Gratitude by master guitarist Steve Mullins and his band Rim of the Well is the latest release from Octave Records and its blend of flamenco, Balkan, African, Latin and musical virtuosity is a thrilling musical experience. Mullins and the band perform his original compositions and distinctive interpretations of two traditional songs with virtuosity and sensitivity. Octave Records’ exclusive Pure DSD high-resolution recording process captures the distinctive voices of Mullins’ guitars and the nuances of the acoustic instruments with exceptional realism and dynamic shadings, making Gratitude a joy to hear on every musical and sonic level.
Guitarist, composer and ethnomusicologist Steve Mullins has played with many of flamenco’s most respected artists, shared stages with ensembles as varied as the Boulder Philharmonic and the Barbelfish Balkan Band, and his compositions have been on television, film, radio, and record. He has a doctorate in ethnomusicology and has published more than 50 articles. On Gratitude he is joined by Rim of the Well musicians Doug Walter (marimba), Sandra Wong (violin), Carl Dixon (percussion – cajon and pandeiro), and Sam Morgan (mandolin).
Steve Mullins. Courtesy of the artist.
Gratitude was recorded and mixed by Paul McGowan and Jessica Carson, who also served as executive producer. It was mastered by Gus Skinas. The album was recorded using Octave’s state-of-the-art Pyramix Pure DSD system, mastered using a PS Audio DirectStream DAC and mixed using PS Audio’s flagship Aspen FR30 loudspeaker. The result is a recording that captures the all-acoustic instruments (nothing is going through an amplifier) with a wonderfully natural quality with extraordinary depth, clarity, spaciousness and especially, impactful dynamic range – start with your system turned to a lower volume as the dynamics are not limited here!
Steve Mullins uses a variety of acoustic guitars to offer a variety of tonal colors and textures. They include a 2002 Dake Traphagen classical on “Insurrection Tangos,” “Possibility of Orchids” and “Ojala,” a 1987 Pedro Maldonado flamenco Negra on “Ruben in the Rain” and “Suenos de Vuelo,” a 2016 German Vazquez Rubio flamenco blanca on “Las Abejas” and “La Llarona,” a 2019 Fernando Mazza classical featured on “Lullaby for Quinn Rose,” and a 1979 Manuel Contreras classical in “Claudia’s Wings.” You can clearly hear the differences between the instruments, from the brighter, more percussive quality of the Vazquez Rubio to the sweeter-sound and greater sustain of the Manuel Contreras instrument.
The album begins with “Insurrection Tangos,” which shows off the exciting ensemble playing and distinctive timbres of the guitars and the instruments, all placed on a deep yet intimate sound space. This is a band that has been playing together for a long time, and you can hear it in their tight yet bouncing feel. Again, the dynamic range is truly incredible. The title track, “Gratitude,” a live-performance favorite, is warm and inviting with excellent separation between the guitar, violin and marimba. “Las Abejas” (”The Bees’), a piece by Augustin Barrios, is arranged by Mullins in the flamenco styles of solea por bulerias and tanguillos and brings in the percussion with the seriously powerful low end of the cajon.
“Claudia’s Wings” is a slow-tempo guitar and violin duet between Mullins and Wong, dedicated to his mother, “who gifted me with music and whose beautiful soprano voice was a soaring soundtrack to my childhood.” “¡Ojalá!” (“Hopefully”), a duo for guitar and mandolin that Mullins says is “inspired by hope for a better world,” features lush guitar and marimba chords and unison playing. “Suenos de Vuelo” (“Dreams of Flight”) with its shifting time signatures and lively interplay between instruments, is an exciting end to a captivating album.
Gratitude features Octave’s premium gold disc formulation, and the disc is playable on any SACD, CD, DVD, or Blu-ray player. It also has a high-resolution DSD layer that is accessible by using any SACD player or a PS Audio SACD transport. In addition, the master DSD and PCM files are available for purchase and download, including DSD 512, DSD 256, DSD 128, DSD 64, and DSDDirect Mastered 352.8 kHz/24-bit, 176.2 kHz/24-bit, 88.2 kHz/24-bit, and 44.1 kHz/24-bit PCM. (SRP: $29.)
