Dani Aubert and Ian Van Ornum have comfortably found a home on the road. The pair and their 5-year-old daughter Eowyn just returned from a nine-month journey through Europe, where they played concerts and learned songs from locals.
The self-ascribed “traveling minstrels” established their musical path five years ago in Oregon. On their farm outside of Ashland, the two hosted a songwriters camp, inviting 30 North American musicians. After the 10 days dedicated to songwriting, recording and summer merriment, 10 new friends didn’t leave.
“Essentially we started a band from the stragglers of that gathering,” Van Ornum says.
The band, originally named Patchy Sanders, spent the next four years performing nationwide. When it was time to part ways a year ago, Van Ornum and Aubert – better known together as the Pynins (“pine-ins”) – had newfound freedom to debut as a duo.
Before playing a single live show, the Fellow Pynins released their first record, Hunter & the Hunted. The theme that weaves throughout is leaving to go elsewhere. Accompanied by instruments like clawhammer banjo, bouzouki and mandolin, their contemporary American folk roots strike ears with a certain timelessness. Aubert brings the warmth of ancient fire singing lullabies like “Dear Ones.”
“[Her voice] is so pure, so crystalline,” Van Ornum says. “I’ve never met anyone who can make up a harmony so quick.”
The music exposes their intimacy as musicians and humans. Van Ornum says they feel happiest when performing “as if it’s the last thing you’ll play in your life, completely unrestricted expressively.”
The Fellow Pynins play Henry Miller Library Friday. Singing and storytelling to a candlelit cabin is “the perfect vessel,” says Van Ornum. “To play in an acoustic setting as it’s been done a thousand years,” he says. “It just feels so old, it’s very fulfilling for us as musicians.”
FELLOW PYNINS 7:30pm Friday, Feb. 10, Henry Miller Memorial Library, Highway 1, Big Sur. $10 suggested donation; limited seating. 667-2574
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