| Tone Poems | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 1994 | |||
| Recorded | February 2, 1993 – January 15, 1994 | |||
| Studio | Dawg Studios | |||
| Genre | Folk, bluegrass | |||
| Length | 48:16 | |||
| Label | Acoustic Disc | |||
| Producer | David Grisman | |||
| Tony Rice chronology | ||||
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| David Grisman chronology | ||||
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| Review scores | |
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| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |   [1] |
Tone Poems:The Sounds of the Great Vintage Guitars and Mandolins is an album of duets by mandolinist David Grisman and guitarist Tony Rice using vintage instruments. [1] [2]
All tracks are written by Dave Grisman except where noted
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Turn of the Century" | 2:55 |
| 2. | "The Prisoner's Waltz" | 4:17 |
| 3. | "Sam-Bino" | 2:38 |
| 4. | "Grandfather's Clock" (traditional) | 3:12 |
| 5. | "Good Old Mountain Dew" (traditional) | 2:19 |
| 6. | "I Am a Pilgrim" (traditional) | 3:33 |
| 7. | "Mill Valley Waltz" | 3:25 |
| 8. | "Vintage Gintage Blues" | 3:15 |
| 9. | "I Don't Want Your Mandolins Mister" (traditional) | 2:17 |
| 10. | "Dawg After Dark" | 4:38 |
| 11. | "Wildwood Flower" (traditional) | 2:47 |
| 12. | "Morning Sun" | 4:12 |
| 13. | "Banks of the Ohio" (traditional) | 2:23 |
| 14. | "Swing '42" (Django Reinhardt/Stephane Grappelli) | 3:03 |
| 15. | "Watson Blues" (Bill Monroe) | 3:30 |
| 16. | "’O sole mio" (traditional) | 2:11 |
| 17. | "Song for Two Pamelas" | 4:22 |
Some of the songs were performed on instruments made when the songs were written to allow the listener to experience the tonal properties of the original performances.
The Gibson ES-150 is a pioneering semi-acoustic electric guitar produced by Gibson Guitar Corporation. Introduced in 1936, it is generally recognized as the world's first commercially successful Spanish-style electric guitar. The ES stands for Electric Spanish, and Gibson designated it "150" because they priced it at around $150. The particular sound of the instrument came from a combination of the specific bar-style pickup and its placement, and the guitar's overall construction.
David Jay Grisman is an American mandolinist. His music combines bluegrass, folk, and jazz in a genre he calls "Dawg music". He founded the record label Acoustic Disc, which issues his recordings and those of other acoustic musicians. He was inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2023.
An archtop guitar is a hollow acoustic or semi-acoustic guitar with a full body and a distinctive arched top, whose sound is particularly popular with jazz, blues, and rockabilly players.
David Anthony Rice was an American bluegrass guitarist. He was an influential acoustic guitar player in bluegrass, progressive bluegrass, newgrass and acoustic jazz. He was inducted into the International Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2013.
Lloyd Allayre Loar (1886–1943) was an American musician, instrument designer and sound engineer. He is best known for his design work with the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Mfg. Co. Ltd. in the early 20th century, including the F-5 model mandolin and L-5 guitar. In his later years he worked on electric amplification of stringed instruments, and demonstrated them around the country. One example, played in public in 1938 was an electric viola that used electric coils beneath the bridge, with no back, able to "drown out the loudest trumpet."
Orville H. Gibson was an American luthier who founded the Gibson Guitar Company in Kalamazoo, Michigan in 1902, makers of guitars, mandolins and other instruments.
The mandocello is a plucked string instrument of the mandolin family. It is larger than the mandolin, and is the baritone instrument of the mandolin family. Its eight strings are in four paired courses, with the strings in each course tuned in unison. Overall tuning of the courses is in fifths like a mandolin, but beginning on bass C (C2). It can be described as being to the mandolin what the cello is to the violin.
The David Grisman Quintet is the debut album by the David Grisman Quintet, recorded in 1976 and released in 1977.
Mike Marshall is a bluegrass mandolinist who has collaborated with David Grisman and Darol Anger.
