Episode 040: Eilen Jewell
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I first heard Eilen (rhymes with feelin') Jewell's music as she was playing at the Green River Music Festival in Greenfield, Massachusetts in the summer of 2006. Jewell was playing an outdoor stage, under a tent, with a myriad of activities going on around the festival property for both kids and adults, but the crowd was listening with rapt attention...not an easy thing to do when playing in such a setting!
Jewell's debut album, Boundary County, was self-released in 2005 and she subsequently signed to Signature Sounds, which released Letters from Sinners and Strangers in late June 2007. Jewell is playing live in the coming months at various points around the US.
I first learned about
This month, an interview with Hilken Mancini (of the bands Fuzzy and The Count Me Outs) who recently released a new CD in conjunction with Chris Colbourn (of Buffalo Tom) called, simply,
One of my favorite things about doing Well-Rounded Radio is that, as a result of hosting and producing the show these last few years, people often turn me on to music they think I'll like, so I often get to hear music that I wouldn't have discovered otherwise.
The first time I heard Great Lake Swimmers was on a Starbucks' Hear Music compliation CD as I was cleaning the dishes after dinner one night. "Moving Pictures, Silent Films" closed out the CD, but it was so stark and beautiful and engaging, I listened, then went back, then listened again, then went back, then listened, again, then...you know, it was one of those moments. 

The Howard Fishman Quartet is not a jazz band, though sometimes they improvise as in that musical form. They aren't a blues or a folk band either, but you'll hear those influences at play, too. A little swing, a little soul, a little rock...the Howard Fishman Quartet will make you recall a wide variety of American music, but it's put together in such a natural, effortless way that it sounds like an entirely new form.
Dan Zanes was the front man for The Del Fuegos in Boston for the better part of the 1980s. After four albums, numerous tours, and much acclaim, the band went their separate ways in 1990, with Zanes resurfacing later in the decade with a new approach: performing traditional and original music for all ages.
Josh Ritter has just released his third CD, "Hello Starling" on Signature Sounds Recordings, following his 1999 eponymous debut and 2002's acclaimed "Golden Age of Radio." Ritter and his band are out now on tour of the US and Europe.

