Tags
Related Posts
Share This
Dynamic Duo
Jackalope Magazine recently interviewed contemporary music majors Sam Armstrong-Zickefoose and Konor Hunter-Crump about their new band, Zickey and the Kondor. The two juniors play progressive folk with some world music and rock influences. Armstrong-Zickefoose plays the banjo, guitar and upright bass, while Hunter-Crump plays the fiddle and the mandolin.
Jackalope Magazine: So I know that both of you were interviewed before as members of the band Laser Cats. Is this a part of that, or is it something entirely different?
Sam Armstrong-Zickefoose: It’s completely different.
Konor Hunter-Crump: Yeah it’s not diet Laser Cats.
SAZ: They’re more of a gypsy-jazz oriented band. What we play is like bluegrass had some sort of accident and suddenly got more complex. This project is more personal. I love Laser Cats and everyone in there, but it’s not the kind of music I see myself playing in the future. This feels like I’m saying something. Most of my compositions come out in this style anyways.
KHC: This is a more accurate representation of our personalities.
SAZ: We’re old time music: We’re both based in roots…
KHC: Steeped in traditions.
JM: What’s the ideal audience then?
KHC: Everybody. Our kind of music is obscure and not what everyone listens to.
SAZ: There’s kind of a bad connotation with bluegrass that it’s this hillbilly sort of music.
KHC: People assume that modern bluegrass will sound like modern country, which has this horrible stereotype of beer and trucks.
SAZ: There’s some country I like, but it isn’t similar to what we do at all.
KHC: Well it is like old country. Those two sound the same. I think we want to prove or demonstrate the value of old music.
SAZ: But also take it in different directions.
KHC: We like to apply new aesthetics to old time music and vice versa. We mix and match.
SAZ: It’s also nice to finally have a bluegrass-oriented project here. I feel like the genre gets overlooked pretty often.
JM: Where does the name Zickey and the Kondor come from?
SAZ: Our former chair Steven Paxton—all hail—gave us both those nicknames in class.
JM: If you could work with any musician in the world, who would it be?
KHC: Chris Thile. He’s like my hero of mandolin playing. He’s considered to be the best in the world. He’s innovative and can play any style. He’s just inspiring.
SAZ: For me it would be Bela Fleck. He changed so much about what the banjo and mandolin can do.
JM: How did you two meet?
SAZ: I think it was Americana ensemble.
KHC: Well, then we met through Laser Cats. You needed a fiddle player.
SAZ: I was so nervous.
KHC: You were nervous? I was nervous!
SAZ: You were so good I thought you wouldn’t want to play with us.
JM: What’s it like working together?
KHC: Well I haven’t written any lyrics I like yet, but as far as tunes, I just scramble to a recording device. They mostly happen at three in the morning at the most inopportune time.
SAZ: I operate differently. Something pops into my head and I steep with it and I keep having little ideas and keep reflecting on them, which is really inefficient. Musically we’re very similar. We have minor disagreements…
KHC: We both like fiddle tunes, and we both like their sound. We usually end up deciding on the same thing. Sam is better at chordal things.
SAZ: I never have to tell Konor what do. It’s usually just like suggestions for which note to try. My tunes tend to be a little safe. I don’t get too adventurous and Konor helps me explore. Konor on the other hand is sometimes a bit…
KHC: Too adventurous.
SAZ: Which wouldn’t be a problem in a big band.
KHC: Yeah, then it doesn’t sound so empty when you’re doing these different parts.
JM: So right now Zickey and the Kondor is a duet right? Do you think you’ll expand or get new members?
SAZ: That’s a good question.
KHC: Duet stuff is really fun, but it’s hard to get some of the sounds we want.
SAZ: It gets lonely.
KHC: I would like to have a bass player sometime.
JM: Do you guy think you’ll stay in the same bands after you graduate?
SAZ: I want to say yes, but I don’t know where I want to live. Getting four or five people to move to the same part of the country is kind of difficult.
KHC: I think me and Sam will stay connected though.
SAZ: We’re kind of like a package deal.
Recent Comments