Auld String Theory: Your Specialist Eclectic Folk Band
Float interweaving mandolin, hammered dulcimer and celtic harp melodies over top of a shifting and twisting banjo and guitar rhythm section, and mix up the repertoire from Celtic, Old Time, and American Song influences. Sprinkle with some whistle and accordion (and handpan) now and then, and divide the selections evenly between sung songs, reels, and jigs/waltzes. That’s Auld String Theory.
Behind the eclecticism of the music and its performers, of course, there are families, interests, oddities, commonalities and uniquities. We are animal lovers and companions, humorists, readers, writers, and what might be categorized as four distinct flavors of geek. Our professional consistency includes a veterinarian, a business professor, a computer programmer and a marketing madman. We have been (or still are) members of other acoustic outfits including The Bala Hounds, The Greystone Ramblers, The Philadelphia Jug Band, and The Plywood Cattle Co. One great advantage of our breadth of style is that Auld String Theory has become a band that specializes in seasonal programming. Our unique theory of string vibration will thus ebb and flow with the calendar, to present up to two sets of Christmas and wintry repertoire in December; 3 sets of Celtic and Irish material on and around St. Patrick’s Day; a full slate of called dance tunes on demand; an evening’s worth of 19th century sounds for a Postbellum program. And, as on our first album, the rest of the year we mix it all up however we feel like it.
Among the 19 selections on Unstrung Heros, we present…
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- A. 26% Celtic Root
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- B. 21% American Traditional/Folk
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- C. 5% Cover, new-written song based on ancient parable
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- D. 10% Swing and Western Swing
- E. 42% Originals based in some way on one or more of the flavors listed above
If that adds up to an excess of 100%, please note two caveats… 1. Genre bleed 2. Did you not see that mathematician isn’t within the above-listed professional consistency?
With Auld String Theory, not only does E=Fb, the whole defies mathematics to get you, the listener, an impossible 104%!
