The Mountain Music Project, a film about a pair of bluegrass musicians who visited Nepal to meet and jam with folk musicians in that Asian nation, is now available as part of Amazon Prime. Subscribers to Amazon’s service can rent the documentary for only $1.99, or purchase it for $8.99, and watch it on any Internet-abled television, computer, or device.
In the film, we watch as Danny Knicely, noted guitarist and fiddler from northern Virginia, and Tara Linhardt, familiar to our readers as a regular festival correspondent, navigate through Nepal. Their engagements with local musicians were shot and recorded by Jacob Penchansky, and edited into a film that is part travelogue and part cultural exchange.
Tara is also a studied mandolinist, and an experienced music educator, and she and Danny traversed the countryside looking if they could find parallels between the music of Nepal and the Appalachian music they loved from home. Linhardt had lived there as a child, and approached this subject with great eagerness.
You can get a feel for the film from this trailer.
Tara is organizing a music-themed visit to Nepal in 2019, an 8-day guided trip to various cultural centers. They will be gone from March 1-9, and several stops will include opportunities to meet and jam with local musicians. More details can be found on Facebook.
