WEST BRATTLEBORO — “Jay Ungar and Molly Mason, with their wealth of knowledge and experience, present shows featuring Civil War-era music, fiddle music from a variety of traditions, American Roots music, and a symphony program that fuses classical and folk traditions,”Âsays dance fiddler and teacher May Lea. “But a performance in Brattleboro is a rare event.”
While Molly and Jay have many ties to area dancers and musicians, they haven't held a concert here for quite a while. Nonetheless, Brattleboro is one of Mason's and Ungar's favorite places.
“There are a few strong centers for Roots music across the country and Brattleboro is definitely one of those,” Ungar says. “We know so many people who live in Southern Vermont, and we often visit the area. Over 20 years ago, we performed at the remarkable Brattleboro Dawn Dance. The music we played for most of Ken Burns' documentaries was recorded at the old Skyline studios in the basement on Main Street in downtown Brattleboro. But we haven't given a concert in the area often.”
That is about to change, as Ungar on fiddle and Mason on guitar and piano will present a concert at the First Congregational Church in West Brattleboro on Saturday, May 7, at 7:30 p.m.
“It's part of our small mini-tour, which is how we do things these days,” Ungar says.
Ungar and Mason will also be performing elsewhere in the region. On May 6 at 8 p.m., they will be in Greenfield, Mass., for a “Mostly Waltzes” dance event at the Guiding Star Grange. On May 8, in Randolph, they will host two events at Chandler Music Hall: an afternoon hands-on workshop from noon to 2 p.m. and a Mother's Day concert from 4 to 6 p.m.
Ungar and Mason have become one of the most celebrated duos in the American acoustic-music scene. Their music can be heard on their numerous acclaimed recordings, on their public radio program, “Dancing on the Air,” on WAMC's Northeast Network, and on film soundtracks such as “Legends of the Fall” and “Brother's Keeper.”
Ashokan acclaim
But the work that brought them the most fame was the music they provided for Ken Burns' 1990 PBS documentary series, “The Civil War.”
Their performance of that series' signature tune, Ungar's haunting composition “Ashokan Farewell,” earned the couple international acclaim. The soundtrack won a Grammy and “Ashokan Farewell” was nominated for an Emmy.
The simple but powerful melody was originally inspired by the week-long Ashokan Music and Dance Camps that Ungar and Mason run for musicians and dancers at the Ashokan Center in the Catskill Mountains.
“People attend the camps to become better fiddlers, guitarists, mandolin players, percussionists, dancers, dance callers and instructors, and while they're doing that, they're becoming links in the chain that help to pass our folk legacy from the people who came before us to those who will follow,” the couple writes on their website, www.jayandmolly.com.
“It was at the annual Ashokan Fiddle and Dance Camps that they have run since the late 1970s ... where I first met them,” says Lea, who is producing the Brattleboro concert and has performed with Ungar and Mason in concert and on several of their recordings. “They brought together top musicians to teach vocal and dance music as well as dancing traditions from Appalachia, the deep South and Cajun country, northern Roots traditions such as Quebecois, Cape Breton, New England, Irish and Scandinavian, as well as Swing and Country music.
“Thousands of people, from very young to very old, have gained skills on their instruments, danced to different kinds of traditional music, and learned about the rich, varied musical traditions of our country. Jay and Molly's leadership in these community enterprises has galvanized many people ... and have had a huge impact on creating the vibrant folk music scene that we see today. They are still at its epicenter.”
Roots on both coasts
Ungar grew up in the Bronx, while Mason spent her childhood in Washington State. While he was raised on pop music of the 1940s and 1950s, she had a fondness for traditional fiddle music and 1930s and 1940s popular tunes.
“I always loved roots music,” Mason says. “When my younger brother took up the fiddle, probably from the inspiration of an uncle who was a fiddle player, I ended up at a fiddle contest in the Midwest.”
In contrast, Ungar hung out in Greenwich Village coffeehouses and roamed North Carolina and Tennessee in search of traditional players.
“I had to travel to distant places to be able to perform as a teenager because when I started out I believed there were virtually no fiddlers in New England,” Ungar says. “Later, I discovered that there was a community of Irish fiddlers right in the Bronx. Nonetheless, there is no denying that in those days an audience for fiddlers was small.”
That was not always the case.
“There was a time when every inch of this country had fiddlers,” Ungar says. “There were different fiddling styles and sounds and favorite tunes in different regions. The fiddle most often accompanied dancing, although occasionally there were solo fiddling or sing-a-longs or the playing of mom's favorite hymn. Remember, this was all pre-television, when people got their entertainment in different ways from now.”
Nor today is there a paucity of fiddle music.
“Young people are really latching on to this music now, taking a new look at it,” Ungar says. “Fears that this music is dying out should be dispelled instantly.”
Jay suspects the music's current revival has arisen as a response to an increasingly digital culture, where the computer and cellphone have become integral parts of life.
“The acoustic music of roots can be seen as an alternative,” he explains. “The current revival is different from the folk revival of the 1960s, which had a more blatant political component, i.e., 'the protest song,' and a response to creating community in an increasingly mobile society. Today, the interest is more in the music itself, although there is a subversive political slant to that too, as an alternative to the corporate world.”
Coffeehouse chemistry
Ungar and Mason met in the late 1970s when each was performing at the Towne Crier, a rural New York club. They hit it off musically and played together from time to time.
