JOYNES, C - God Feeds The Ravens

An exciting new release on Bo Weavils Wooden Weavil series. English acoustic guitarist C Joynes, a resident of Cambridge, has released a few self produced excellent CDRs. Joynes uses a heavy thumb-led finger-picking technique that harks back to traditional country blues and early ragtime, however, he uses this technique to explore alternative melodic traditions: the English folk-tune; North and West African music; elements of classical Indian music; proto-minimalist and impressionist musics from the European classical tradition. His approach to the recording and compositional process contains a subtle and unassuming experimentation, at times including collaged fragments, field recordings, processing, en-plein-air recordings, and cut-and-paste. The version of Since I Lay My Burden Down incorporates variations on lyrics and vocal lines drawn from a different song entirely. He has a penchant for reworking over-familiar pieces and stripping them of their kitsch and cliché, presenting them afresh, such as with Christmas Medley, the arrangement of A Night In Tunisia, and the gospel-based And When The Sun Begins To Shine. Joynes music is instinctive, well-researched, placid, and evokes a certain simplicity and naiveté.-Bo Weavil.