Gotta go make dinner (yes it's midnight) now, but I'll challenge myself to add something with no guitar in it next. Surely I'll come up with something. (Other than Mozart which would be cheating...)
Oh, and of course, Arooj Aftab. Not your typical Berklee College of Music grad. Her stuff with Vijay Iyer and Shahzad Ismaily is amazing and mesmerizing (and never the same twice). Here's her TinyDesk concert www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUYJ...
YouTube video by NPR Music
While we're on the subject of guitarist-singers with great voices, Mary Spender. Everything I love about Dire Straits with a fantastic female vocal range. (She usually sings in her alto range but I think she's actually a coloratura soprano.) www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHYY...
YouTube video by Mary Spender
As readers of DGC know, I do love me a leggero tenor, the widest and most versatile of the male vocal singing types. Here's Jesse Clegg doing an acoustic version of his song "Clarity." (Yes, Johnny Clegg's son.) www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyQo...
YouTube video by Acoustic Nation
I learned about this band from the Keif Llama comic books. Matt Howarth always packed in music references, but I'd forgot the name of the band. So I stood there in Newbury Comics with my eyes closed until I screamed out Ozric Tentacles! Which is the name of the band. www.youtube.com/watch?v=MttL...
YouTube video by Ozric Tentacles Official
Aren't they great? I can put Transmutation Transmutandis on repeat.
I've seen guitarist Ottmar Liebert live twice, once at a small jazz venue in Boston where he had the two *quietest* percussionists imaginable (because otherwise you couldn't hear the guitar). It was a lot like this: www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dCM...
YouTube video by Minter Hsieh
Another Koenix for good measure. In their acoustic mode at a festival. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gqqu...
YouTube video by Tom Snow
There's only so many words that'll fit in one skeet. It's from that era when Bill Laswell was producing... everything, basically? Which reminds me of another one I should add...
While we're on the subject of rock mixed with trad folk instruments, don't sleep on Swiss "alpine medieval rock" band Koenix, who I also discovered accidentally during lockdown: www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjiZ...
YouTube video by Ritter-Fest