I've heard from a number of folks that they think it is a "slow spring."  I think that means that the termperatures have been a bit low, the air a bit moist, the evenings a bit too cool.  In sum, not a great time to be putting tender plants outside.  Now, it is possible that I have, myself, made similar comments.  But I don't stand by them.  For a huge chunk of my life, I've flourished with slow springs.  And I have had the fortune of visiting many places that "suffer" from late springs.  So when I hear people complaining about the weather, I think, "well, I guess you just haven't lived enough places."  Because, no matter the weather - too hot, too cold, too wet, too dry, too similar, too changing, and on and on - there is someplace in the world where that is a "normal" and even a "great" spring that brings joy to hearts.  As I sit in my potting shed lamenting my inability to plant my peppers, I remind myself of this.

So today on Routes & Branches & Beyond, I have another set of Spring Rambles for 2025.  I have anthems from the great folk scare, session chestnuts, aggravatingly-nimble young fiddlers, Breton songs from Quebec, an acoustic folk icon joining a bunch of bands - one song at a time, downhome Stoic philosphy delivered in harmony, the blues joyously cakewalking into town, Scottish polskas & potatoes, and fine flutes with questionable percussion.  All from musicians such as Kiérah, Peter & Paul & Mary, Bob Dylan & the Band, The Bothy Band, Ad Vielle que pourra, Michelle Shocked & the Red Clay Ramblers, Michelle Shocked & Hothouse Flowers, Relative Harmony, Taj Mahal, The Poozies, and Casadh an Tsúgáin (whoever that is...).  Put down that tomato seedling and join me.

Routes & Branches & Beyond, show # 371 2025 05 29

Today on Routes & Branches & Beyond it's another set of spring rambles, spiced with the glorious human diversity in music-making.  Don't let those pasty-faced whiners and their obsession with the "dangers of diversity" get to you.  As a species, we have a grand panoply of music, and I can get to only a tiny slice of it on this show.  But I try anyways.

So I'll play spooky modal stringbands, salty Cajun classics, Newfoundland rabbit-snaring tunes, yearning prairie ballads, slides from County Kerry, high-hoppin' bluegrass chops, mischievoursly charming Scots/Breton music, original newgrass, shady folk blues, Dutch Django Swing, Algerian-French celtic DADGAD, and Appalachian chicken chokers.  From musicians such as The Woodticks, T-Salé, Rawlins Cross, Neil Young, Séamus Begley & Stephen Cooney, John Reischman & the Jaybirds, Cantrip, Tony Rice, The Dreadful Snakes, Ken Whiteley, The Rosenberg Trio, Pierre Bensusan, The Chicken Chokers, and Mark Howard & Friends.  Join us.


Routes & Branches & Beyond show # 372 2025 06 05

sewing susan

through night's thorofares (sic.)

This is a reprise edition of Routes & Branches & Beyond from four years ago - just at the end of the pandemic.  Remember that?  Regular programs resume in early July.

Remember those things we called "concerts"...? Remember the musicians on stage, with bright lights, eager audiences, and feedback from the sound system which came from trying to balance a harp and a bagpipes on the same stage? Yes, they are slowly coming back. Glory be! To hasten their arrival, "Routes & Branches & Beyond" has a series of shows, with tracks that were recorded live at festivals and concerts, called "Remember Concerts?" Join me for episode 1, with music from Beoga, Les Batinses, La Bottine Souriante, Ricky Skaggs & Kentucky Thunder, the Amsterdam Klezmer Band, the String Sisters, Capercaillie, the Blue Sky Boys, Calan and more. Join us. Just show us your wristband and you're in!

Routes & Branches & Beyond for 2025 06 12

(This is a re-run of a show from 4 years ago, back when we were trying to emerge from the pandemic and go back to concerts...]

"Vaccination?"
"Check!"
"Mask?"
"Check!"
"Hand sanitizer?"
"Check!"
"Two-metre pole to help maintain physical distancing?"
"Check!"
"OK, let's head to our first post-Covid concert. Yippee!"
"Wait, did we remember to buy tickets...?"
"Darn!"
"We can't blame that on the pandemic...!"
This week on "Routes & Branches & Beyond" we eagerly await the beginning, any moment now, of concerts and festivals and generally music made in front of our eyes so that we can see the guitar chords that they are playing. I have another week of live tracks, from bands like A Crowd of Bold Sharemen, Neil Young, 1755, Erich und das Polk, Floyd Westerman, the Avett Brothers, Johnny Clegg. Québreizh, Le rêve du Diable, Tariq Abubakar & the Afro-Nubians and Dirk Powell & Christine Balfa. Get out that uncomfortable low-slung canvas festival chair and join me!



