11/7/2008

Don Campbell

In the four years since blues fingerpicker Mary Flower moved to Portland, She's fallen head over heels in love with the City of Roses.

A musician of international caliber, Flower relocated from Colorado in 2004. She hasn't looked back. A favorite at folk festivals, winner of numerous fingerpicking guitar contests and a nominee in 2008 for both a Blues Foundation Blues Music Award and a Portland Muddy Award, Flower pays tribute to her adopted hometown with a new CD, "Bridges," on Memphis-based Yellow Dog Records.

The CD is a culmination as well as a tribute. The title pays homage to the sheer number of structures that cross our rivers (depicted nicely on Gary Houston's cover art), but also refers to the bridges she builds with her music. A masterful instrumentalist, she covers Piedmont-style blues, ragtime, country blues, swing, folk and hot jazz.

The 14-song project was recorded in Portland. She further cross-pollinated by hand-selecting favorite musicians to play along. In Portland, she says, "The genres seem to be cut really tight, and people usually don't cross over. I like so many different kinds of music, and I play so many different kinds of music. I really wanted to utilize people from different categories. To see Rebecca Kilgore meet Duffy Bishop for the first time, I thought it's just time."

Flowers roster included not only the above two chanteuses but also a cross-categorical A-list of great Portland players. Contributing to "bridges" were multi-instrumentalist Tony Furtado, New Orleans ex-pat and saxman Reggie Houston, young piano phenom Mac Potts, her son Jesse Withers from Jackstraw on upright bass, accordionist Courtney Von Drehle from 3 Leg Torso, Mark Vehrencamp on tuba, Doug Bundy on clarinet, Spud Siegal on mandolin and nephew Matt Johnson (also owner of Secret Society Recording Studio, where it was recorded) on drums.

To show how deep the connection runs, Flower lauds pianist Janice Scroggins, who contributes melodically deep and passionate keyboard work to the project. "All first takes," Flower says. "She can read your mind."

The CD is a luscious lusty mix of rootsy styles, anchored by Flower's immense finger-style guitar technique and warm-as-honey-and-whiskey voice. Her meter perfect guitar work is inventive, dexterous and rock solid. Her voice is as comforting as a winter quilt and effortless as a breeze.

The background duet of Bishop and Kilgore is genius. Scroggins' piano throughout is as muscular as it gets. Furtado's banjo and bottleneck guitar contribution to "Rhythm of the Road" aurally expands the landscape without showboating.

Portland continues to build a sizable body of work of American string music, where the strength of performance outshines any need for recording trickery or overproduction. And Flower has upped the ante.