Wild Asparagus is one of the premier contradance bands in New England. But what works well at a contra dance doesn’t always translate to an excellent CD. The very things that are necessary for dancers — a steady beat and repetition in the tunes — can limit a CD.
The tracks are compiled from the band’s five previous albums, Music From a Little Known Planet, Tone Roads, Call of the Wild, From the Floor Up and Wherever You Go. Most of the tunes are old traditionals — and the new tunes are firmly rooted in the tradition that engendered the old. The arrangements aren’t flashy or bombastic, but the beat is lively and steady — this is contradance music, after all — and the vitality of a living tradition is evident here. Besides which, they’re darn good musicians.
“The reason they’re better than most contra bands is that they practice,” one contradancer told me — unlike many house and pickup bands (who nonetheless provide competent music for many dances). Perhaps another reason is because the group has been playing together since the mid-1980s, with occasional shifts in personnel. All the cuts on this album feature David Cantieni (on flute, whistle, oboe, sax, and bombarde), Ann Percival (on guitar and piano), and George Marshall (on concertina, bodhran, egg, and guiro). Marshall is also often the caller, which may be another part of the band’s appeal: callers run the dances, and the more familiar the band is with the caller, the smoother the music, hence the smoother and more enjoyable the dancing. On this album, Marshall doesn’t say a word.
The group’s familiarity with each other and their musicianship allows them to play cool arrangements of great tunes. Contradancer Jessica Holland appreciates the variety of instruments. She says, “When the bombard plays, the energy spikes. We know it, they know it. We wait for it, they tease us.”
Within the confines of providing danceable music, the group provides a lot of variety in melody and rhythm and instruments. A number of tracks include combinations of tunes, necessary to keep boredom at bay while still playing nonstop for more than 3 or 4 minutes. Pickup bands can get sloppy, or have players drop out for a moment at the transition but the transitions here are tight and lovely. The first track is a combination of the traditional “Fahey’s”, traditional “Woman of the House”, and Danny Noveck’s “Sligo Creek”. The piano and fiddle keep a driving rhythm going for over 6 minutes.
In the “Contney’s Yard/Heave Together/My Needs” set (all by David Cantieni), the way the instruments pass the melody from one instrument to another is particularly clear.
Most dance evenings end with a waltz, and the CD keeps to that tradition. “The Ootpik Waltz”, runs a bit more than 4 minutes — plenty of time to flirt with a new partner or settle in and get comfortable with the idea of heading home with a well-known one.
The music on the album is well-played — the question is whether you want to listen to an entire album of dance music. I had trouble stopping dancing to the music long enough to type a review, but I don’t think I’ll play the CD often. Listening to a track or two tends to inspire me to turn off the stereo and head out to the nearest dance. If you’re lucky enough to live in New England, you can almost always find a Wild Asparagus live gig within a few hours’ drive.
(Great Meadows Music, 2003)
