Commissioned by Fisher/Lau Project

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Raven Black Hair is meant as a celebration of my Kentucky heritage and the bluegrass music of my youth. Containing variations on both the lyrics and melody of Joseph Philbrick Webster’s 1860 bluegrass classic "I’ll twine ‘mid the ringlets' " (a variant of which, 'Wildwood Flower,' was later popularized by the Carter family), this work seeks to present an abstraction of a particular musical and geographical landscape. The chosen instrumentation of voice, autoharp, and pitched metals is also meant as a bluegrass cultural reflection. Raven Black Hair invites us to dive deep beneath the surface of this regional and personal history, revealing a pure emotional core. - Jordan Munson

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Audio by Chris Dobbs

Video by Matt Panfil

Recorded at the Healer, Indianapolis, IN. November 2022