Julian Lage on World's Fair, Playing Solo and the Art of Interpretation

My guest this week is Julian Lage and we're talking about his extraordinary solo guitar album 'World's Fair'.

Julian will be known to many of you as a jazz player but is also widely known in the bluegrass and string band world through his wonderful duet records with Chris Eldridge of Punch Brothers and Mighty Poplar. In fact, Julian's first recording was an acoustic duet with David Grisman as part of the 'Dawg Duos' album.

Julian talks about the challenges and opportunities of playing solo, how he approached making this particular record, why he threw away his first attempt and what he learned about his own playing from making 'World's Fair'.

We also discuss the role acoustic music has played in his career, why being able to interpret song and tunes is so important and how playing music socially in New York with singer songwriters gave him the seed for what turned into 'World's Fair'.

This was a fascinating conversation about a superb album, but also about some of the deeper questions about what it means to make music, both alone and with others.

You can buy the 10th anniversary vinyl and CD reissues of 'World's Fair' and the accompanying songbook via Julian's store.

Follow Julian on Instagram for regular updates and news.

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Thanks to Bryan Sutton for his wonderful theme tune to Bluegrass Jam Along (and to Justin Moses for playing the fiddle!)

Bluegrass Jam Along is proud to be sponsored by Collings Guitars and Mandolins and Token premium guitar picks

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