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"The Water Is Wide"

Mark Nelson
Acme Arts

Nelson is a musician who possesses that rare combination of insight and talent necessary to successfully transcend conventional concepts of genre and culture. He does so here with instrumental interpretations of melodies from Hawaii, Scotland, Appalachia and Mexico that he has arranged to blend the familiar sound of Hawaiian slack key with that of the dulcimer (a grass-roots Euro-American instrument). Nelson, who credits Keola Beamer as an inspiration and mentor, plays both slack-key guitar and various dulcimers, while several guests sit in on various tracks. Hawaiian standards and Scottish airs alike assume wondrous new forms in these arrangements.

A slack-key treatment of Duke Ellington's "Mood Indigo," an Appalachian-flavored take on "Pua Sadinia" and a bluesy interpretation of "'Opihi Moemoe" are among the gems that await discovery.

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