Routes & Branches & Beyond for 2025 06 19

today in church we learnt about rubber chairs

This is a reprise edition of Routes & Branches & Beyond from four years ago - just at the end of the pandemic. Remember that? Regular programs resume in early July....  Get out your edgiest T-shirt, your best bling, your glowsticks and lighter, and join me on "Routes & Branches & Beyond" for another show of music captured "live" in concert. From artists like Runrig, Flook!, the Grateful Dead, Flogging Molly, Bellowhead, Clannad, Bob Marley & the Wailers, Men of Steel, Tony McManus & Julia Toaspern and Mana. "Is there a link among all of these artists," you ask. Good question, indeed.

Routes & Branches & Beyond for 2025 06 26

Ah, summer!  A time to relax, to let the belt out another notch, to attend dubious garden parties with dubious neighbours and belt out dubious campfire classics.  A time to walk on trails we usually avoid, to stay out a bit later than usual, to eat more adventurously, and to generally exercise our relaxation muscles.  So that is also what we do here at Routes & Branches & Beyond world headquarters at this time of year.  This show, episode 373 of the show, is the first of a series called "Summer on the Range.

Let's roam together, through meticulous Scottish classics, worldly blues roots, New Orleans funky soul, cheesy jazzgrass, willfully austere Appalachian ballads, quirky-but-sensible Danish Schottishes, fiddling families of the Ottawa Valley, Canadian frontier folk, and vegan klezmer cowgirls.  All from musicians such as Ossian, Taj Mahal, The Neville Brothers, Béla Fleck, Si Kahn, The House Band (not the one you think), Everything Fitz, Ian Tamblyn, Leon & Eric Bibb, Sisters of Sheynville, and JCB with Jerry Holland.  Put on some sunblock and join me.


Routes & Branches & Beyond show # 373 2025 07 03

We put a lot of pressure on summer, really.  An unfair amount of pressure.  I wouldn't be surprised if studies showed that summer was the most stressed of the four seasons.  We go through the short days and long pants of winter, looking toward the comforts of summer, expecting it to  cure our ills and massage our joints and bandage our wounds from a year of the chaos of our world.  Oh, and we expect the season to grow our tomatoes as well!  But that seems a tad unfair - to put all of that pressure on one season.  So maybe we should give summer, the season, a bit of slack this year?  In this spirit, this week on Routes & Branches & Beyond we have another episode of Summer on the Range for 2025.

You'll hear roaring backyard barmaids, spartan dances chock full of notes, cool Abyssinian dub for the hipster in you, Norwegian re-thinking of Irish tunes, languid americana floor pallets, rockabilly honky-tonk shimmies, sardonic cowgirl lullabies, and putting on your red dress for a dance.  From musicians such as The Bookends, The Travellers, Jascha Lieberman Trio, Tailsway, Inti-illimani, Blue Asia, Boiled in Lead, Rosemary Phelan, Gillian Welch, The Ditty Bops, Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer, Ivan Rosenberg, Daniel Kahn & the Painted Bird, and Duo Mosaic.  Put some more ice in that tea and join me.

Routes & Branches & Beyond show # 374 2025 07 10

In the middle of a hot day, a normal human body starts to close down - to protect key organs.  Kind of like when your laptop decides to upgrade right before that big cofernece presentation!  In some cultures, there is an attempt to ignore the body's pleas for rest, and people strive to produce at the same level as always.  On the other hand, in many civilized coutnries they close down for several hours every mid-day during the hot season, or sometimes massive numbers of workers take 4 or 6 weeks off during the hottest months.  So here on Routes & Branches & Beyond we are observing these laws of the universe by relaxing into our Summer on the Range series.

Today I'll have Atlantic Canadian moose avoidance fiddles, Irish poteen anthems, nordic folk noir, Danish world travelling music, bagpipe-driven blues, pleas for peace from the voice of the 60s, odes to the transfixing solitudes of northern Ontario, heart-wrenching Latinex love ballads and Scottish dance club jigs.  All from musicians such as Mark Sullivan,Viik,Baltinget,Altan,Back Alley John, Joan Baez, Hart Rouge, Rodney Brown & the Northern Roots Band, Maná, and Capercaillie.  Set up that hammock and join me.

Routes & Branches & Beyond, show # 371 2025 05 29

Ivan Emke

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