Sam Amidon Bill Frisell: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert

Sam Amidon takes traditional music and makes it his own. He might begin with a traditional murder ballad and then morph it into something of his own, fueled by Bill Frisell s languidly atmospheric guitar, Shahzad Ismaily s minimal but essential percussion and Amidon s own yearning voice. At other times, Amidon weaves his own new tunes into worn, weary, seemingly ageless sagas. Amidon has been doing this for a long time. In 1998, back when he was 16, NPR aired a story about his Vermont contradance band Popcorn Behavior, a group he d assembled with his friend Thomas Bartlett Doveman). Sixteen years later, Amidon has made a gorgeous new album, LilyO, and performed a pair of its songs at the Tiny Desk followed by Short Life, from his 2013 album Bright Sunny South. BOB BOILEN Set List Blue Mountains 0:01 Pat Do This, Pat Do That 4:57 Short Life 10:45 Credits Producers: Bob Boilen, Maggie Starbard; Audio Engineer: Kevin Wait; Videographers: Nick Michael, Maggie Starbard; Assistant Produc