Today sees the second show in this year’s series of Since The Devil Is Gone I Mostly Feel Lonely brought to you by the Monarch/Festsaal crew. Tonight is Paul Metzger, an Appalachian banjo wizard, who not content to play conventional banjos, has modified his to have 23 strings. It’s an impressive instrument and needless to say his playing is nothing short of incredible, definitely a show you’ll remember for a while to come.
Doors are open at 8pm and show time is 9pm sharp.
Metzger summons the spirits of his musical Appalachian forefathers, guitarist Django Reinhardt and classical sitarist Nikhil Banerjee, among others, weaving a peerless, highly individualistic style that sounds unlike anyone but himself. Metzger’s playing doesn’t imitate raga structures so much as use those modal figures as his starting point. He employs dazzling, breviloquent string plucks on the main banjo strings, whilst producing rhythmic, droning textures on the cross strings of an added bridge. Some have suggested similarities to the works of John Fahey or Sandy Bull, but Metzger’s modus operandi doesn’t constitute a mirroring of those styles rather, he composes and operates apart from their music, in an insular and altogether separate universe. In the process, Metzger transcends and expands the lexicon in a wholly organic manner.
