Friday Five: Violet Sol, Anna Grace Agrawal, Nature Meets Nurture, University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra, Brave New Works
A lot of classics in this edition of the Friday Five. I'm not talking about the recordings themselves—that's up to you, dear listener—but four of the five Ann Arbor artists/ensembles featured below are classical musicians or have definitely studied classical music at some point, and the remaining musician strives for an orchestral majesty in his music. Check out new sounds from Violet Sol, Anna Grace Agrawal, University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra, Brave New Works, and Nature Meets Nurture.
Violet Sol, "Eliza"
The Ann Arbor quintet Violet Sol somehow mixes R&B, jazz manouche, Kentucky mountain music, and Edvard Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" into the prog-jam oddsey that is the group's latest single, "Eliza."
Anna Grace Agrawal, Anna Grace Covers
Anna Grace Agrawl is a vocal/opera student at University of Michigan, but her new mini-album focuses on covers of rock-pop songs by Fleetwood Mac ("Gypsy"), 1975 ("I Couldn't Be More in Love"), The Story So Far ("Navy Blue"), Phoebe Bridgers ("Georgia"), and two more. A link to stream the album on various services is here.
University of Michigan Symphony Orchestra, Kairos
Kairos is comprised of four compositions for orchestra by award-winning Michigan composition faculty Evan Chambers, Kristin Kuster, Stephen Rush, and William Bolcom. Each piece is a world premiere recording captured at Michigan’s Hill Auditorium.
Brave New Works, The Outer Bar
Brave New Works is a 10-piece new-music ensemble based in Ann Arbor whose new album features a song cycle based on the works of American poet Amy Clampitt. The group's first album, 2008's Quintets: Albright-Bolcom, is also on Bandcamp.
Nature Meets Nurture, Nature Meets Nurture
Nature Meets Nurture is one-man Ann Arbor band Dave Slaw who wrote, played, and produced this self-titled debut. The album's 10 songs have elements of Pink Floyd and Radiohead run through a goth-rock filter. You can purchase the vinyl/tape/download from Bandcamp and stream the album on Spotify and Apple Music via Nature Meets Nurture's website.
Christopher Porter is a library technician and the editor of Pulp.