Drifthouse and the House Concert Idea

Had you heard of Drifthouse before now? Oddly enough, a few people around the world have used the word for various things–an acting company, an island getaway, a "mystical architecture" referred to in an online utopic story. Chances are, the people who used the word "drifthouse" in these various ways had no knowledge of the others using the word. I only discovered this global usage of the word by searching the internet for information about our musical group. We simply liked the fact that the word connotes opposites–the steadiness of a house with drifting. We like to think this is akin to the way we approach music. We give steadfast respect to all genres of music as we drift from one to another.

Because of our stylistic drifting, Drifthouse is quite hard to label. We are perplexed when people ask us what kind of music we play. Some of our answers have been "chamber world" or "chamber folk" or often something far more frivolous. Although these terms come close to describing our "consort", there are certain dangers of limitation or the lack of limitation associated with the terms "world" music or "folk". We cannot achieve the world music consort sound as someone like Paul Winter Consort has because we simply don't have the instrumentation. And, the word "folk" certainly implies a lot of different things to a lot of different people. We didn't set out to be difficult, we simply play what we like and our musical interests and backgrounds are quite diverse. Since we don't play for a living, we don't feel the need to be defined. We aren't facing a record company that naturally wants to know where to file its artists–R&B, folk, etc.

Because of our difficult classification, it is tough to book us in the usual venues in our area. Besides, we have found that we are a concert group, not a band. Although, we chuckled when the Baton Rouge Advocate referred to us as a "chamber ensemble" that is certainly closer to describing us than would the terms "band", "group", or even "quartet". As a "world chamber consort", we find that we need the intimate setting to fully express to audiences what we're all about. We need for our audience to hear the subtleties of our arrangements and the meanings of the lyrics. We often play totally unamplified, because we avoid situations where we have to overpower the room noises–such as the grinding of ice in the coffee shops or the sliding of chairs and tinkling of glasses in restaurants. Why should only classical music be granted a prime listening environment? We believe real music lovers deserve to hear music in the best environments.

So, where can one hear Drifthouse?

Almost implied in its name, one can best hear Drifthouse at house concerts. A house concert is simply a concert given at someone's house. The host of the concert invites guests of his/her choosing and collects money from the guests–usually at intermission–in a range of suggested donations announced in the invitation. There can be food, wine, etc. served at intermission. THESE CONCERTS ARE NOT OPEN TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC. They are by invitation only. It is best to have an RSVP and guest list so one knows about how many people must be accommodated at the concert. Any reimbursement to the host for food, etc., if required, can be worked out between the host and musicians in advance.

If you receive this information while attending a Drifthouse performance, please seriously consider hosting the next Drifthouse concert as we depend on the graciousness of hosts to keep our music alive. Or, if you know of someone who might be interested in supporting the arts in this way, please pass on this information.

Current Drifthouse Personnel

Robert Calmes–guitar, vocals

Suki Kuehn–cello, percussion

Cassie Krebs–vocals, flute, guitar, mandolin, percussion

Ian Perkins–percussion

Contact: Robert Calmes at (225) 665-6397 or e-mail at: guitarplayrob@aol.com

Suki Kuehn at (504) 738-3309 or e-mail at robert.kuehn@shell.com



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