Both Canadian fiddler April Verch and North Carolina-based singer and multi-instrumentalist Joe Newberry have some serious musical chops.
Verch was last on Lake Effect in 2012 with her Ottawa Valley/American bluegrass/Appalachian hybrid band The April Verch Trio. She is the winner of multiple fiddle championships and the owner of many musical awards for her fiddling and singing and step-dancing.
Newberry has performed on A Prairie Home Companion, done some Transatlantic sessions with Scottish fiddler Aly Bain and American dobro master Jerry Douglas, and has written award winning songs for gospel acts like The Gibson Brothers.
Newberry and Verch recently decided to add duo to their resumes. It was in that stripped down configuration, they arrived in Milwaukee a few weeks ago to perform and chat with Lake Effect's Bonnie North in the studio. And it turns out, playing music this way really allows them both to shine.
Newberry says this is because at the roots of things, they trust each other. "We're not going to have a train wreck. But if we do it's going to be just fine. We'll figure it out and we'll figure it out together," he says.
Verch agrees. "Yeah, there's a lot of trust in a duo situation," she says. "You have each other's back and you have to know that, I think, for it to work."
Here are the songs they played live in the studio:
