Best of Nashville Music

BEST PLACE TO SPOT THAT DUDE WHO PLAYED ON THAT RECORD: FAMILY WASH

They’re Nashville’s unsung heroes—the folks you’ve heard or seen play a bazillion times, yet you don’t know their names. And on any given night, it’s not uncommon to find five or six of them sitting at the bar at the Family Wash. That guy at the end? Pete Finney, pedal steel player for everyone from Patty Loveless and Allison Moorer to The Clientele. Who’s the mop-topped dude Pete’s talking to? Oh, that’s former Black Crowe Audley Freed, who’s also played with the Dixie Chicks and Gov’t Mule…sitting next to his wife (and former Jayhawks keyboardist) Jen Gunderman. And if it isn’t those darn Pisapia boys: Joe (Guster guitarist) and Marc (Josh Rouse’s drummer)…along with honorary Pisapia brother Hags Haggerty, who you may have seen playing bass with Rouse or Wilco side project Autumn Defense. Hey, Stu Kimball! You were awesome with Dylan last week! I guess Patty Griffin’s off the road, ’cause there’s her bass player, Frank Swart, talking to longtime David Bowie guitarist Reeves Gabrels and Warren Pash, who wrote Hall & Oates’ “Private Eyes.” Geez, I must sound like a jerk. After all, Neil Young told me never to namedrop. But it’s hard in this place. Now where’s my shepherd’s pie, dammit?! —JACK SILVERMAN

BEST CONDUCTOR TO TURN CLASSICAL MUSIC ON ITS HEAD: PAUL GAMBILL

Who says you have to perform Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony exactly the way it’s written? Who says classical music can’t rock, fox trot or tango? Certainly not Paul Gambill, the adventurous music director of the Nashville Chamber Orchestra. Gambill has devoted his music career to reinventing classical music from the ground up. His concerts may intersperse spiky contemporary pieces between the movements of a Beethoven symphony, or they may mix music with a multimedia slideshow. But what they never do is pander. Gambill is a serious artist who understands that true success comes from being good and original. So don’t expect gimmicks at his concerts—just ear-bending, life-affirming music. —JOHN PITCHER

BEST COMPOSER TO TURN CLASSICAL MUSIC ON ITS HEAD: MICHAEL ROSE

If you think classical music is stuffy, boring and predictable, then you’re clearly not listening to the music of Michael Rose. A composition professor at the Blair School of Music, Rose writes works that willfully defy convention. His Concerto for Klezmer Band and Orchestra, which received its world premiere last March courtesy of the Nashville Chamber Orchestra, freely mixes world music with classical techniques. It also mixes improvisation with a composed score, making it almost more like a big-band piece than a classical work. Still, the best thing about his music is its sheer lyrical beauty—Rose is a self-described “slut for melody.” If only the rest of the musical establishment could be so profligate. —JOHN PITCHER

BEST SHOWS WE CAN’T TELL YOU ABOUT: HOUSE SHOWS

In our efforts to publish comprehensive music listings each week, the Scene encounters a fair bit of gray area. Take the burgeoning house show market—there aren’t exactly official addresses and contact numbers for the basements, living rooms, bedrooms, kitchens and the occasional apartment that have all played host to a wealth of local and touring artists—mostly those whose appeal is, let’s say, less than universal. Most venues won’t cater to the city’s festering noise and experimental music scene, so, much like malignant tumors, those artists find more vulnerable cells to invade. Ark, Brown Swarm, Science, Necking and Meemaw aren’t often mentioned in this paper, but their names are familiar to those who frequent the BYOB portion of the scene. Still, the harsher sounds of Nashville aren’t the only ones heard at these shows—How I Became the Bomb played a basement house show this past year. Lucky for Nashville, the number of houses hosting music has steadily increased. But hearing about the shows is still a little like getting tipped off to a speakeasy—just hope you’ll be in the right place at the right time to overhear someone mention a kick-ass show on Porter Road. Just sayin’. —MATT SULLIVAN

BEST LOCAL ROCK BAND WHO’D BE AT HOME ON THE GRAND OLE OPRY: THOSE DARLINS

If history has taught us anything, it’s that punk rock and old-time country music have more in common than anyone would have ever suspected. The Murfreesboro, Tenn., trio known as Those Darlins illustrate this truism. Jessi Wariner, Kelley Anderson and Nikki Kvarnes banded together over their love of The Carter Family’s deadpan, crazed music and bring an energy to live performance that recalls the antics of punk heroes such as The Cramps. They’re all under 25, yet display a precocious wisdom, as their cover of A.P. Carter’s “Little Darling Pal of Mine” demonstrates. If the folks who ran the Grand Ole Opry had any sense, Those Darlins would be hawking Goo Goo Clusters and stirring up audiences with originals such as “The Whole Damn Thing,” a tale of unrepentant chicken-eating. Most of the time they don’t even use a drummer, which makes them more traditionalist than the Opry is these days. —EDD HURT