ALL WOUND UP!
You may wonder how Cathy & Marcy & Brave Combo came to record this family music party together. It started in 1997, when we were all performing at the Live Oak Festival in Santa Barbara, California. Brave Combo was on stage, Cathy & Marcy were sitting in the front row and an audience of 5,000 kids, parents, grandparents and everyone in between were singing, dancing and enjoying life to the fullest. When everyone jumped to their feet to dance the heavy metal version of the Hokey Pokey, we were hooked. More kids, more parents, more teachers needed to hear life at its fullest in the musical sense and experience the energy and incredible musicianship Brave Combo has to offer. So, a seed was planted.
We watered that seed off and on for another three years until it grew into the recording you now hold with new songs, old songs, polka, hora, rock and roll, calypso, waltz and more. So, sing along, dance along, play along, and have a great time. And don't be embarrassed if you find yourself listening without the kids!
Cathy & Marcy
Brave Combo:
Jeffrey Barnes: saxophones, flute, clarinet
Alan Emert: drums
Carl Finch: electric guitar, piano, keyboards, accordion, vocals
Bubba Hernandez: bass, vocals
Danny O'Brien: trumpet
Cathy & Marcy:
Cathy Fink: acoustic guitar, five string banjo, vocals
Marcy Marxer: hammered dulcimer, electric guitar (Swing It, Chopsticks), congas & percussion, mandolin, 6 string banjo, steel drums, acoustic & nylon string guitar (De Colores), vocals
AWARDS: GRAMMY finalist-Best Children's Album, Parents' Choice Award, ALA Award, WAMA Award. #1 on amazon.com for 1 week in all categories.
Review:
Parents and their kids may know Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer as the award-winning, prolific songwriting duo for kids. But who are these Brave Combo guys that Fink and Marxer are hanging out with on All Wound Up: A Family Music Party? The Denton, Texas, band, who make some of the most danceable party music around, specialize in polkas, a host of Mexican and Latin dance styles, plus an occasional Middle Eastern flavor or three. They're well traveled, musically speaking, with a host of critically praised albums and a legion of fans. Throw the Combo together with Fink and Marxer, and you get the whole enchilada: essential traditional and freshly original party tunes (plus the new and incendiary calypso number, "I Will Never Clean Up My Room"). Your junior constituents will repeat "The Mockingbird Polka," penned by Fink and Marxer, and the old Harry Belafonte tune "Turn the World Around" so often that you'll dream them in your sleep. As if that weren't enough reason to join the party, who could resist a disc that highlights a salsa version of "Chopsticks" and "Funiculi Funicula," the classic ode to joy that belongs in the world view of every girl and boy? A delight, through and through. --Martin Keller
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