I spoke with Steve about the album, guitar playing, and music.
Frank Doris: How'd you get together with the other musicians on the album?
Steve Mullins: We've been playing together in various configurations for 15, 20 years, at least. Doug was a professor at University at Colorado Boulder, and head of the percussion department. The day we met, I was looking for him to try to get permission to use his gamelan instruments in one of my classes, and he was looking for me because he was interested in learning more about flamenco on that very day.
So when I tracked him down, he was all excited about getting together, and so we started playing. I’ve played with Sandra the violinist even longer in various configurations. She's a very much in demand violinist around town.
My original band was called Laughing Hands that played for 20-some years, and we were one of the early Boulder jam bands. We used to sit in a lot with String Cheese Incident and Leftover Salmon, so in the 1990s in Boulder we were all part of that. At that time, I played mostly mandolin and we were doing David Grisman jazzy bluegrass kind of stuff. That was before I got introduced to flamenco and really went that route after that.
FD: Everyone on the album is an unbelievably accomplished musician. Did you have charts for the songs written out?
SM: I wrote out all their parts other than the improvised solo sections. Doug and Sandra are both great improvisers. Sam, the man who plays mandolin, is one of my students. I'm a mandolinist too, but since we really didn't want to overdub stuff any more than necessary, I brought him in on three pieces to play mandolin.
FD: The one thing that I almost literally struck me…I'm listening to the first song and turning it up to a comfortable level, and then all of a sudden, boom! The dynamics are…wow.
SM: It’s nice to be able to do that on a recording. Part of that's a function of the marimba and its incredible dynamic range, and especially the way Doug plays.
FD: All the instruments are acoustic instruments and you can hear the real character of everything.
SM: It's an unusual combination of timbres that I really love. Carl Dixon, who was also a professor of percussion at CU, his specialty is Brazilian percussion. So, he brought in the pandeiro on two pieces.
FD: Why did you use the guitars that you did for each particular piece, and what's the difference between a flamenco negra and a flamenco blanca?
SM: Flamenco blancas are a little more [of a] traditional flamenco [instrument] with a cypress wood back and sides, so they have a little brighter, less bassy, more percussive quality, whereas the flamenco negra has a rosewood back and sides and is closer to a classical [guitar]. It’s a little more of a hybrid.
I'm a real connoisseur of the timbre of the nylon string guitar, and I have about 12 of them. I spend a lot of time just playing them side by side and relishing their subtle differences. Which guitar I choose to play has to do with the nature of the piece – if it's a more slow-moving, sustained piece like “Claudia's Wings,” I like a richer, bassier, more sustaining quality, which you get from a classical [guitar]. On a more flamenco upbeat piece, like “Insurrection Tangos,” I want a more snappy percussive quality. Most of my guitars are very hybrid and they work for either [style].
You always want a flamenco blanca if you're accompanying flamenco dancers because they cut through the sound of the [dancers’ tapping] feet better. It's a more penetrating solid, really hard timbre that cuts through. It doesn't have as nearly as many overtones. A classical will have a lot more overtones.
FD: And you can really hear that on this recording.
SM: Yeah, I’m really happy with the recording quality.
FD: I can just picture Paul and Jessica Carson wondering why you were bringing all these guitars into the studio.
SM: I could have brought in more. You become a connoisseur of tone.
FD: I know. I've got more than 15 guitars in my house and every one's different. My wife says, “do you really need this many guitars?” Well, she doesn't say that anymore. She stopped saying that about 30 years ago!
SM: Sounds exactly like mine. She gave up on that some time ago!
FD: What inspired you to write some of these songs, and were they already in existence or did you write them specifically for the album?
SM: Most of them were already in existence or in process before I got started on this album. I've put out many records of my compositions over the years, so these are almost all written within the last couple of years. The really brand new one is “Lullaby for Quinn Rose,” for my new granddaughter, which I started last fall.
