Third Coast Percussion: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert

May 29, 2018, Tom Huizenga Back at the beginning of time, the human voice was the very first instrument. Probably close in second place were folks banging on stuff in other words, percussionists. The quartet of gentlemen who form the Chicagobased Third Coast Percussion takes primordial pounding into a completely distinctive new league. To be sure, in this Tiny Desk performance, they ll play their sophisticated, modern marimbas and vibraphones, but be on the lookout for the subtleties of tuned cowbells and 3, 4 galvanized steel pipes, like those found at the local hardware store. Add to that a glockenspiel, a MIDI synth, a melodica, a drum kit, children s deskbells, crotales, a Thai gong and a singing bowl, and you ve got significant noisemaking potential behind Bob Boilen s desk. The mesmerizing opening number, Niagara, written by the group, is from the band s latest album, the aquacentric Paddle to the Sea. This water is fastmoving, with pulsing, repeating patterns in the vibraphone, punctuated