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UPR Presents: Folks Over For Christmas

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Utah Public Radio presents "Folks Over For Christmas" with hosts Kirsten Swanson and Jessica Sonderegger.

UPR invited some of Utah's wonderful musicians to join us in studio to share some of their own music and Christmas arrangements.

Special thanks to Kate & Kyle Pyfer, Cory Castillo, Jeremy Nivison, Jett & Riley Fesler, Emily Pack, Megan Simper and Kramer Dahl of Hoodoo, Robert Linton, Todd Wilkinson, Matthew McCleve, Jeremy Hoop and Rachel Kohler of MayDay Red, and Hilary Murray for their time, talents and enthusiasm. And thanks also to technical producers Shalayne Smith Needham and Friend Weller.

Transcript:
KIRSTEN SWANSON: Welcome to folks over for Christmas at Utah Public Radio. I'm Kirsten Swanson

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: and I'm Jessica Sonderegger. This week we invited some of Utah's wonderful folk musicians to join us in studio to share with us some of their own music and
Christmas arrangements, and we are so excited to share them with you.

KIRSTEN SWANSON: Hoodoo is an emerging Americana band based in Logan with sounds that honor the past with a modern twist.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: They joined us in studio to record an original arrangement of Old King Wenceslas.

"Good King Wenceslas" by Hoodoo

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: That was Good King Wenceslas arranged by Megan Simper performed by Hoodoo featuring Megan Simper on guitar, Hillary Murray on mandolin and Kramer Dahl on bass. Love of folk and acoustic music has brought us together tonight. Our next selections come from a duo who came together and found love through the music. Kate and Kyle Peiffer joined us in studio and shared with us how they met.

KATE PYFER: Before we started dating. We sang a song together, and that's how I knew.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: Oh!

KYLE PYFER: That is. Yep. That's how I knew she was the one.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: That's how you... Okay, wait,

KATE PYFER: I did. Yes, that's exactly how I knew she was the one. We sang a song. It sounded great. And I was like, that's it.

KATE PYFER: No, um... we didn't sing a lot before. When we were engaged, we did.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: okay

KATE PYFER: Now we sing together all the time, so... right? Shower, kitchen, wherever, we sing together.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: The car, all of the above.

KATE PYFER: Lots of car singing.

Kate & Kyle Pyfer "Silent Night"

Kate & Kyle Pyfer "Away in a Manger"

KIRSTEN SWANSON: we just heard Kate and Kyle Pyfer with Away in a Manger and before that Silent Night. This next is an arrangement of Oh Come All Ye Faithful performed by Emily Susan Pack and Jett Fesler when they joined us in studio they talked about Christmas music and how this arrangement came to be.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: I especially enjoy Emily's take on the holiday season and the redemption she's had in performing a Christmas song with Jett.

EMILY PACK: I love Christmas music. And sometimes I feel like embarrassed for liking it so much because everyone else it's like sound they hear at the grocery store. And they're like, "Oh, I can't wait for it to be off" but I, like, savor every second of it. So it's really cool to play a Christmas song with Jett who doesn't really like Christmas music usually, but to see like, I don't know. It makes me feel like kind of validated for liking it on a regular basis.

JETT FESLER: I'm not even really... I'm not really religious. And so the song is it's really awesome I because I love the melody of it and it just sticks in my head.

Emily Susan Pack and Jett Fesler "Oh Come, All Ye Faithful"

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: That was Oh Come All Ye Faithful with Jet Fesler on guitar and vocals and Emily Susan Pack on piano. Jet Fesler and his wife Riley were both born and raised in Utah. Now residing in Logan they fittingly chose Born and Raised by John Mayer to do for us in studio. Riley told us that this is the song that got her into folk and acoustic music, she explains:

RILEY FESLER: And it's a song about, youknow, growing up and kind of when you wake up in the morning one day and realize that you are supposed to be grown up and kind of what that means, and how how to deal with that. This song came into my life when I was maybe 23 years old or 22 I was feeling all of these feelings about being grown up and I felt like my life wasn't where it was supposed to be, or what... you know where I expected it to be or where other people expected it to be. And so it really it was really meaningful to have somebody put it into words that I things I never realized that I was feeling. And then John Mayer just did.

