photo-Jeromie Stephens

Willie Marschner

reviews

Willie Marschner - fiddle, mandolin, vocal
Danny Knicely - guitar, mandolin
Brennen Ernst - banjo, guitar, piano
Mark Schatz - bass
Pearse Marschner - banjo, guitar, vocal
Tom Mindte - mandolin

Road to Columbus
Under the Double Eagle
Brown County Breakdown
Autumn Leaves
Sugar Tree Stomp
Queen of the Delta Waltz
Wild Fiddler’s Rag
Irish Slow Set: An Caisleán Óir / Billy Malley’s Scottische El Cumbanchero
Lorena
Irish Jigs: Kilavel / Brendan Tonra’s / The Irish Inmates
Jesse Polka
Old Time Set: Sally in the Garden / Growling Old Man / Elzic’s Farewell
Mansions for Me
Grey Owl

   Popular music is a hard road to travel, I believe.  When it is marshalled in a glitzkrieg aimed just at making money, it loses musical and moral value - and easily becomes detrimental to the culture.  When it is cut off from change and ossified in the concert hall or the Smithsonian archive, it loses its vitality and relevance to the culture.  But there is a middle way.  It is a way that respects musical tradition and form enough to breathe life into it and keep it fresh and vibrant.   It is a way that remembers the intimate connection between music and dance, between music and the spirit, between body and soul. The flame of true American traditional – and yet popular – music does still burn.  It lives in the square dances of the Shenandoah Valley, Oktoberfests in the historically German villages of Texas, bals acadiens around Lafayette, LA, and in Irish sessions in Baltimore and Philadelphia.  It is out there, doing its thing the way it has since the earliest settlers shared their songs and their dance steps around a fire with Native Americans – though you won’t immediately find it on Spotify.

   Here is a fine selection of it played by a fellow born under a happy musical star.  You won’t immediately discern the musical discipline instilled in the boys of St. Paul’s K Street choir, who are taught to follow a traditional plainchant with an avant-garde chorale in the Phrygian mode.  Nor are you likely to see the coals from the campfire picking sessions that Willie grew up around.  You may hear traces of the influences Willie will be soaking up for a while from some of the finest and broadest musicians in the Southeast, guys like Brian McDowell, Rex McGee, and Zan McLeod, guys who are as likely to follow a Round Peak breakdown with a set of Sligo reels, a Bill Monroe standard, and then how James Brown would have taken a jazz standard when they jam together. 

   Each of these prodigious musicians has their forte and Willie has his.  To my ear, Willie’s music is subtly Irish, even when he is swingin’ like Grapelli.  But genre does not bind or restrict musicians like Willie.  It inspires them to know their roots, love their ancestors, and also to transcend them.  This record is a link in the chain of respect for tradition and virtuosity that stretches all the way back.  Willie’s grandchildren will learn these songs.  On this record, the tunes, the production values, and the persistently brilliant accompaniment provided by Brennan, Danny, Tom, and Mark make this a record that will be worth listening to by those grandchildren as much as it is worth listening to today.  Congrats on making your first record, Willie.  Success has many fathers and I’m the least of them when it comes to your music.  But I sure am proud of you.

Pearse Marschner, September, 2020
Dedicated to the master Willie only barely got to know, Georgia fiddler Frank Maloy, who passed on from this life while this record was being made.

Quotes:

At festivals, whenever I'd hear wind of some small boy tearing it up on a fiddle on the previous night, it'd almost always end up being Willie. I have been jamming with Willie since he was 6 in his parents’ living room. It has been a treat to see him develop as he has always had a strong ear and been fearless about the people he is willing to jam with. 

• Long (Kiki) Nguyen, family friend and local picker

Willie Marschner is an exceptionally talented young man. While he automatically lives up to his musical epithet, no matter what instrument he picks up, no wrong notes come out. My friend, the sky’s the limit!

• Gabe Epstein, banjo player for Songs of the Road Band based out of Ashville, NC

I've been playing bluegrass for about 30 years and I was floored about how good this 12 year old kid was not only on the fiddle, but guitar and mandolin.  But his fiddle playing is outrageously superb.  In addition, he can sing solo and do studio-quality harmonies.   It just so happened that I was running a musical showcase at a local music venue in Falls Church, Va.(JVs Restaurant, Bar and Grill on 12/03/19) and was lucky enough to have the Fiddlin’ Willie Band and guest performers shortly thereafter.  Needless to say, it was stunning to all who were there.   I believe my parting comments after their performance was "Get out and see and hear Willie before he heads to Nashville."

• Andy Nocero, DC area music promoter

Festival season travel often brings fond encounters with young musicians with advanced abilities on their chosen instrument.  Usually these prodigies gear up for a perfect execution of a winning contest arrangement crafted by players from a generation or two before they were born.
While that is satisfying, it is no match for the joyful excitement in stumbling across the likes of young Willie Marschner who has gone far beyond the mindset of performance clone and has already developed impressive skill as a nimble improviser. His musical maturity goes beyond even that into the realm of composer and arranger, and yet somehow he is still at home running around with the rest of the festival youth in a mean game of tag. Willie, don't break those fingers!

• Rex McGee, award winning banjo and fiddle player, educator, and innovator