Cahalen Morrison & Eli West Febrary 22, 2013 at 7 PM

Cahalen Morrison and Eli West

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 22 @ 7:00 P.M.

Black Forest Community Center
12530 Black Forest Rd. Black Forest, Colorado (map)
In roots music, Cahalen Morrison & Eli West are either the oldest young men or the youngest old men. Whether a song is three months or 100 years old, they play it with the freshness and creativity of youth and the unhurried ease and open spaces of players fifty years further down the musical road.
They play songs that could have been around for 100 years. Some have; some others were written by Cahalen. Their music, rooted in bluegrass and old-time, stays honestly within those boundaries, but is infused with their own style, their own thinking musician’s sensibilities. With two voices, guitar, mandolin, bouzouki and banjo, they play and sing with an ease and truth that comes from a love of the music and a vast reserve of technique that’s rarely used.
According to one writer, “Cahalen Morrison writes songs that sound like a Cormac McCarthy novel: simple, beautifully crafted, and seemingly formed from raw natural elements. Eli West brings jagged, angular arrangements based in bluegrass and oldtime, but refracted through a 21st century lens. Like Ansel Adams’ photography, their music is instantly accessible and built from the simplest materials, but at the same time seems to transcend its base fundamentals. Together, Cahalen and Eli tap the root of the old country and bluegrass duets. As the sparse landscapes of Cahalen’s vocals reflect the warm glow of Eli’s voice, it’s clear that this duo was made to sing together.”
They’ve captured the attention of musicians at the very top of the roots music dogpile, including Tim O’Brien, Dirk Powell and Aoife O’Donovan. Tim, who wrote the liner notes to their latest album “Our Lady of the Tall Trees,” said “Cahalan and Eli are making music that the world needs.”
But the best summary comes from Paul Constant of Seattle’s The Stranger, who said “The easy critical impulse is to point out that Cahalen Morrison & Eli West sound like they’ve stepped out of a crackly record or wax cylinder from the 1920s. And it’s easy for a reason: They’ve got the kind of classic voices that beautifully complement roots music and, sure, they stick to the old-timey instruments. But any schmuck can chew on a corncob pipe and call it a nostalgia act. Morrison & West can write gorgeous, solid songs with harmonies that’ll wake you up in the middle of the night when your subconscious remembers how fine they are. That kind of songwriting isn’t nostalgic. It lasts, is all.”
They held us spellbound two years ago; join us on February 22 for music that the world needs.

Pumpkin Carrot Cake -From Stephanie

At the last open stage we needed extra bakers so I asked my sister to chip in. She provided her pumpkin carrot cake. It proved to be so popular that we sold out very quickly and several people came up to me asking about the recipe. Here it is...

From Stephanie Watson: Here's the pumpkin carrot cake recipe with my changes. I add carrot baby food and leave out the oil. The cake is so moist it doesn't need the added fat so this is really a no fat cake except for the frosting.

2cups flour

2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup milk

1 1/2tsp lemon juice (I left this out> I was too lazy to squeeze a lemon)

3 large eggs

1 1/4 cup can pumpkin

1 1/2 c sugar

1/2 c brown sugar packed

1 can crushed pinaplle 8oz drained

1/4 cup grated carrots

1 jar or single serve container carrot baby food

1 cup flaked coconut

1 1/4 cups nuts (I use pecans)

preheat oven to 350 and grease your cake pan (I use the disposable rectangle for this or you can do two 9 inch round pans to make a pretty cake.

combine dry ingredients in a medium bowl.

beat eggs, pumpkin, sugar, brown sugar, pineapple, carrots, and use lemon juice to curdle the milk, then add that to the cake. I didn't curdle this for the cake I sent with you. I got tired and skipped a step. I've made this with just milk and been happy with the results. stir in coconut and 1 cup nuts. Pour into cake pan.

Bake 30 to 35 minutes for 9 inch round. It takes close to an hour for the rectangle. I bake it 40 minutes then check on it until a toothpick comes out clean.

My frosting: 1 whole bag of powdered sugar, two blocks of cream cheese, 1/2 stick of softened butter, 1 tsp vanilla. beat cream cheese and butter until soft, slowly beat in powdered sugar a few cups at a time. Add vanilla before you finish beating in the powdered sugar. This makes a big batch of frosting so you can put a really thick layer on the cake.

Then I take 1/2 cup of flaked coconut and toast it in a frying pan. Just spread the coconut in the pan and heat on medium stirring constantly for a few minutes. You'll see it start to brown, then top that right onto the frosted cake. When the coconut is warm, it settles right into the frosting and sticks so you don't have to worry about it falling off.

Joanna Springer

The Sister Brothers January 4 at the Perk!

Friday, January 4, 7:30 PM

Open w/ The Sister Brothers

Pikes Perk Downtown, 14 S. Tejon, C.S.

$4/$7, Students $5.

The Sister Brothers

January 4

Dick Carlson, Marianne Danehy and Charlie Hall are the Sister Brothers.

Dick played with Black Rose (the band) for all ten years of its existence, with Palmer Divide for five years.  Between the two bands, he played a hundreds of gigs and released five albums.  His rock-steady bass playing has been compared to “the heartbeat of a blue whale”; we’re not sure whether that’s good or bad.  His ankles are still recovering from his days as an all-Nebraska basketball star; his coach was quoted as saying “Dick almost never shoots when he doesn’t have the ball.”

Marianne teaches Suzuki violin and fiddle in Colorado Springs.  In a prior life, she worked as an engineer for Hewlett-Packard.  She grew up playing classical violin and more recently “found her people,” namely those who stay up late playing folk, Celtic, country and bluegrass music.   She performed with the all female trio, Blue Sage, prior to playing with Charlie and Dick.  Charlie and Marianne founded the Colorado Roots Music Camp, and she teaches fiddle there every year.

Charlie is a co-founder and past president of the Black Rose Acoustic Society, and co-founder and director of the Colorado Roots Music Camp.  He was a finalist in the 2000 National Finger Style Guitar championship, and was nominated Bluegrass Guitarist of the Year in 1996 by the Colorado Bluegrass Music Society.  He played with Black Rose for ten years and has played with Joe Uveges, Phil Volan and the nearly-famed Trio Reynoso. 

The Sister Brothers celebrate good country songs served without artificial ingredients.  They play a swing tune or two, fiddle tunes, some bluegrass, some folk. They sing songs that review the salient characteristics of Iowa, orphanhood, old-fashioned love, lost love, found love, misplaced love, love that crushes you like a monochromatic Kansas farmhouse dropped by a tornado, loneliness, bandits, the South, the South again, birthdays and their concomitant rehashing of the prior twelve months’ personal failures, small towns, big towns, ginormous towns and the Wrong Side of the Tracks.  And the South.

Joanna Springer