The 15th edition of the Geneva Music Festival ended with a bang Sunday afternoon when fiddler-extraordinaire Michael Cleveland and his band Flamekeeper took the stage on the lawn of the boutique hotel Geneva on the Lake. On the shores of majestic Seneca Lake, sidled up to well-manicured hedge gardens, the air was ripe for getting sliced up by some good old fiddle tunes. A perfect afternoon in the Finger Lakes was afoot.
A high-peaked festival tent held a couple hundred seats filled with music fans eager to lay ears on one of the hottest stars on the scene today. It was another sold out show in what was a highly successful four-week program for the festival, which saw a 30% increase in ticket sales this year featuring world-class artists across classical, jazz and bluegrass.
Michael Cleveland and his band; Josh Richards on guitar and vocals, Nathan Livers on mandolin and vocals, Jasiah Shrode on banjo, and Chris Douglas on upright bass and vocals; took the stage promptly at showtime and immediately kicked into a high-energy instrumental giving each member time to stretch their legs.
Douglas laid down the bass-line from Sugarhill Gangs “Rapper’s Delight” (nee “Good Times” by Chic) toward the end of his turn, to which Cleveland responded, “Play that funky music bassman!” Cleveland then launched into a lengthy solo in which he hit the lowest possible note on a fiddle, made even lower as he proceeded to de-tune the G string while playing. He continued to adjust with the tuning through his soloto close out an over fifteen minute opening number. The crowd roared in appreciation and the scene was fully set. Cleveland rightly observed, “I can tell this is gonna be fun!”
From there, the band ran through a healthy mix of grass-ified pop and rock tunes, bluegrass canon, fiery instrumentals and their own originals. Julian Lennon’s “Too Late For Goodbyes” sounded like it was meant for the high and lonesome sound in their hands. John Hiatt’s “Tennessee Plates” and Blackberry Smoke’s “One Horse Town” had a shorter road to travel but likewise fit in perfectly with the more traditional “Uncle Pen,” “How Mountain Girls Can Love.”
Inspired by Billy Strings’ “Dust in a Baggie,” their own drug-related tune, “Mescaline” departed from the traditional with trippy echoey guitar effects and a plucked out fiddle solo. “For Your Love,” another original, included a truly inspired solo by Cleveland that built slowly to an incredible peak, which must have cut straight through to the heavens as the skies open up into heavy rainfall right on cue.
The show closed appropriately with their take on the classic “Orange Blossom Special,” which was what sparked Cleveland’s passion for the fiddle when he heard played as a young boy in his hometown of Henryville, Indiana.
But they weren’t through yet, of course, the immediate and enthusiastic standing ovation got the band back to the stage for a few more. They honored a request for “Dance Around Molly” which Cleveland seemed pretty pleased about, “Good call, we haven’t played that in a million years.” The afternoon seemed to be over with a performance of the traditional “Long Journey Home,” but again, the crowd persisted. So they were rewarded with a mandolin and fiddle duet of “Jerusalem Ridge” played front of stage without mics. One final time to hear Michael Cleveland’s incredibly fluid and clean playing, unimpeded by amplification. Now what could be more perfect than that?
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