Basic Folk 183 – Brittany Haas
Fiddler Brittany Haas has an impressive resume: she started touring at 14 with Darol Anger, recorded her debut album at 17, started performing with Crooked Still before she finished college and has played on Chris Thile’s radio program Live From Here and done stints in David Rawlings and Gillian Welch’s David Rawlings Machine. Currently, she’s teaching workshops and classes in between working with her band Hawktail along with Paul Kowert, Jordan Tice and Dominick Leslie. Their latest album, Place of Growth, is a song cycle in appreciation to the natural elements, which have always intrigued Brittany.
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She’s a trailblazer in fiddling and also has an acute awareness of burnout. The past few years have seen her pursuing and obtaining a masters in social work and teaching classes at East Tennessee State University as their artist-in-residence. Our conversation includes a discussion of balance and awareness when it comes to keeping her music joyful. And then there’s science: she has a degree in Evolutionary Biology at Princeton University. Also, Hawktail’s latest album is a journey through the natural world. We talk about the band giving each other the space to be themselves on the record. Brittany is chill, brilliant and generous. Enjoy and then go listen to Hawktail’s new record all in one sitting.
This is a great interview, very satisfying for questions asked–anticipated–what a fan might want to know. Having listened to dozens of Brittany’s performances I had no idea who she “is”. One might say Molly T is over-abundantly interviewed, while Brittany the opposite. (love Molly). Very interesting that Brittany took lessons from Jack Tuttle. I recently discovered “old time” fiddle music, and Brittany is always popping up in Youtube videos. I bought the latest album of Hawktail, which brilliantly retains “memories” of old time, if at times merely in the band’s instrumentation, but always moves into new realms. Britanny’s patented style, musically full of exquisite filigrees and right-on time, also consists of her being always well- groomed on stage, even in less formal settings. Not to mention, and one will studiously not mention her beauty, she never fails to draw in all others in the band, and audience, with her welcoming stage-presence and eye-contact.