FD: That's just a really pretty piece. “Suenos de Vuelo” has a lot of mood shifts and that one really grabbed me in particular.
SM: That’s one of my favorites too.
FD: I expected “Las Abejas” to be like “Flight of the Bumblebee” or something but it’s not like that.
SM: I changed the whole opening section from the original. I reset the melody in a whole different rhythmic pattern.
FD: “Gratitude” really…it really feels like gratitude. You captured the feeling.
SM: I've had a lot of people in the audience come up and say that about that one.
FD: On some of the songs you have the full band, and some of them are trios and less instrumentation. Did you do that because you felt the music called for it?
SM: Yeah. I wanted to feature the instruments a little more clearly [on the duos and trios]. ”Claudia’s Wings” has just a violin and guitar, so it really features the violin and the timbre of the guitar a little more. “¡Ojalá!” is a marimba and guitar duo.
FD: You've had quite a career. Other than this album, are there any highlights of playing with certain artists or orchestras…or anything crazy that happened? Well, every musician has crazy things happen on a gig.
SM: We probably don't have time for that! Well…I was playing with a flamenco dancer on a trailer at some kind of festival, and then the trailer tipped up and she had to go shimmying down the trailer.
FD: Could you name some of your musical influences?
SM: My original teacher way back in the 1980s was Tim O’Brien, a well-known kind Nashville guy. He was in the Bluegrass band Hot Rize. He was my first teacher on mandolin, and that inspired me to ultimately go to music school, where I went and got my bachelor's and master's and doctorate. I had various professors who were influences on me in flamenco. I started studying with Renee Heredia, who's a fairly famous flamenco guitarist in Denver. He hired me to play mandolin in his flamenco group, and later as a substitute for some shows for an 8-week gig he was doing.
SM: I didn't know much about flamenco guitar, but I was thrown into the fire, and then because I had done that with him, I started having flamenco dancers hire me to perform with them, even though I knew nothing about it, and luckily I didn't know how much I didn't know, or I would've…
FD: You would have never done it! I can't tell you how many stories I've heard of musicians who were just thrown into the gig and had to sink or swim. You’d think flamenco would be something you’d have to study for years, decades…
SM: Rene Heredia used to say it takes 20 years to learn to accompany dancers, 20 years to learn to accompany singers, and 20 years to learn to become a soloist. I am certainly still learning, and I've never gotten tired of it."
FD: I learned a long time ago that you can't be proficient at everything on guitar. You can be influenced by all kinds of different styles though.
SM: I got really interested in ethnomusicology, which is why I went to get my doctorate in that. Just the whole notion of how all these rich styles of music around the world exist, and can teach us so much, especially about how to listen in different ways.
FD: Being a musician and studying music really is endless. There's the famous quote by Pablo Casals. He was 80 years old and when asked why he practiced so much, he said, “because I think I am making progress.”
SM: I quote that a lot.
FD: Everybody finds their voice. You certainly found yours. I can't wait to play this album for people. Paul and Jessica must've been thrilled when they did it.
SM: Well, they're very encouraging. It was fun working with him. They're great people.
FD: Paul and I still get excited about this stuff. It's lots of fun. It's never ending. That’s…
SM: The beauty of music. It keeps you young, it keeps you learning. It's lifelong learning and lifelong imagination and creativity.
FD: That's part of the excitement of live performance. You see somebody play, and realize that this is the first time for them in that moment. It's a special moment. I tell people that I wish you could get up there and play and enjoy the feeling. And never say you can’t. Get an instrument. Learn three chords, learn some simple songs. Never say that you can't do it.
SM: I know so many people do. They limit themselves and they're competing with some notion of what think they should be as opposed to just listening to the beauty coming out of their instrument.
I do a lot of private teaching. I've always kind of balanced performing, classroom teaching, and private individual instruction. And the very best students are the ones who just revel in stroking an E minor chord. If you can take joy in that sound coming off your body that way, just a single chord, you're a musician.
