Track Premiere: Salt Spring from John Reischman

Mandolin master John Reischman has a new album soon to be released, with a clever title drawing on his long career as both a stellar sideman and an innovative bandleader. Known for his collaborations with Tony Rice and his many years in the traditional string music community along the west coast, John is calling this project New Time and Old Acoustic.

Today we are pleased to premiere the debut single from this album, a new recording of Reischman’s most enduring number, a composition of his called Salt Spring. Written as a contemporary style fiddle tune, it was included on the first record from John Reischman & The Jaybirds in 2001, and has since become a jam standard among mandolin players world wide. As that album is no longer available, and in recognition of its international acceptance, John has re-recorded it here, assisted by Molly Tuttle on guitar, Alex Hargreaves on fiddle, Allison De Groot on banjo, and Max Schwartz on bass.

John tells us that Salt Spring, named for Salt Spring Island off the coast of British Columbia near his home in Vancouver, captures the New Time aspect of his upcoming album.

Salt Spring has really gotten around the world. Someone sent me a video of a fiddle group playing it in Catalonia. I went to Australia for the first time in 2018 and found it so interesting that a tune of mine got there before I did. It’s such an honour to me that so many folks play it.”

Here ’tis…

Salt Spring is available now wherever you stream or download music online. Radio programmers can get the single track at AirPlay Direct.

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About the Author

John Lawless

John had served as primary author and editor for The Bluegrass Blog from its launch in 2006 until being folded into Bluegrass Today in September of 2011. He continues in that capacity here, managing a strong team of columnists and correspondents.