There’s a musical family in Maine that has consistently created music that has been thrilling audiences all over with their trademark sound of folk served up with close vocal harmonies and spot-on instrumental expertise. The name of the family? Why the Gawlers, of course … and they will perform Sunday in Jewett Hall at UMA. To that end, a telephone interview was arranged with Ellen Gawler (who’s also in the popular quartet known as the Ladies of the Lake) at her home in Belgrade to chat about the show and her talented family and friends.
Q: What does this performance involve?
Gawler: Well, as it has been in the past, it’s going to be the Gawler family and the Boardman family, with Greg Boardman and his two sons, Isaac and Aiden.
Q: What are the instruments of choice for those three gentlemen?
Gawler: Isaac plays the mandolin and Aiden plays the guitar — he’s a music student at Ithaca College and he’s making music down there, writing songs and recording out. They all do it online these days so it’s not a printed record but it’s a project that he’s working on. Greg plays guitar and fiddle — a fine fiddler, very well-known around the state — and he also plays cello and viola. He plays almost everything. He’s talented.
Q: So it will be the Boardman and the Gawler clans.
Gawler: Right! And we have two daughters that will be with us. Elsie, who lives in Monroe, and Edith are going to be with us, too. Edith is newly married to a fellow named Bennett Konesni, who will be joining us, also…he plays guitar and fiddle.
Q: So no Molly this time?
Gawler: Molly is traveling; she’s dancing with the group Pilobolus and won’t be able to join us that week.
Q: And what is Pilobolus, perchance?
Gawler: Oh, that’s a dance troupe and they are touring Europe at the moment. It’s a major tour and she won’t be home until June.
Q: Does Molly prefer the dancing over performing music?
Gawler: Oh, she loves them both.
Q: You are primarily a fiddler/vocalist, correct?
Gawler: Yes.
Q: And your husband, John, covers what instruments, just for the record?
Gawler: Guitar, banjo and he sings. Oh, and Edith plays the fiddle, the guitar and the banjo; and Elsie plays the cello and the fiddle and she sings and writes songs, as does Edith. And I just remembered that this will be our first show in the Augusta area since the Gawler Sisters’ CD came out last year right around the Christmas season, and we didn’t perform it at all last year, so this will be the first time.
Q: Do you get to play Jewett Hall often? Is this an annual show?
Gawler: For this particular show it’s been every other year and Ladies of the Lake has one on the odd years, too, so it’s been a number of years like that.
Q: Do you enjoy Jewett Hall.
Gawler: Oh, it’s lovely and the audiences have been so great. The last year we had to turn away nearly 50 people and instead what we did was we brought them to the gallery space and gave them a little pre-show, just a few songs to send them home with because there wasn’t enough room for them; we had to turn them away because the fire marshal has something to say about that! But it’s a great space, acoustically wonderful and we always have a wonderful sound man named Scott Perrow to work the board … he’s been around a long time and he knows his stuff.
Q: Is the Gawler Family coming out with something new?
Gawler: This Gawler Sisters’ album is the new effort. On this CD it’s the Gawler Sisters are front and center, but mom and dad are helping out around the edges. It’s been nice because it’s been a bit of a launching pad for them and they’ve done a few gigs without mom and dad … that’s been really exciting for them. They’ve been enjoying that. They do such a beautiful job and, truth be known, they don’t really need us. They’re fine without us. We just like playing together is all.
Q: And that comes through, too, whether it’s a live performance or one captured in the studio — that love of music is palpable.
Gawler: Definitely. Oh, and I could tell you a little bit more about Greg, as well. We’ve known Greg for, well, as long as we’ve been playing music. He’s one of our oldest and dearest musical friends. He started Maine Fiddle Camp — he’s kind of a fiddling icon in the state of Maine — and he’s played in the Maine Country Notes Orchestra with us for 25 years. Right now he teaches strings in the Lewiston public schools department and he does workshops and concerts all over the state.
Q: How long have you been making music?
Gawler: I’ve been playing out as a fiddler since I was 19 … so that’s a long time.
Lucky Clark writes about good music and those who make it; luckyc@megalink.net.
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