Monday, Dec. 16, 2019 – Sonic Seasonings

Sonic Seasonings with FLOW and Friends.

In a new Echoes Sonic Seasonings, we bring you FLOW and Friends. FLOW is the instrumental supergroup with pianist Fiona Joy Hawkins, guitarist Lawrence Blatt, trumpeter Jeff Oster and guitarist Will Ackerman, the founder of Windham Hill Records. With a coterie of friends, they get together in new configurations to reinvent the sound of Christmas.

We’ll hear Fiona Joy Hawkins joined by violinist Rebecca Daniel. The two musicians released a beautiful album of free-flowing neo-classical music exploring sorrow and loss called The Lightness of Dark. They are joined by percussionist Jeff Haynes and Jeff Oster on flugelhorn. They deconstruct a set of familiar seasonal songs into refracted variations as if spun through a prism.

Guitarist Will Ackerman teams up with guitarist Vin Downes for a unique take on a lesser-known seasonal song. Ackerman is a veteran of Echoes Sonic Seasonings shows and his Winter Solstice collections on Windham Hill were an inspiration for all Echoes seasonal programming.

The trio Departure is an as-yet unrecorded trio, but the three musicians have their own extensive discographies and credits. They include trumpeter Jeff Oster from FLOW. He has several solo albums, including a couple of Echoes CD of the Month picks. His latest is called Reach. Bassist/keyboardist Tom Eaton is the producer and utility player of FLOW. He also has several solo albums of deep ambient music, including his latest, How It Happened. Guitarist Vin Downes is also a solo artist with several albums of his own. His latest is When the Sea Lets Go. They send carols into an ambient space, where Miles Davis meets Pink Floyd on the rings of Jupiter.

FLOW and friends turn Christmas into an intimately chilled and musically adventurous mood live on Echoes Sonic Seasonings.

Echoes Sonic Seasonings – Program 19-51A
Start Time Group Name Song Name Album Name
 First Half Hour
0:01:00 Nightnoise Bring Me Back A Song A Winter’s Solstice Vol. II (v/a)
0:06:00 Sonic Seasonings – In Concert: Fiona Joy Hawkins and Rebeca Daniel
0:07:31 Fiona Joy Hawkins Jingle Bells (live) Christmas Joy
0:12:30 Fiona Joy Hawkins & Rebecca Daniel Sugarplum Ghost (live) Lightness of Dark
0:16:52 Fiona Joy Hawkins Away in a Manger (live) (unreleased)
0:21:00 Fiona Joy Hawkins Christmas Joy Christmas Joy
0:25:23 Will Ackerman & Vin Downes What Strangers are These (live) Four Guitars
 Second Half Hour
0:30:00 Sonic Seasonings – In Concert: Departure
0:32:04 Departure Come All Ye Faithful (live) unreleased
0:38:30 Departure Silent Night (live) unreleased
0:43:35 Departure Little Drummer Boy (live) unreleased
following the concert:
0:47:13 Tom Caufield Silent Night I Heard It Was Christmas Day
 Third Half Hour
1:01:00 Angels Of Venice Little Drummer Boy Sanctus
1:06:00 Philip Aaberg I Saw Three Ships Christmas
1:09:55 Tori Amos Snow Angel Midwinter Graces
1:13:30 Al Rudd The Magic of Christmas Christmas AD: The First Snow
1:17:08 Smoke Fairies Give And Receive Wild Winter
1:21:43 Jeff Johnson/Brian Dunning/Wendy Goodwin One Last Flower Winterfold
 Fourth Half Hour
1:30:00 SHEL & Jars of Clay Wonderful Feeling A Family Christmas
1:34:35 Michael Spriggs Good King Wenceslas Winter Moon
1:38:51 The American Dollar War On Christmas The American Dollar
1:42:35 break
1:43:20 Bryan Carrigan A Hundred Winters Old Fall Into Winter
1:47:25 Mannheim Steamroller Above the Northern Lights Christmas 25th Anniversary Collection
1:51:42 Sue Hutton & Althan Maroulis God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman Christmas Nocturne
DISCOGRAPHY
FLOWPromise
Fiona Joy Hawkins & Rebecca DanielThe Lightness of Dark
Jeff OsterReach
Lawrence BlattLongitudes and Latitudes
Will AckermanWas It This Lifetime
Tom EatonHow It Happened
Vin DownesWhen the Sea Lets Go

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