Aaron Olwell and Chris McGrath go track by track through Old Town Band
By Folk Department
Date: 10/20/2023
Time: 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm
Aaron Olwell and Chris McGrath will stop by WTJU October 20 to go track by track through their new release, Old Town Band. Sunset Road airs Friday afternoon from 4-6 at 91.1FM and online at wtju.net.
Aaron Olwell plays lots of instruments in lots of styles, including Old Time, Irish, and Jazz. He lives and makes Irish flutes in Nellysford, VA.
Chris McGrath plays instruments that have strings on them in the Old Time and Irish ways. He lives with his wife and two musical children in Rockbridge County, VA.
Aaron and Chris first played tunes together in the Catskill Mountains in 2000 and got deeper into it when Chris moved to Virginia in 2008. Sometimes Irish, sometimes Old Time, sometimes it was hard to tell. But it wasn’t that long ago, before the hard lines of genre had firmed up, that musicians would play whatever tunes they could think of on whatever instruments they had. It is in that spirit that Aaron and Chris put together the selection of tunes in this collection. Many of the tunes here also expose the connections between the melodies of Ireland and Appalachia. Aaron plays fiddle, flute, concertina, and clarinet; Chris plays fiddle and banjo. This is the Old Town Band.
