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James Blackshaw

When UK-native James Blackshaw plays his 12-string guitar, something spiritual takes place. Performing and recording since 2003, his name is frequently mentioned alongside the likes of Jack Rose, Steffen Basho-Junghans, Sir Richard Bishop and Glenn Jones as one of the most foremost modern pioneers of solo acoustic guitar music. Now at the age of 25, Blackshaw, an untrained musician born and still residing in the suburban environs of Greater London, draws as much inspiration from early religious music, South-Asian folk music and composers such as Arvo Part, Simeon Ten Holt, Steve Reich and Charlemagne Palestine as he does from John Fahey, Robbie Basho and the early Takoma Records roster, constantly breaking boundaries in what could be conceived as a somewhat limited medium. In his part improvised and part written songs, Blackshaw makes expert use of Eastern and Western scales, chord changes reminiscent of European classical music and incredibly intricate fingerpicking patterns to make a sound that is both challengingly minimalistic, yet warm and approachable to anybody who might hear it, with a rare sensitivity that conveys both immense beauty, hope and sadness.

Blackshaw has been featured in a range of magazines across the world including The Seattle Weekly, The Washington Post, Italy's Blow Up magazine and most recently in a one page article in the October 2006 issue of The Wire. His last album, "O True Believers" (Important Records/Bo'Weavil Recordings) also received enthusiastic reviews in Pitchfork, Fakejazz, Uncut, The Wire, Signal To Noise, The Observer (one of the UK's most highly-regarded national newspapers) and many other printed and online magazines.

After succesfully touring Japan, Europe, Scandanavia, US and UK in 2005 and 2006, playing with artists such as Sir Richard Bishop, Espers, Brightblack Morning Light, Feathers, Greg Davis, Jack Rose, Glenn Jones, Sharron Kraus, Simon Finn, Marissa Nadler, Alexander Tucker, Josephine Foster, Seiichi Yamamoto of The Boredoms (with whom he improvised with) and Christina Carter. James Blackshaw has been busy recording a new album, entitled "The Cloud of Unknowing", which will be released by New York's Tompkins Square label in early 2007, alongside CD reissues of his earlier, out-of-print, limited edition albums.

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430
Album Review

James Blackshaw: The Glass Bead Game

Read "The Glass Bead Game" reviewed by David Rickert


Had Ira Gitler not encountered John Coltrane and heard James Blackshaw instead, he might have used his famous “sheets of sound" to describe the guitarist's music. Blackshaw uses his twelve-string guitar to create giant waves of chords that repeat motifs, creating a harmonious and meditative music that is like new age music for the intelligentsia. New age has such a negative stigma that I hesitate to use that word in describing what Blackshaw does, but there's no denying that that's ...

279
Album Review

James Blackshaw: The Cloud Of Unknowing

Read "The Cloud Of Unknowing" reviewed by Chris May


Music of such shimmering, unalloyed, heavenly beauty as this doesn't come along very often. Maybe once or twice a decade. Guitarist Johnny Smith's early masterpiece Moonlight In Vermont (reissued Roulette, 2004) and harmonica player Hendrik Meurkens' Amazon River (Blue Toucan, 2005) are amongst recent releases of comparable loveliness.

British 12-string acoustic guitarist James Blackshaw's roots lie in the Takoma school of American primitivism led by guitarist John Fahey--in the “cosmic sentimentalism" which Fahey turned against in his final ...

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Music Industry

James Blackshaw:the Glass Bead Game

James Blackshaw:the Glass Bead Game

Source: JamBase

By: Dennis Cook

Meditative but never somnambulant, James Blackshaw's latest merges the the comforting acoustic layering of early, excellent Windham Hill albums with the more highfalutin' fingerpicked guitar machinations of Sandy Bull and Robbie Basho. The Glass Bead Game (released May 26 on Young God Records) builds from the tintinnabulous base of Blackshaw's exquisite 12-string guitar, adding empathetic strings, wordless vocals, splashes of piano and other subtle touches. He's joined by Current 93 members John Contreras (cello) and Joolie Wood ...

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Recording

James Blackshaw Catalogue Released Digitally

James Blackshaw Catalogue Released Digitally

Source: Big Hassle

Tompkins Square Label has released three catalog albums by 25 year old experimental 12-string guitarist and composer James Blackshaw, from the UK. The albums, “Sunshrine". “Celeste" and “Lost Prayers & Motionless Dances" have previously only been available as tiny private press editions. All are available via itunes, eMusic and all digital platforms.

AllAboutJazz.com says of Blackshaw's most recent album, The Cloud of Unknowing, “Music of such shimmering, unalloyed, heavenly beauty as this doesn't come along very often. Maybe once or ...

"The most gem-like overlooked album this year is neither hairy nor scary; rubber-necking into the great unknown isn't high in its priorities. But it is preternaturally beautiful. "O True Believers" by 24-year-old guitarist James Blackshaw features 10 fingers and 12 strings and, frankly, urinates all over whatever will be the Mercury Prize's token folk nominee next year. Blackshaw is British, but virtually no one has heard of him outside the US folk underground; he deserves ticker-tape parades. His style derives from the Takoma school founded by John Fahey, but that is all detail. Blackshaw's got it all: skills to hyperventilate for, and instinctual loveliness in spades." - Kitty Empire, The Observer, 31/12/06

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Music

Recordings: As Leader | As Sideperson

The Glass Bead Game

Young God Records
2009

buy

The Cloud Of Unknowing

Tompkins Square
2007

buy

Running To The Ghost

From: The Cloud Of Unknowing
By James Blackshaw

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