Album Notes

EJ Ouellette & Crazy Maggy

Led by EJ Ouellette on fiddle, guitars and vocals, Crazy Maggy rocks the roots of traditional fiddle music by blending ancient melodies with new arrangements, contemporary lyrics, and soulful grooves.

Ouellette is bringing fiddling into a new light. With respect and love for traditional music, EJ & Crazy Maggy are defining a new genre of music -- RAD/TRAD -- by blending traditional fiddle music with radical new arrangements and contemporary lyrics and influences. The result is a mesmerizing sound that rocks audiences with its energy and invention.

The Boston press has called Ouellette a “Celtic fiddle master,” with “a keening, propulsive edge, merging the jubilant and the plangent in a single verse.” A lifelong musician, EJ picked up the fiddle later in his career, fiddle being one of many instruments he has played professionally. He started his band, Crazy Maggy, while fusing his rock skills with his roots in Irish, French Canadian and Cape Breton music.

EJ & Crazy Maggy's blend of ancient melodies and syncopation, combined with a modern rhythm section, pop sensibilities and arrangements, attracts music lovers of all ages and backgrounds. The band’s tribal jams, known as “Maggy moments”, always bring down the house.

“We play ‘the tunes’ and then we jam. We suck the marrow out of every bit the tune has to offer,” says EJ.

Maggy music is showcased on the band’s debut CD, “Rock the Bow 5.0,” which features Ouellette on fiddle, vocals, guitars and mandolin.

Selected quotes:

Steve Morse of the Boston Globe:

“Ouellette is a Celtic fiddle master, but he has also pushed this group in exciting new directions. Dips into Jean Luc Ponty-style jazz and Celtic/world-beat fusion are some of the offshoots of this powerful band, which plays with precision and passion.“

Daniel Gewertz of the Boston Herald:

“EJ Ouellette & Crazy Maggy was a delightful electric fusion surprise. Fiddle and sax lead a fearless band. A stylish fiddler, Ouellette exhibits a keening, propulsive edge, merging the jubilant and the plangent in a single verse.”

Bruce Menin of the Newburyport Current:

“Ouellette and Crazy Maggy are among the most prominent practitioners of Rad-Trad, fusing traditional values and forms to modern, nay "radical" sensibilities… The combination of sax and fiddle is a revelation and a dream. The music itself achieves what Ouellette sets out to do. It marries the rootedness of tradition with the urgency of the outward edge… The band rocks.”