Jett & Riley Fesler "Born and Raised"

KIRSTEN SWANSON: That was born and raised by John Mayer performed by Jett and Riley Fesler. Now let's return to Emily Susan Pack who we heard on piano with Jet Fessler on Oh Come All Ye Faithful. This time we'll hear an original composition from her.

Emily Pack 16:02
It's called So Easy. So I come from like kind of a comedic background and this song basically started as a sketch idea of this person hiding like tiny bottles of alcohol around during a family Christmas party. So the song kind of explores this person finding finding alcohol around the house. It's so charming.

Emily Susan Pack "So Easy"

Emily Susan Pack "What Are You Doing New Year's Eve?"

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: We have just heard Emily Susan Pack with Frank Loesser song What Are You Doing New Year's Eve? and before that her original song So Easy. Hilary Murray is one of us here at UPR. She does graphic arts and works as an intern during the day but by night she performs solo or with groups in Logan. She talked to us about the range of experience and color she finds in music.

HILARY MURRAY: I think that you know, human nature, we see things a lot in black and white, like you just decide, "oh I'm not good at that." But there's so much gray in between and I think that that's kind of like how you evolve yourself and so if you... I know I keep on talking in colors...

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: It's good. We can all -- most of us -- I know that there are some gonna be some colorblind listeners out there, but most of us can relate to colors, so thats' great, and not all of us can really understand music in the technical sense so..

HILARY MURRAY: So maybe colors is... it makes more sense. yes.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: Yes. It's a good translation.

Hilary Murray "Santa Baby"

Hillary Murray "Frosty the Snowman"

KIRSTEN SWANSON: Two familiar Christmas tunes there by Hilary Murray first Santa Baby followed by Frosty the Snowman. I know Jessica, you've been looking forward to this custom recording from Mayday RED. And they sent it to us from their base in Utah County.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: Yes, yes, Mayday RED is a personal favorite. Rachel Kohler and Jeremy Hooper introduced me, a couple of years ago right around the time we lost the Joy Williams and John Paul White duo of Civil Wars -- and extremely talented. In November they released their first full length original album Let it Burn, which is now available on iTunes for anyone who's listening. They are of the indie pop epic Euro rock variety, but they added a little folk to the repertoire. Let's hear them now performed The First Noel.

Mayday RED "The First Noel"

Cory Castillo "Seven Dollar Song"

KIRSTEN SWANSON: That was a very rockin' First Noel by Mayday RED followed by Seven Dollar Song by Cache Valley artist Cory Castillo. He explains the song's genesis this way.

CORY CASTILLO: So I was in Twin Falls, Idaho with the band and we were staying at a Motel Six and I came out one morning and there was a Greyhound bus there parked at the office and man got off the bus and he caught my eye because he had a hammer and sickle tattooed on the back of his hand. And we got talking, and he just had gotten out from prison. And I gave him seven dollars. And... I bought this song for talking to that man.

KIRSTEN SWANSON: What a story.

CORY CASTILLO: You know if I ever made the big time, you could get it for 99 cents on iTunes. So who got the better end of the deal there?

KIRSTEN SWANSON: Corey brought in Jeremy Nivison, another guitarist for the next number and I understand that it was this evening's event that brought them together on the piece.

JEREMY NIVISON: Yeah, the song that we're gonna play actually, we -- he just called me two days ago -- and said "hey, do you want to do something on the radio on Thursday?"

CORY CASTILLO: We've never played together before.

JEREMY NIVISON: And I'm normally a bass player so I thought this is a good excuse, because I've been trying to play more guitar lately. So this has been a good excuse for both of us to actually get together for the first time.

