Hope
Hoffman &
Link to Online Booking Form for Event Planners
Publicity Photos:
Choice of 4 photos for print publication;
click on image for resolution at 200 dpi:
(please include credit: Photo by Johnny Wechs)
(please include credit: Ron Gallup photo)
(please include credit: Photo by Johnny Wechs)
(please include credit: Paul Andrews Photo)
"Kittlish," a Scottish word translated as"ticklish" (or, more accurately, "like a live wire") is the namesake of this facile, exuberant trio featuring Hope Hoffman's original New England dance tunes from their album Infinite Winter Squash: New Maine Fiddle Music.
Sheet music and audio links
for Hoffman's original tunes are at
www.hopehoffman.org.
Hope Hoffman & Kittlish is:
Hope Hoffman, composer and fiddler/violist; Larry Burkett on guitar, tenor banjo and percussion; and Hugh McGinness on guitar, cittern, and (if we're lucky) jaw harp.
Bios:
Hope Hoffman
(director, fiddler, composer, vocalist)
Hope is known for her warm and personable music performances from Presque Isle to Manhattan. Her style is noted for its evocative beauty and rough-and-tumble playfulness.
With a lifetime of experience as a writer, actress and dancer, Hope has been a self-employed musician and teacher in Maine since 2001.
Hugh McGinness
is a regular performer on cittern, guitar, banjo, jaw harp, etc. He has been playing some kind of music or another for nearly 50 years, and is also one third of the Irish trio Feckless, with George Fowler on fiddle and Susanne Ward on pipes.
Larry Burkett
accompanies traditional fiddle players on guitar, including Fiddle-iscious, and occasionally the Don Roy Trio and Lucien Mathieu.
Hope Hoffman & Kittlish present Hoffman's original fiddle and viola tunes, often-comic storytelling about the farming, winterizing and neighborly adventures which inspire them, and a rhythmic and lyrical repertoire of traditional Irish, Scottish, French Canadian, English and Scandinavian music.
"Kittlish," a Scottish word translated as"ticklish" (or, more accurately, "like a live wire") is the namesake of this facile, exuberant trio: Hope Hoffman, composer and fiddler/violist; Larry Burkett on guitar, tenor banjo and percussion; and Hugh McGinness on guitar, cittern, and (if we're lucky) jaw harp.
CD
Infinite Winter Squash: New Maine Fiddle Music
Compositions by Hope Hoffman, recorded live by Hope Hoffman & Kittlish
Audio Samples:
8th of February (fast dance tune for viola)
(tune and recording © Hope Hoffman 2007)
(tune and recording © Hope Hoffman 2007)
Reviews of the Album:
"Pure New England
fiddle music, proud of its rural past, relishing the present ... the
feeling of a warm kitchen above a well-stocked root cellar ... The performances
are inviting, warm, energized and straight ahead, with a bit of mischief
thrown in."
- Greg
Boardman, longtime Maine fiddler and teacher
"Hope's waltzes
... convey an original sensibility, with particular passages which more
hip reviewers might be inclined to call 'edgy,' and yet she has captured
the sweetness of the waltz, that faraway quality which speaks to our
instincts for things which exist simply for the sake of their own beauty."
- Jeff Trippe, reviewer for Mainefolkmusic.com
Hope Hoffman's
New Maine Fiddle Music
Composer and fiddler Hope Hoffman presents her original New England-style fiddle tunes, along with the stories and traditional music which inspired their creation, with a lively and imaginative trio, Hope Hoffman & Kittlish.
Infinite Winter Squash: New Maine Fiddle Music is a recent album of original dance music recorded by Hope Hoffman & Kittlish. Hoffman's compositions are influenced by Maine dance music (which draws on Scots-Irish, French and Scandinavian traditions), and her imaginative and narrative approach to composing.
The often-humorous stories behind the tunes highlight the everyday adventures of farmers and neighbors, enjoying, grappling with or musing over farm foods and extreme weather.
