ROOTS AND BRANCHES: AMERICAN MUSIC ON SCREEN

NARRATED BY TOM SAUBER, MARK GRAHAM AND ORVILLE JOHNSON
FOLLOWED BY LIVE SET OF MUSIC BY THE KINGS OF MONGREL FOLK

Northwest Film Forum announced a special presentation on May 8 featuring motion picture and newsreel footage from the 1920s and 30s of country, blues and jazz performers. Clips range from the iconic Jimmie Rodgers and Dock Boggs, to anonymous jugs bands, fiddlers and field hands. The footage captures musicians at work in a vanished America – at barn dances, street corners, fiddler conventions and in the fields. Musicians Tom Sauber, Mark Graham and Orville Johnson will share their encyclopedic knowledge of Americana and old-time music as they narrate these rarely seen film clips. Following the film program, the trio will perform a set of their own music, inspired and informed by blues, bluegrass and American roots music.

Mark Graham and Orville Johnson, known as The Kings of Mongrel Folk, are among the two most talented and widely respected roots musicians in the United States. Graham is known for his harmonica virtuosity on Irish and American fiddle tunes, his rich, woody sound on clarinet, and his wry humor. Many groups, including the Austin Lounge Lizards, Bryan Bowers, and the Limelighters, have recorded his songs.

Orville Johnson, an instrumental gunslinger whom the Seattle Times described as "a player's player," has a gift of finding the "secret ingredient" that makes a song perfect, whether it's an R & B tune from New Orleans, a country blues or a jazzy ballad. Orville's guitar, dobro, and quavering, honeyed vocals have seasoned more than a hundred recordings, soundtracks and countless TV and radio commercials. He also produces records and teaches at events like the International Guitar Seminar and Pt. Townsend Country Blues Workshop. He has shared the stage with artists such as Doc Watson, Bonnie Raitt and John Lee Hooker.

Between the two of them, Graham and Johnson have played many of the most coveted gigs in North America and Europe, including the Newport Folk Festival and Caffe Lena, out East; South by Southwest, in Texas; the Bay area's Freight and Salvage and Kuumbwa; London's Festival Hall and Glasgow's Celtic Connections Festival, in Europe; and on their home turf, Bumbershoot and the Northwest Folklife Festival.

Graham and Johnson will be joined at Northwest Film Forum by their friend Tom Sauber, who is a master musician in a variety of styles, a multi-instrumentalist (banjo, fiddle, guitar, and mandolin) and singer, well-grounded in tradition, with a comprehensive grasp of style and an exceptional ability to teach.

In the 30-plus years Tom has devoted to playing traditional music, the cast of characters with whom he has associated reads like a who’s who in old-time, bluegrass, and Cajun music. Tom’s contributions to traditional music include hosting a radio show for 12 years on station KPFK in Los Angeles. He holds a masters degree in folklore, and contributed musical analyses to the notes for two landmark recordings: the anthology of Mississippi fiddle music Great Big Yam Potatoes, and Eck Robertson, Famous Cowboy Fiddler. He is also an exceptional teacher who is in demand at the major traditional music workshops across the country.

The trio will share and narrate vintage performance footage from both music icons and forgotten greats. The evening's performance will begin at 8pm. Tickets are $8/NWFF members and $10/general, and can be purchased online at www.brownpapertickets.org.

Sponsored by KBCS 91.3 FM and Easy Street Records