Feb 9, 2024
Kendl Winter’s upcoming album “Banjo Mantras” began as a way to connect with her fans and peers by sharing her daily melodic meditations and explorations on the clawhammer banjo. “Banjo Mantras” will be Kendl Winter’s first solo release in five years and her first foray into highlighting her banjo prowess on an instrumental album.
""It is artists such as Kendl Winter who are able to produce music that is of their own modern time whilst having easily recognizable roots that date back many decades" -American Roots UK
Kendl Winter’s upcoming album “Banjo Mantras” began as a way to connect with her fans and peers by sharing her daily melodic meditations and explorations on the clawhammer banjo.
“The Banjo Mantras” will be Kendl Winter’s first solo release in five years and her first foray into highlighting her banjo prowess on an instrumental album. Primarily known as a songwriter and multi-instrumentalist in the Americana duo The Lowest Pair, “The Banjo Mantras” lean into Kendl’s skillful explorations as a banjo player to bring forward an album of intricately textured instrumental compositions. Stemming from an improvisational approach Kendl termed her music “mantras” because of their repetitive and hypnotic nature. Her first single, "Humming Mantra," (to be released September 8th, 2023) draws inspiration from the vibrant Pacific Northwest summer. Lively clawhammer banjo evokes the tune’s title and contrasts alluringly over a sustained and droning accompaniment on her old archtop hollow bodied guitar.
In Kendl’s words: “The banjo mantras started off as morning writings, like morning pages but in musical form, daily pen to paper, fingers to strings, listening, feeling, sliding and thumbing my way around my open back banjo. I might have stumbled upon a new technique or tuning from tab or a friend, even a student, and would implement it into the day’s soundscape, catching happy accidents in stride and weaving them back into the fabric of the melody. I like the idea of the banjo mantras being ultimately formless, though when I went to record them for this project, form had to be contended with, if at least to capture a snapshot of the moving flowing breathing and changing musical motifs.”
Primarily known as one half of the Americana duo The Lowest Pair, Kendl is also a prolific collaborator and solo artist. Arkansas born, Winter honed her distinctive blend of country, bluegrass, and lo-fi indie folk in the late 2000s as a member of folk-punk band the Pasties, followed by stints throughout the next decade as part of bands like bluegrass quartet Blackberry Bushes, Americana duo Southern Skies, indie rock outfit It's All Gotta Go, and the afore mentioned duo The Lowest Pair. A multi-instrumentalist best known for her banjo playing, Winter has recorded several well-received solo albums for Olympia’s K Records, including 2013's “It Can Be Done!”, before joining the roster of Team Love Records for 2018's “Stumbler's Business”.
Kendl began releasing solo work in 2006, putting to use her proficient banjo, Dobro, and guitar skills on the album “Still Life” released by French Road Records. A second album of new material followed in 2007 with the loop-based “A Walk in the Shadows”, and a third the next year with the self-released album “Kite”.
In 2009, Winter set about working on material for a new album, recorded partly at her home in Olympia and partly on a boat in the Puget Sound. The result of these sessions was the haunted and elegant “Apple Core”, which Winter initially self-released, before the record found wider re-release on K Records in 2010. Winter's relationship with K continued, and 2012 saw the release of “The Mechanics of Hovering Flight”. This marked the first album she did not self-record, opting instead to work with K Records founder Calvin Johnson as engineer. The optimistic “It Can Be Done!” followed in 2013, also on K Records, featuring the backing band The Summer Gold.
In 2014 Kendl formed the folk duo The Lowest Pair, with fellow banjoist Palmer T. Lee. Starting with 2014's “36¢”, The Lowest Pair went on to release five studio albums in just three years' time.
Signing with New York indie label Team Love Records, Kendl returned to solo work in 2018 with the release of “Stumbler's Business". In 2020 The Lowest Pair released their critically acclaimed 7th album, “The Perfect Plan” on Thirty Tigers followed by 2022’s release of “Horse Camp”, a collaboration with The Lowest Pair and instrumental acoustic duo Small Town Therapy.