FRED & DOROTHY TECHAU - Simple Gifts - Parlor Instrumentals

FRED & DOROTHY TECHAU Simple Gifts - Parlor InstrumentalsThe Rose - Enduring Young Charms - Spinning Wheel - Limerick Waltz - Carry Me Back To Old Virginny - Old Black Joe - Annie Laurie - Santa Lucia - Banks Of The Ohio - Danny Boy - Old Kentucky Home - Rosewood Casket - I'm Always Chasing Rainbows - Goin' Home - Juniper Medley - Beautiful Dreamer - Shenandoah - When I Grow Too Old To Dream - I Dream Of Jeannie - Tennessee Waltz - Simple Gifts Medley - Waltz Of The Wind - Somewhere My Love This is an amazing CD to review, for several reasons.  I've never listened to a 'parlor instrumental' CD, neither have I listened to something that carries me back so many years when 'parlor music' was the 'in' thing to do.  Not only listening to it, but playing it. Please remember we are in a time when there was no television, no radio, no amplifying microphones or anything like that.  Just pleasant music played well on acoustic musical instruments....in the parlor.  Guests would come for an evening of chit-chat and background music.  Sometimes the musicians were so good there was very little chit-chat.  That's kind of what this CD is all about.  The musicians are so good they will 'draw' attention away from anything else going on.  But also, it's definitely 'background music' and would make an incredibly good attraction in an antique store, a museum, a florist's shop, just about anything that would be attractively enhanced by light 'easy-to-listen-to' music.  Here's the instruments.  Fred Techau plays lap dulcimer, guitar, harmonica, and mandolin.  His wife Dorothy plays lap dulcimer and hammered dulcimer, and Harriette Andersen added the acoustic upright bass.  Now there's a big difference between lap dulcimer and hammered dulcimer.  The lap one is exactly that, it sits on the lap and is played with a pick. the hammered one is the forerunner to the piano and is played with mallets.  Lovely music all the way through, I would certainly recommend this for any of the preceding stores, and would hope they would find a way to contact the Techau's, who by the way just returned from a several week trip up the Amazon River in South America.Bob Everhart, Music Reviewer, www.ntcma.net
Source:http://countrymusicnewsinternational.blogspot.com/2013/05/fred-dorothy-techau-simple-gifts-parlor.html

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