Home » Jazz Articles » Live Review » Tom Griesgraber and Bert Lams at Kennett Flash

3

Tom Griesgraber and Bert Lams at Kennett Flash

Tom Griesgraber and Bert Lams at Kennett Flash
By

View read count
Tom Griesgraber and Bert Lams
Kennett Flash
Kennett Square, PA
August 27, 2016

A good piece of music can paint a picture, evoke feelings, tell a story or possibly, in the right hands, do all those things together. This is certainly what happens when Chapman Stickist Tom Griesgraber meets up with guitarist Bert Lams (the stage—left member of the California Guitar Trio) in among their other respective gigs. They weave a sophisticated musical tapestry: old-world roots and modern technology, emotion and smarts, compositional intricacy and simple beauty. The pair also makes expert use of electronics and looping, which lets them either sound like a straightforward almost-acoustic duo or blend layers and effects the way a painter mixes colors.

The cozy café space of Kennett Flash may sit in a charming metropolitan suburb, but on this summer Saturday the pair transported us back to the 19th-century American frontier. The main set was drawn from their studio debut Unnamed Lands (ThosSounds, 2013), a concept piece that envisions the experience of a wagon-train convoy journeying from America's early colonies into the wilds. Lams is equally at home taking dignified flights on the guitar or adding electric grunge, while Griesgraber's fluid fret-dancing adds percussive flavor and vivid atmospherics as called for (often at the same time). The duo's distinctive style can seamlessly incorporate any of their influences from down-home Americana to classical or Celtic music. In any mode the results are always picturesque and wordlessly eloquent.

The program largely followed the album's narrative flow: starting with the loping optimism of "Don't Look Back," adding adventure and drama in moments like "War Dance" and the dynamic multi-part centerpiece "Prairie Suite," and eventually capping off the planned set with the lush tension-releasing washes of "Pacific."

Both took turns at the microphone in between to further elaborate on the background and inspiration for many of the pieces, also allowing Griesgraber to give a brief amusing tutorial about the Stick before they wrapped up with the epic-and- eerie "Victor's Chase." It added up to a quietly classy evening of harmonic delights. A performance by these two can serve as a course study on technique or a dazzling display of effortless interplay, but all the while (and more importantly) makes sure the virtuosity never overshadows the human heart underneath.

Tags

Comments


PREVIOUS / NEXT




Support All About Jazz

Get the Jazz Near You newsletter All About Jazz has been a pillar of jazz since 1995, championing it as an art form and, more importantly, supporting the musicians who make it. Our enduring commitment has made "AAJ" one of the most culturally important websites of its kind, read by hundreds of thousands of fans, musicians and industry figures every month.

Go Ad Free!

To maintain our platform while developing new means to foster jazz discovery and connectivity, we need your help. You can become a sustaining member for as little as $20 and in return, we'll immediately hide those pesky ads plus provide access to future articles for a full year. This winning combination vastly improves your AAJ experience and allow us to vigorously build on the pioneering work we first started in 1995. So enjoy an ad-free AAJ experience and help us remain a positive beacon for jazz by making a donation today.

Near

Philadelphia Concerts

More

Jazz article: Bark Culture At Solar Myth
Jazz article: Hingetown Jazz Festival 2025
Jazz article: Hayley Kavanagh Quartet At Scott's Jazz Club

Popular

Read Take Five with Pianist Irving Flores
Read Jazz em Agosto 2025
Read Bob Schlesinger at Dazzle
Read SFJAZZ Spring Concerts
Read Sunday Best: A Netflix Documentary
Read Vivian Buczek at Ladies' Jazz Festival

Get more of a good thing!

Our weekly newsletter highlights our top stories, our special offers, and upcoming jazz events near you.

Install All About Jazz

iOS Instructions:

To install this app, follow these steps:

All About Jazz would like to send you notifications

Notifications include timely alerts to content of interest, such as articles, reviews, new features, and more. These can be configured in Settings.