June 2024 - Digital Edition

Often, when we think about traditional Appalachian music, two young women from Brooklyn and Chicago, respectively, are not the archetypes that come to mind — for many, this “old-time music” is something that is strictly produced and enjoyed by old men with beards in the mountains of Tennessee. But Nora Brown and Stephanie Coleman are two players who are very much interested in bringing out the complexities of this genre and tradition for a new generation.

Brown grew up in Brooklyn, studying under Shlomo Pestcoe, a renowned local banjo player and musicologist, and rising to fame as a banjo prodigy at a very young age. “My family didn’t really know what old-time music was,” Brown says, “but it was just like folk songs [and] a lot of children’s songs follow that [or] are originally American folk songs. And so to me, I guess it didn’t feel that strange, because they were often very similar to songs I was singing in school.” Now at age eighteen, a student at Yale University, she has played around the world and released several albums, and is currently on tour with Coleman, who she met at an old-time jam session hosted by the storied Sunny’s Bar in Brooklyn’s Red Hook neighborhood.

Coleman is the older of the two, but also began playing early at the age of eight, following in the footsteps of her father, another old-time fiddler. A former member of the well-known band Uncle Earl, Coleman has quite the resume. A veteran touring musician, she’s even played on Cape before, alongside the GRAMMY-winning Del McCoury Band.

Brown and Coleman are both deeply passionate about the roots of their music. Speaking over Zoom, the two are quick to indulge me in a history lesson about the music that they play. Old-time music is an American genre, but as with all things American, it draws many of its characteristics from a variety of global traditions, including the influence of both European immigrants from the British Isles and West Africans brought to the United States as slaves.

Brown plays clawhammer banjo, which is different from the way many bluegrass banjoists approach the instrument and is closer to the way that enslaved African people might have played it when the banjo began to emerge from such groups in the Caribbean. Some uncertainty exists over the true origins of the banjo itself, but it has clear similarities with many African gourd instruments like the kora, which many suspect could reveal its true home.

The fiddle has an equally complicated legacy as well. Its roots are likely Byzantine, but Brown points to the influence of Scotch-Irish, West African, and Native American fiddle traditions in the instrument’s playing today as well. Like the banjo and many other instruments that make up America’s musical legacy, the fiddle has been held by a wide variety of players from various cultural backgrounds over the years. This kind of music isn’t even necessarily specific to the South, Brown says, “A lot of the traditions that we draw from are from that region, but fiddle music was played all around America.”

But it isn’t just Appalachian music that Brown and Coleman are excited about. Brown, who also performs in a Slavic vocal choir, says that this traditional Eastern European folk music also informs the way she approaches performing, especially when she’s singing. “I have a tendency to kind of be a little bit like withholding with like, the amount of energy I put out in my voice,” she says, “and in that tradition, you’re supposed to put on a nasal-like voice — it’s all supposed to be in the front of your face, it needs to be piercing. And so singing like that makes me feel more comfortable projecting more and having more energy and more power in my singing.” Coleman says she grew up around a lot of Cajun music as well, which inspires her bowing technique as a fiddler.

As is clear, the two radiate a love for music and musicology, which shines through in their remarkable playing. Brown’s latest album, Long Time to Be Gone, which was recorded live in a large church in Brooklyn, elevates a wide-range of traditional songs to a truly transcendent level, with the young musician’s powerful banjo arpeggios and smooth voice amplified tremendously by the unique acoustics of the space.

However, the process was challenging. “People always think that, the bigger a space, the more beautiful the sound is,” Brown says, “and that can be true but it can also be hard to hear yourself in those types of settings. So, we experimented a lot with how to capture sound the best in the church.” Nonetheless, the result is amazing. There is something incredibly raw about the way she approaches the music, which feels rich with the stories and lived experiences that have produced these songs. Even for the casual trad-folk fan, or the complete newcomer, the album feels deeply profound.

But this sense is nearly doubled by the way Brown and Coleman play together. On their latest EP, Lady of the Lake, the two dive deep into their music once again, their instruments intertwined in perfect rhythm. Coleman’s subtle fiddling bubbles with technical prowess and energy, filling every gap in Brown’s banjo-playing as if in rich conversation. The pair’s voices only add to the magic, executing beautiful harmonies throughout that add layers upon layers to their playing to create a fantastic, textured atmosphere that makes this record so powerful.

Despite being full of American tradition, both say that Appalachian music resonates worldwide. “I love playing like Ireland, Scotland, England,” says Coleman, “It’s like the best because the traditional music [there] is so much more part of the culture. Children are raised learning tunes in school [and] learning the tin whistle… The music just feels so much more part of the culture.”

Apart from their international journeys, the two will bring the sound of Appalachia to the Cape on July 15th at Payomet. They say they’re excited to experience the Cape, and it’s hard not to eagerly anticipate their arrival. It might just be one of the most interesting acts of this season.