Ambition often follows talent, and Laura Cortese has an embarrassment of both. Her open-armed approach to her art reveals a determination to spread the word about folk music and dance without watering down their distinctiveness.
When the Boston-based fiddler and vocalist plays at The Acoustic Music Revival on Saturday, expect to hear a contemporary twist on familiar Celtic forms.
Cortese’s time spent at Boston’s prestigious Berklee College of Music informed her Irish-Italian heritage, which includes generations of traditional folk fiddlers.
“Part of going through a music college for me was listening to all sorts of music,” said Cortese over the phone from Boston. “Being into traditional Scottish fiddle music, it was important to have a lot of peers who played rock and jazz and funk.”
Cortese’s clear, powerful alto and groove-oriented playing betrays a mix of musical styles from alt-rock to folk. Her hometown paper, The Boston Globe, called her fiddling “technically brilliant yet warmhearted,” while her website is filled with declarations of love from fans and critics.
“I have influences from old-time Appalachian, Norwegian and various types of Scottish fiddling,” said Cortese. ” I tend to think of myself and a few other American fiddlers that have all these influences as having a uniquely American sound.”
Cortese became interested in fiddling when she was 4 years old as she watched her Irish grandparents play classical violin and popular folk tunes. As a 12-year-old, she met another girl who attended the Valley of the Moon Scottish Fiddling School in Northern California. Her interest was instantly piqued.
She begged her mother to let her attend, and today the 25-year-old has moved from student to teacher, instructing youngsters in various forms of step dance and music.
“I was never really into the whole school-orchestra thing, just sitting next to people and reading sheet music,” Cortese said. “At Berklee I realized that my main focus for what I play was all about groove. Traditional dance music is all about that too – very gritty and groove-oriented.”
Cortese keeps like-minded company. She will be joined Saturday by Lissa Schneckenburger, a friend and occasional bandmate in Boston’s popular Halali, which has toured nationally to great acclaim. Tenor guitarist Corey DiMario and the excellent indie-rock/
folk drummer and multi-instrumentalist Neil Cleary (The Essex Green, Annie Hayden, Erin McKeown) round out the bill.
Cortese also plans to play in the Anarchist Orchestra, a side project with a punk attitude led by Tao Seeger, grandson of folk-music legend Pete Seeger.
“(Tao) was like, ‘You are the only fiddler that could be in this band!’ ” Cortese said. “A lot of people say I have this sweet yet volcanic thing about my playing, and I wonder if that’s the Italian heritage. I think it’s sort of how I treat my fiddle.”
Certainly, Cortese’s mix of modern and traditional styles creates an explosive sound that favors melody and rhythm over overtly technical performances. The momentum in songs like “Blow the Candle Out” propels the listener to a giddy plane where dancing is mandatory.
Cortese also includes a cover of The Cure’s “Just Like Heaven” on her new album, “Even the Lost Creek,” to pay tribute to the music she listened to while growing up.
“It’s really easy to have a distinct sound when you’re playing a song no one’s heard, but I wanted to take a song everyone had heard and do something different with it, to show people what my sound was,” she said.
The night before entering the studio to record her album, she and her bandmates sat around jamming until they happened upon “Just Like Heaven.”
“The ’80s pop song is always the hit at the jam sessions,” she said. “When someone plays ‘Eye of the Tiger’ on the accordion, everyone’s like, ‘Yeah!’ So I wanted to have that vibe.”
Reach staff writer John Wenzel at 303-820-1642 or jwenzel@denverpost.com.
Laura Cortese
FOLK FIDDLER|Acoustic Music Revival, 3445 S. Broadway; 8 p.m. Saturday, all ages; with Lissa Schneckenburger|$12|303-744-1737 or AcousticMusicRevival.com
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