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Alex and BB: Play Banjo

Skillful double-banjo action from Alex Borwick and Catherine ‘BB’ Bowness. Alex’s tenor and BB’s 5-string weave together like delicate aural spiderwebs – it’s especially good to listen to this album with headphones because they’re panned left and right, so you get to hear what each of them is doing. These are two very talented banjo players. You may remember Alex from new-folk envelope-pushers Forbidden Joe, and I’ve talked about Bowness’ achievements previously in my review of her solo album ‘Village Green’. If you’ve read this far into a review of a banjo album, it’ll be worth your while to go back and look that one up too! As with that album, this one finds them making their banjos speak fluent bluegrass, folk, and even classical, with most compositions being their own original work. With a delicacy of touch that’s most unexpected from banjo players, they work together so well it’s almost like hearing one 9-string banjo played by a four-handed banjo demon, sensitively recorded, mixed and mastered by Robbie Duncan at Braeburn Studios.

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