Summer Crashing European/Dixie Frog release
Summer Crashing US/Pravda release
Susan's violin
LINKS
www.pravdamusic.com/svoelz.htm
Susan Voelz is a violin player, songwriter, performer and often a very magical woman. In the mid eighties when we met, she was playing violin with lots of effects in town full of fiddle players....remember to never call Susan a fiddle player. She taught Suzuki violin to children (she taught my kids for awhile). When I first knew of her she was playing in a really good band called Grains of Faith... I wonder where those tapes are? She eventually went on to play with Ronnie Lane (yes! Itchykoo Park, Small Faces), John Mellencamp, Alejandro Escovedo, Poi Dog Pondering, Charlie Sexton. Brian Wilson & more. On year in Texas she formed a very cool ensemble called "the Cactus cafe Orkestra"......Mostly classical players who got together once a month ato perform at the Cactus Cafe on the UT campus. They were a bit like Penguin Cafe Orkestra...odd arrangements, strange sounds from their expensive violins and cellos. John Hagan, Lyle Lovett's super cellist was in CCO.
When I was recording the first POI DOG record I brought Susan in to do some violin and she just became a part of the band quickly. All of those beautiful squeaky scratchy sounds on Poi Dog recordings are mostly Susan and her duet with Bruce Hughes of a Roky Erickson song "Had to Tell You", is one of the most Beautiful things I have every recorded. I always include it on my producer samplers. Susan eventually moved to Chicago with Poi Dog and still plays with Frank Orrall in his yearly formations of the band. She has a string ensemble in Chicago (which is closer to her family home of Milwaukee) and they do session work often. Susan is one of the only people I know who has been a vegetarian for a long time and practices a lot of peaceful things. When you meet her you can feel this peace that comes of from years of being good to yourself.
I helped Susan get her deal to release her solo recordings on Phillipe Langlois' French label..Dixie Frog Records. She released 2 recordings with Dixie Frog, both of which are very special. In the US these were ultimately released on Pravda Records and were recorded in my living room, her living room, at the Cactus Cafe, really anywhere we could drag some microphones and a tape (or ADAT) machine. Susan is cooooooool!