An acoustic-electric guitar is an acoustic guitar fitted with a microphone or a magnetic or piezoelectric pickup. They are used in a variety of music genres where the sound of an acoustic guitar is desired but more volume is required, especially during live performances. The design is distinct from a semi-acoustic guitar, which is an electric guitar with the addition of sound chambers within the guitar body.
The Pizza Tapes is an album by Jerry Garcia, David Grisman (mandolin), and Tony Rice. It was recorded at Grisman's studio on two evenings in 1993, and features unrehearsed performances of folk and bluegrass songs. It was released on the Acoustic Disc label on April 25, 2000.
The Gibson ES series of semi-acoustic guitars are manufactured by the Gibson Guitar Corporation.
A resonator mandolin or "resophonic mandolin" is a mandolin whose sound is produced by one or more metal cones (resonators) instead of the customary wooden soundboard. These instruments are sometimes referred to as "Dobro mandolins," after pioneering instruments designed and produced by the Dopyera Brothers, which evolved into a brand name. The trademark "Dobro" is currently the property of the Gibson Guitar Corporation. When Gibson acquired the trademark in 1993, they announced that they would defend their right to its exclusive use.
David Grisman has issued albums with his groups the David Grisman Quintet and Old & In the Way, performed in duos with Jerry Garcia, Andy Statman, Martin Taylor, Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard, John Sebastian, Tony Rice, and played in the psychedelic band Earth Opera with Peter Rowan. He has produced solo albums and collaborated with musicians in many genres.
Tone Poems 2 is an album by American mandolinist David Grisman and British guitarist Martin Taylor that was released in 1995 by Grisman's label, Acoustic Music. It is a sequel to Tone Poems, his collaboration with bluegrass guitarist Tony Rice. This is a jazz-oriented recording on which Grisman and Taylor play a variety of vintage, fretted, acoustic instruments. They use 41 guitars, mandolins, mandolas, mandocellos, and tenor guitars.
Tone Poems 3 is an album by mandolinist David Grisman, dobro player Mike Auldridge, and guitarist Bob Brozman that was released in 2000 by Grisman's label, Acoustic Disc. The album is a sequel to Grisman's albums Tone Poems and Tone Poems 2, which were recorded with Tony Rice and Martin Taylor, respectively. The trio plays vintage slide and resophonic instruments such as the Dobro and resonator guitar. The songs cover many genres: Hawaiian, blues, country, bluegrass, and jazz.
The F-5 is a mandolin made by Gibson beginning in 1922. Some of them are referred to as Fern because the headstock is inlaid with a fern pattern. The F-5 became the most popular and most imitated American mandolin, and the best-known F-5 was owned by Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass music, who in turn helped identify the F-5 as the ultimate bluegrass mandolin.
Scott Law is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, and multi-instrumentalist known for his work with guitar and mandolin. Based in Portland, Oregon, he has been a professional musician since 1992, performing within genres such as rock, blues, bluegrass, and Americana with groups such as The String Cheese Incident. In 1999 Law founded Scott Law Music. After performing with numerous bands, Law released his first solo album as a singer-songwriter, Deliver with the Scott Law Band, in 2005. This was followed by several other albums, including the acoustic album Black Mountain in 2013.
Jack Lawrence is an American bluegrass guitarist. He was Doc Watson's performing partner since the early 1980s. As major influences, Lawrence cites Doc Watson, Clarence White, and Django Reinhardt.
The mandolin has had a place in North American culture since the 1880s, when a "mandolin craze" began. The continent was a land of immigrants, including Italian immigrants, some of whom brought their mandolins with them. In spite of the mandolin having arrived in America, it was not in the cultural consciousness until after 1880 when the Spanish Students arrived on their international performing tour. Afterwards, a "mandolin craze" swept the United States, with large numbers of young people taking up the instrument and teachers such as Samuel Siegel touring the United States. The fad died out after World War I, but enough had learned the instrument that it remained. The mandolin found a new surge with the music of Bill Monroe; the Gibson F-5 mandolin he played, as well as other archtop instruments, became the American standard for mandolins. Bowlback mandolins were displaced. The instrument has been taken up in blues, bluegrass, jug-band music, country, rock, punk and other genres of music. While not as popular as the guitar, it is widespread across the country.
