Herschel Freeman Agency

Heart-Stopping Harmonies

Founding members Nicky Mehta and Ruth Moody are delighted to welcome New York-based alto singer Heather Masse and Vancouver-based fiddler. Jeremy Penner to The Wailin’ Jennys.  Heather brings a fresh new voice that is steeped in both bluegrass and jazz traditions, and Jeremy’s eclectic musical background is well suited to his new role as the band’s featured  instrumental soloist. 

Heather Masse grew up in rural Maine and began singing at an early age. She received a degree in Jazz Voice from the New England Conservatory of Music. She has performed with the world-renowned contemporary bluegrass band "The Wayfaring Strangers," and has appeared at venues throughout the country including NPR's World Cafe, the Somerville Theater, and Boston's Symphony Hall, sharing the stage with the Boston Pops Orchestra. She recently recorded an eponymous album with the up-and-coming Boston-based group "Joy Kills Sorrow"—a modern string band that incorporates bluegrass, jazz, old-time, and pop styles—as well as a self-released EP Tell Me Tonight, a collection of original songs performed with her own Brooklyn-based outfit “Heather and the Barbarians.”

Jeremy Penner, like the Jennys, began his career in the rich musical community of Winnipeg.  He and Ruth played together in the Celtic/Old Time ensembles “Scruj MacDuhk” and “Moody Penner and Swain”, releasing critically acclaimed CDs and touring together internationally for six years.  Ruth went on to form “The Wailin’ Jennys”, and Jeremy joined “The Bills” before launching his solo career.  A highly skilled and musical player, he has studied fiddle with Casey Driessen in Nashville and Matt Glaser in Boston, and is well versed in a variety of traditional genres.  Jeremy’s unique, dynamic style incorporates Jazz, Old Time, Bluegrass, Celtic, and Cajun music. 

The Wailin’ Jennys have toured three continents, and are enjoying burgeoning international acclaim and a rapidly growing fan base. They continue to garner rave reviews for their album, Firecracker, which has spent over 30 weeks in the Top 5 on the Billboard Bluegrass chart, and has charted in the Top 20 on Billboard’s Top Heatseakers, Top Independent Albums and Top Internet Albums. Firecracker also rose to #2 on the Amazon Top Sellers Chart.

Over the past two years, The Wailin’ Jennys have made many appearances on Garrison Keiller’s ‘A Prairie Home Companion’, sharing the stage with luminaries such as Bonnie Raitt and Meryl Streep.  This February, the band had the honour of performing alongside Roseanne Cash and Phil Cunningham as well as other notable artists at the venerable Celtic Connections festival in Glasgow, Scotland. 

”…perhaps more beautiful than ever. The Wailin' Jennys are the darlings of the North American roots music arena.” Greg Quill, The Toronto Star, July 2006.
 
“Like three little birds singing softly and sweetly in the early morn, the harmony of the Wailin’ Jennys pleasantly rises from the speakers and greets the listener with a refreshing start to the day.” David McPherson, Exclaim! 

“Fueled by the elemental power and transcendent glory of their honeyed three part harmonies, Firecracker is guaranteed to soothe your soul with its earthy passion and heartfelt compassion.”  

Creem Magazine/Metro Times Detroit

BIOGRAPHY

Three extraordinary voices, two founding singer-songwriters, one singular vision: The Wailin' Jennys continue to evolve into far more than the melodious sum of their individual talents five years after blowing in on a fresh acoustic breeze from Canada's mid-western heartland.

Spurred onward by a growing fan base that swoons at their intuitive harmonies and revels in their engaging stage presence and uplifting repertoire, the Jennys embarked on a giddy blur of activity following the release of their second album, Firecracker, in August, 2006. Numerous head-turning reviews ("quiet, warm, subtle, mellifluous ? almost too good to be true," noted British daily The Independent) greeted a recording produced by David Travers-Smith (Jane Siberry, Harry Manx) and featuring a crew of ace musicians led by guitarist Kevin Breit (Norah Jones, k.d. lang). The trio wooed progressively larger audiences throughout North America while also making successful forays to the U.K. and continental Europe. And foremost among an unfolding series of life moments have been a second Juno Award nomination in Canada, the continuation of a much-cherished relationship with A Prairie Home Companion (Garrison Keillor's popular National Public Radio show) and a memorable date alongside Rosanne Cash at the prestigious Celtic Connections festival in Glasgow.

"One Voice," a live staple and highlight of the Jennys' Juno- winning debut album 40 Days, remains a metaphoric statement of intent that to this day underlines the group's original mandate: three individuals with unique gifts combining seamlessly into a single beatific entity. Soprano Ruth Moody (guitar, banjo, accordion, bodhran) and mezzo Nicky Mehta (guitar, harmonica, ukulele, percussion) are charter members who've anchored the Jennys since the first line-up formed in their Winnipeg hometown. The critical third voice, an alto who fills out the chordal range of the group's vibrant three-part harmonies, has been filled in turn by Cara Luft, Annabelle Chvostek and, now that the latter has returned to her own solo career, new recruit Heather Masse.

Launching what fans are fondly calling version 3.0 of the Jennys, Heather is a New York-based singer and pianist who finds the middle ground between contemporary bluegrass (through her work with roots supergroup The Wayfaring Strangers) and jazz vocals (which she studied at the New England Conservatory of Music). She gelled immediately with Ruth and Nicky during an impromptu audition in a bathroom backstage in Philadelphia. Singing raw versions of "Amazing Grace" and an old Hank Williams song, the three women quickly nailed the essence of the Jennys' exquisite sound while hinting at exciting new possibilities that will flower in the months of touring and studio sessions that lie ahead.

