Acoustic music has a special resonance in certain places. I remember one time hiking through the Armstrong Redwoods near my home in Sonoma County and hearing a flutist playing in the hollowed-out stump of an old redwood tree. You could tell he enjoyed the special sound that his flute was making from such a special place and it wasn’t just the aura of the place that made the tones sound so good. It must have had something to do with the resonance from the wood or the projection of the partially enclosed space. Whatever it was, it sounded really special.
Caves are enclosed spaces too. They have a special resonance and a popular concert series makes use of this special quality of caves. I have watched a number of concerts from the cavern in Tennessee that hosts these concerts. Bands of interest to bluegrass fans feature prominently in the list of artists who play in the cave. For example, Dan Tyminski is playing tonight.
https://www.thecaverns.com/shows
I watch these programs via my local public TV station. Please give them your support. Another program I saw recently also featured cave music.
http://americasforestswithchuckleavell.com/
The program that caught my interest aired tonight so you might have to navigate the web site a bit in order to find it. Hopefully the episode will post by the time you read this and you can watch it.
For those of you who don’t know this, Chuck Leavell is an amazing musician. He played with the Allman Brothers, the Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton. I think I watched him in concert with the Dixie Dregs in the early eighties, a band which later included Mark ‘Connor.
Unfortunately in the recent America’s Forest video, Chuck is unable to haul his piano down to the cave for his concert at the end of the video. So he plays mandolin with some local Arkansas musicians. He has fiddle, banjo and guitar to complement and it sounds pretty good.
But that’s just what you hear from lame digital audio. Imagine what it would sound like in a cave!
