Strange Conversation

Kris Delmhorst

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 27, 2006)
• Original Release Date: June 27, 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Signature Sounds Recordings
• ASIN: B000FGFUJU
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #96,157 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Rarely has a songwriter joined forces with such a distinguished array of collaborators, as New England's Kris Delmhorst shares credit for this material with the likes of Lord Byron, Walt Whitman, George Eliot, E.E. Cummings, and Rumi. Yet never do these adaptations from poetry (and some prose) have a whiff of academic stuffiness about them. To the contrary--the album could be appreciated as much for its musical range as its literary inspiration, as Delmhorst transforms the Whitman passage she titles "Light of the Light" into exuberantly Beatlesque pop, matches Eliot with a Dixieland brass section on "Invisible Choir," gives Cummings's "Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town" a ragtime playfulness that evokes memories of the jug band era, and turns the rousing closer of Rumi's "Everything Is Music" into a spirited campfire singalong. She adapts her voice to fit the material and the arrangements, from the breathy intimacy of "Since You Went Away" and the languid torch song "Tavern" (which draws as much from the style of Peggy Lee as the words of Edna St. Vincent Millay) to the edgy, wiry rock of "Water Water." --Don McLeese

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Intellectual blues, November 29, 2006

By	Richard L. Pangburn (Bardstown, KY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Gosh, what a find. This is my first CD by this artist, only the second CD I've felt compelled to review this year. I was attracted by the literary concept, and the audio samples provided by Amazon sounded a bit like Maria Muldaur or Bonnie Raitt at their bluesy best. It turns out that my first impressions were right.

A booklet included with the CD gives the literary sources of the songs, opposite the lyrics of the songs themselves. It is amazing. The musical arrangements are so adept, sound so right, that I knew immediately that I was going to listen to them again and again.

I love her upbeat interpretation of E. E. Cummings' "anyone lived in a pretty how town," but mostly I love her intellectual blues.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Intelligently crafted, July 18, 2006

By	Catherine Theresa Graciano "rin tin tin" (South Pole, Antarctica) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

As an amateur DJ for a community radio station, I stumbled upon this CD (well, more like requested it) and have been quite pleased. Yes, it's a CD compiled of songs that are inspired by famous poems or, alternatively, there are musical versions of the original poems themselves. Although there are moments when her song doesn't quite do the original justice, there are also moments when she nails it better than its original author. I particularly enjoyed the upbeat Galuppi Baldessare, the heart-breaking Sence You Went Away and The Drop and the Dream. For literary folks out there, I believe you'll find this to be a grand treat. The original poems included in the CD booklet are a nice compliment to the songs themselves. It's an intelligent and thought-provoking album with a wide range of music styles.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Complex poetic experiment, July 18, 2006

By	Nadine Cooper "Nadine Cooper" (Austin, TX) - See all my reviews

I admit, I stumbled on this album because I had too much time on my hands in the summer heat, and I like Mark McKay's music, and I saw on his album page here on Amazon that Kris did some vocals and cello playing for him on a couple of his albums--Shimmer and Live from the Memory Hotel. I am always looking for new music, a new album to be the kind of album I just love and can listen to over and over again for months. If you know what I'm talkin about you also know how rare it is! Anyway, this album just might turn out to be one of those. So far so good! I'm loving the purity of it. The poetry angle is a cool angle. Richard Buckner did this too, fyi, for anyone who might really dig this experiment! But don't listen to reviewers, just check out the samples and downloads and see for yourself.