years." - Tony Sclafani
Silver Spring Gazette, April 6, 2005
Singing at Sangha: Music, community mix in Takoma Park
Franz Kellner, Tricia Khleif, Wendy Lanxner
and Bob Novak
will perform a benefit for Oxfam's Global Emergencies
Fund
It was one of those strange coincidences, Jennifer Carter says, but the day she opened Sangha, her shop in downtown Takoma Park was Sept. 11, 2001. "In the beginning, it was to be a distribution point for fair trade products," explains Carter, a native of Hudson Valley, N.Y., who has lived in Takoma Park for the last 15 years. "[Products] from what I call 'endangered cultures,' indigenous cultures from around the world." Why not? Sangha is, after all, the Sanskrit word for spiritual community as well as one of the pillars of Buddhism. But the simple idea became more complicated. "Since I opened on 9/11, I became devoted to bringing the local community together. It galvanized day after day from that point on, becoming a center on a macro and micro level," she says. And now, three years later, Sangha is known as a musical venue and a place for readings, performances and consciousness raising -- sometimes all these things at the same time. This Saturday, Sangha will host a benefit for Oxfam's Global Emergencies Fund.
"It was an idea that came up within my group around the time of the tsunami," says Jerome Meltzer, pianist with the Minor Thoughts Quartet. "I'd had a relationship with Sangha because we had played there several times." Meltzer, who describes his quartet as "modern but a bit more mainstream: a straight-ahead jazz group," says that post-tsunami, many relief organizations had decided to channel funds into "forgotten" disaster areas like the Sudan, Chad, Ethiopia, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. These places had disasters, too, but the tsunami's dramatic effects meant their plights received less media focus and subsequently less charitable aid. "Oxfam had received so much money for tsunami relief they were channeling funds into other areas," Meltzer explains. "One of which was the international disaster relief fund."
"Their fund goes beyond tsunami relief," says Wendy Lanxner, whose band xoxo (say "sho-sho") will perform along with Minor Thoughts Quartet. "A lot of organizations are suffering right now, and this is for their global disaster relief. It includes tsunami victims, but goes beyond that." Lanxner is a local. She grew up in Silver Spring. "The first thing I did was play the recorder in fourth grade," she recalls. "I got this book by Maria Von Trapp that I still use with my students: 'Enjoy Your Recorder.'" After Oakview Elementary and Blair High School, Lanxner was enjoying music on a high enough level to head off to Ohio's Oberlin Conservatory of Music. By the time she came back, she held a bachelor of arts degree in artistic creativity studies from the University of Massachusetts and a career as a musician, composer and teacher.
"We're having a hard time categorizing what we do," she says when asked about xoxo, her group with fellow singer-songwriter Tricia Khleif on guitar, (Lanxner plays mandolin, guitar and flute) plus Franz Kellner on fretless bass and Bob Novak on drums and percussion. "Acoustic rock, contemporary acoustic -- it's hard to come up with a pat answer, but I'm loving it," she adds. "We're working on our album."
However people categorize the music of xoxo, Lanxner says it finds its jazzy counterpoint in the Minor Thoughts Quartet -- "post bebop jazz," as she describes the group. And that's fitting because she calls Sangha "THE place for avant-garde jazz in Washington. People like Rachel Cross and Lisa Moscatiello have played there." That's because Carter is such a big fan. "I'm a lover of improvisational, experimental, creative work in general," says the soft-spoken fair trade advocate. "This improvisational jazz is incredible music. It's amazing to be present for it." And she would like everyone to be present, no matter what their background. Indeed, Carter says there's only one kind of group she has traditionally kept off the Sangha premises. "The only people I haven't allowed to use this space is [representatives from] political parties," she explains. "My purpose is to be open to everybody." Two local groups, Minor Thoughts Quartet and xoxo, will perform at 8 p.m. Saturday in Sangha, 7014 Westmoreland Ave., Takoma Park. A $15 donation is suggested. Call 301-891-3214
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, September 2004
Things Heat Up for Bush At Home
Tricia Khleif, Bob Novak, Wendy Lanxner, Franz Kellner,
and Len Seligman play a song for Iraqi mothers (staff
photo D. Hanley).