"Heather fits in astonishingly well with us," enthuses Nicky.  "She's got a smoky, enveloping kind of style. People will go nuts when they hear her." Adds Ruth, who first learned of Heather from their mutual friend, Crooked Still's Aoife O'Donovan: "We found a perfect vocal blend the first time with Cara, then we captured it in a different way with Annabelle. So naturally we were thinking, 'Oh man, can it really happen again?' But we have stumbled on such a rich treasure. Her voice is just so round and warm."

Ruth Moody has long understood the power of three. She grew up in an accomplished musical family singing with two sisters, then spent five years fronting Winnipeg's Scuj MacDuhk. When the popular Celtic/roots road warriors broke up in 2001, she again craved what she calls "the sense of completeness and wholeness that can only come with three female voices. The Jennys provide a sense of continuity that threads through my entire life."

For her part, Nicky Mehta was on track for post-graduate studies in communications when she released a buzzworthy solo debut CD and, not long after, signed on as a first-generation Jenny. "The group sort of just happened to us," she says, laughing. "The idea was to present our individual visions in a larger collective, but before we knew it things had taken on a life of their own. We've constantly been playing catch up ever since. What's great is that nothing has been premeditated and we keep being surprised in the most creative, interesting ways."

"Now we've closed another chapter in the Jennys' story and opened a new one," says Ruth. "We're thrilled to be writing it with Heather. She's a kindred spirit. That we can find the magic while laughing and singing together in a dimly lit bathroom says it all really."


Review

Songs with a bang

By Jay Votel
June 6, 2006
The Wailin' Jennys
Firecracker Red House Records

With a baker's dozen of fresh, rootsy songs and their signature heart-stopping harmonies, the Wailin' Jennys' second recording should prove explosive for their careers.   The three Canadians, Annabelle Chvostek, Nicky Mehta and Ruth Moody already have won the admiration of Garrison Keillor, who featured them on his popular program "A Prairie Home Companion," heard on National Public Radio.

The first Wailin' Jennys disc, "40 Days," with vocalist Cara Luft, earned the trio a 2005 Juno -- the Canadian equivalent of the Grammy award, for Roots and Traditional Album of the Year.
Miss Luft left the group and was replaced by Miss Chvostek. The Jennys' sound remains as pure as a mountain stream, though, and just about as bubbly. With claw hammer banjo, mandolin and fiddle high in the mix, producer David Travers-Smith capitalized on the trio's penchant for the old-time sound, adding just the edge of rock guitars, percussion, organ and horns to make the disc palatable for modern tastes.

Each of the women wrote four songs for the recording, and the first four set the tone for the rest of the disc. Miss Chvostek wrote "The Devil's Paintbrush Road," with its hooky refrain, plus "Live and die and gone," followed by Miss Moody's composition, "Glory Bound," practically a hymn complete with "hallelujahs." Either of these songs would be welcomed by the most die-hard traditional music lover.

With Miss Mehta's "Begin," the Jennys steer into more of a pop sound with layered, sustained harmony vocals, tinged with accordion and fiddle. The disc hits its stride on Miss Moody's "Things That You Know," with goosebump-inducing three-part harmonies backed by a rhythm-and-bluesy combo that includes mandolin.   The Jennys' a capella arrangement of the traditional "Long Time Traveller" would have been at home on the "O Brother" soundtrack.

These songs have a hint of folk politics. What traditional recording would be complete without a call for peace?   But this is not peace in the sense of protest; rather, it calls for universal justice. In "Avila," with its refrain "O sweet peace," Miss Mehta writes, "I will not rest until this place is full of sunlight/Or at least until the darkness is quiet for a while."   The lyrics also display a playful quality at times. Miss Chvostek writes in "Swallow," "You got me, arrow shot me/Now come connect-the-dot me."

This isn't your grandfather's folk music. There are no ballads with 20 verses -- no heart-rending tales of woe, murder, freight trains or rivers.  Yet in the Wailin' Jennys' pleasant, well-produced songs there is an undercurrent of a century and more of homespun songwriting, set to musical sounds that conjure traditional themes and images. It was the formula for success in the 1950s and early '60s for groups like the Kingston Trio, Limeliters and Brothers Four.

Could "Firecracker" ignite another folk boom?

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Tour Schedule

June-September 2008

June 13 S  Arts In The Park, Manhattan KS

June 21  Cuyahoga OH (Prairie Home Companion)

June 27  Britt Festival, Jacksonville OR

June 28-29 Kate Wolf Festival, Sebastopol CA 

July 9  Prescott Park Arts Festival, Portsmouth NH

July 10 Wolfeboro Folk Concert Series, Wolfeboro NH

July 11  Strand Theatre, Rockland, ME 

July 12/13 Stone Mt. LIVE, Stone Mt. Arts Center, Brownfield ME 

July 18-19  CA World Fest, Grass Valley CA  

July 20  Freight and Salvage, Berkeley CA

July 22 Whitefish Theater, Whitefish MT

July 23  Myrna Loy Center, Helena MT

July 24 Arts Council concert, Big Sky MT

July 29  Englert Auditorium, Iowa City IA

July 31  Paramount Theater, St. Cloud MN

August 1 Reif Center, Grand Rapids MN

August 2 Big Top Chautauqua, Bayfield WI

August 27 Lincoln Harbor Park, Weehawken NJ

August 30  Mauch Chunk Theater, Jim Thorpe PA

Sep 4-6 Sisters Folk Festival, Sisters OR 

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