Michael Miles

If, as Walt Whitman once wrote, the poem of the earth is the voice of the rain, then surely the poem of America is the voice of the banjo. Join us for an evening of storytelling as Miles channels some of our most singular American voices such as Pete Seeger, Carl Sandburg, Woody Guthrie, Walt Whitman, Johann Sebastian Bach, Mark Twain, and excerpts from slave journals in this musical documentary. The old-timey twang of his claw hammer technique reveals the complex history of the American experience from humor to heartache in this provocative tour de force.

• Pete Seeger remarked on his first exposure to Miles’ music: “one of the most beautiful recordings I’ve ever heard. It’s enough to make me want to learn the banjo all over again.”
• Miles will play seven different banjos throughout the course of the 90-minute show.
• The modern banjo evolved from an earlier West African instrument called a kora, which was formed from a gourd cut in half and covered with a cow skin.