Explorations in Music Series
The Center for Contemporary Arts of Santa Fe, 1992
Davey Williams & LaDonna Smith
The duo of violinist LaDonna Smith and guitarist Davey Williams have been the foremost exponent of the Southern-style, front porch tradition of free improvisation for eighteen years. A resonant shoot-out, the music of Smith and Williams reconciles the soulful power of delta blues with the richness of improvisation” —Cegep, France. “Smith’s viola stroked grand gestures and hoedown tactics behind Williams’ sometimes surrealist6i guitar escapades. Theirs is the Nip & Tuck School of Improvisation – at its wildest an orgiastic yelp, at its most intimate like the inside of a pumpkin growing.” __Downbeat Williams, who learned guitar from the Chicago blues legend Johnny Shines and cut his teeth on the southern soul circuit is one of the most versatile six-stringers alive, a one man bridge between Derek Bailey, Albert Ayler, Muddy Waters and Spike Jones. Smith, trained as a classical violinists alternates between “sweet siren and fiendish noise maker” matching William’s triple-time hair pinning. Masters of standard and extended techniques, Williams and Smith are billed as “the world’s tightest improvising duo, together they predict the present.”