“In my mid-20s, I finally got a chance to perform on the East Coast,” Mason says. “In those days the only places to perform were tiny pockets such as coffeehouses in college towns. After the tour, I got the opportunity to stay on in the East through the winter rent-free, and found myself living 20 minutes from Jay.”
Ungar and Mason were married in 1991. In the early 1980s, Ungar had put together a band with fellow fiddlers Evan Stover and Matt Glaser and guitarist Russ Barenberg. When Fiddle Fever, as the collaboration was called, needed a bassist, Molly signed on.
At that time, Fiddle Fever band members Glaser and Barenberg were working with a young filmmaker on a documentary called “The Brooklyn Bridge.” They gave Ken Burns a copy of Fiddle Fever's second LP, “Waltz of the Wind,” which included Ungar's “Ashokan Farewell.”
Burns was so taken with the evocative and haunting melody, he used it in his next film, “Huey,” about Louisiana Governor Huey Long, and he wound up inviting Jay and Molly to provide music for many of his projects.
Now considered an American folk classic, “Ashokan Farewell” is played by fiddlers and classical musicians worldwide. It has been performed by major orchestras, and has been recorded by artists from Mark O'Connor to Pinchas Zuckerman, James Galway to Charlie Byrd, Jerry Garcia, David Grisman and The Osborne Brothers to Polka King Jimmy Sturr.
“I got a lot of hate mail about Ashokan Farewell,” Ungar says. “People couldn't believe it was not a genuine Civil War song, and demanded to know from where I stole the song.”
“I wouldn't call it hate; let's just say some people were a little disgruntled,” adds Mason, who believes that, in their way, the letter writers were sending a tribute to the authenticity of the sound.
A career-making breakthrough
The “Civil War” series was as much a career breakthrough for Ungar and Mason as it was for Burns. “That series and things like 'RiverDance' and 'O Brother, Where Art Thou' opened up the ears of people to this sound,” Ungar says. “Everything was different for us suddenly. Before we had to figure out how to sell our music or lose an audience; afterward we had a ready-made audience, primarily for the music of The Civil War.”
Ungar and Mason immediately put out a CD of Civil War songs. “Frankly our success was a little overwhelming,” Ungar says. “I was interviewed by every major newspaper in the country and appeared on many radio and television shows. After I did an interview in The New Yorker, an EMI executive called us from Angel/Capitol Records. He wanted to know if Molly and I could come to lunch tomorrow in New York City.
“By this time, I had become apprehensive about all the attention we were getting, and said I was busy. He asked where we would be at noon tomorrow, and I said at our kitchen table. He then asked if he could come and visit us. And indeed, the next day a limousine pulled up to our stone house in the Catskills and made us an offer we couldn't refuse.”
Ungar and Mason signed with Angel Records in 1991. Their first recording, a collaboration with baritone Thomas Hampson and pianist David Alpher, was the now-classic “American Dreamer,” a collection of the songs of Stephen Foster. They followed this with “Waltzing With You,” an elaboration on their score for the film “Brother's Keeper,” a Sundance Film Festival prizewinner. Perhaps the duo's best-known composition is the title track of “The Lovers' Waltz,” an album of romantic fiddle music from Appalachian, Scandinavian, Celtic, Klezmer, and Swing traditions.
While recording for Angel, Molly and Jay continued to put out independent recordings that didn't fit the label's musical profile.
“Usually artists are given an exclusive contract, but the EMI executive who signed us ... gave us a nonexclusive one that enabled us to pursue other recording options,” Ungar says. Ungar and Mason no longer record for Angel. But then the entire recording industry has radically changed in the last decade.
“We eased out of the whole record-deal thing, as we grew away from what they liked to offer,” Mason says.
“Although many musicians complain - and with good reason - about the changes in the industry, we are fortunate in the digital age,” Ungar adds. “In many ways, it has enabled our audience to grow.”
'Are you Jay and Molly?'
“For instance, recently Molly and I were in an airport near Charlotte, N.C., and, killing time as we were waiting for a plane, we took out our instruments and started playing 'Blue River Waltz.' Soon enough, a woman in her mid-20s came running over to us exclaiming, 'Isn't that the “Blue River Waltz”? Are you Jay and Molly?'
“We were, of course, surprised and flattered that she knew our music. She told us that she discovered us on Pandora, played it at her wedding, and since has been sharing it with all her friends through social media.”
Mason and Ungar perform a wide range of music.
“We do some fiddle tunes of unknown ancestry as early as the 1600s, especially of Scottish origin,” Ungar says. “Many were collected and annotated in the 1800s. As early as the 1920s, these songs started to get recorded. These were professional singers who had performed at country fairs, barn dances, and even on the radio, which was thriving by then.”
Although dedicated to preserving the historic tradition of Roots music, the duo also write much of the music they play. “I would say that about a third to a half of the program in any concert is original,” Mason says. “Whether the music is new or old, and whatever era we draw on for our music, in concert we perform a selection of what feels most important to us, and others that are near and dear to our hearts,” Ungar says.
With their wealth of experience, broad perspectives, great senses of humor, and delightful as well as instructive stories to share, Mason and Ungar combine consummate musicianship, incomparable warmth and wit, and an obvious love of the music.