Cory Castillo & Jeremy Nivison "The Little Drummer Boy"

Todd Wilkinson & Matthew McCleve "Do You Hear What I Hear?"

KIRSTEN SWANSON: We've just heard Little Drummer Boy with Cory Castillo on acoustic guitar and Jeremy Nivison on electric guitar, followed by Todd Wilkinson, accompanied by Matthew McCleve for the prayer for peace, Do You Hear What I Hear?

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: Todd Wilkinson is known to the Utah and Wyoming folk scene as an amazing guitar artist and vocalist, but he's also my dad. And I knew he would do this for us if I just asked the right way. So this is all I had to ask for for Christmas. Thanks also to an outpouring of Facebook support, I was able to manipulate him onto the show today. And I want to thank him publicly. Thank you, Dad and Merry Christmas.

KIRSTEN SWANSON: Family is such an important thing at the holidays. We talked about family and music and holidays, with acoustic guitars. Robert Linton, who came to play a couple of numbers for us.

ROBERT LINTON: Yes. Seems like everybody in my family plays an instrument. Yeah. My younger sister is incredibly talented. She has an amazing voice and she plays guitar.

KIRSTEN SWANSON: Is that Libby Linton?

ROBERT LINTON: Yep, absolutely. And she has been doing music for quite a few years. And then my other family members, they've dabbled in music through various instruments, piano drums, bass guitar. My dad plays a mean slide guitar and, and my mom and my older sister play piano. And then my brother, he plays the drums and bass guitar. And so we, we all like to express ourselves through music and and there's been times where we've even been able to have our own jam sessions at home with each other.

ROBERT LINTON: That was my next question. So do you do this together?

ROBERT LINTON: Just for fun? Yeah. I mean, my sister and I, we support one another quite a bit in our music endeavors. But we've always kind of gone our different paths stylistically, with our performances and our music, so...

KIRSTEN SWANSON: So when you do come together and play together, what kinds of things do you play?

ROBERT LINTON: You know it's, it's completely spontaneous. However we feel in that moment. We might gather up a song that was one of our favorite favorites growing up, or we might just improvise a brand new song, you know, if we felt so inclined. But yeah, it's all. It's all about just having a good time and playing music. I have an album that will be out the end of this month called Beyond the Clearing. It's my fifth album, but at the same time, I've really developed my style within the last three albums, and so I feel really good about what we've accomplished with this new album. I work with musicians from around the country, and we collaborate on adding other instrumentation over my guitar work. Some really nice cello pieces and and violin that we've layered over the guitar and and so I'm really thrilled with this new album I think it's gonna be great to share it once it's finally completed.

KIRSTEN SWANSON: Thank you very much.

Robert Linton "What Child is This?"

Robert Linton "Silent Night"

JESSICA SONDEREGGER: We've heard two numbers from Robert Linton: What Child is This and Silent Night. We had a lot of fun and heard a lot of original and specially arranged music and we were so pleased to have been able to share it with you.

KIRSTEN SWANSON: We thank Tom Williams and Peg Arnold for the opportunity tonight, Kate and Kyle Pyfer, Cory Castillo, Jeremy Nivison, Jett and Riley Fesler, Emily Pack, Megan Simper and Kramer Dahl of Hoodoo. Robert Linton, Todd Wilkinson, Matthew McCleve, Jeremy Hoop and Rachel Kohler of Mayday Red, and Hilary Murray for their time, talents and enthusiasm for this project. And we thank technical producers Shalane Smith Needham, and Friend Weller for making this special sound so wonderful.

JESSICA SONDEREGGER:
Thank you for joining us as we have had folks over for Christmas. Before everybody went home we got a group together to play an original number written by Cory Castillo featuring Cory on guitar and vocals, joined by Emily Susan Pack on piano, Megan Simper on mandolin and Kramer Dahl on bass. This is Show Me a Sign.

Folks Over Ensemble "Show Me A Sign"

BLAIR LARSEN: This is Utah public Radio.