I first met Lee Hunter when we both worked for the Student Activities Department while attending Florida Community College of Jacksonville, FL. I didn’t know at first she was a musician and singer, but her other features caught my attention quickly: Cute, intelligent, and passionate about protecting the environment. I don’t think she and Arvid had met yet. One day on my way to class I saw this guy walking toward me who looked like a mixture of teen rocket scientist and Dagwood, with arcs of jet black hair framing the forehead of his inquisitive, handsome face.“I’m looking for the Student Activities Office," he told me. “I’ve got these promotional flyers for a concert we’re giving. I have to get a permission stamp to post these around the campus."
“I work for Student Activities," I said. “What kind of music?"
“New, old, electric, acoustic," said Arvid. “Some experimental, some traditional."
“Cool," I said. “I’ll help you put them up."
I don’t remember if we ever got the approval stamp from Student Activities, but we got the posters up and the word out.
At the concert, Arvid played everything from acoustic 12 string finger picking folk music to ethereal electronic wizardry on an electric double necked guitar with a paint job like the World of Tomorrow.
I should point out that I usually prefer listening to electric guitar, but when Arvid plays acoustic, his licks are just as embracing and exhilarating as most electric guitar players’ riffs. His chops and Lee Hunter's vocals and rhythm are a very satisfying combination.
Britain's New Musical Express calls Arvid Smith "a wizard on the silver strings." Florida music magazine describes Lee Hunter’s voice as "haunting, passionate, and powerful".
 
Together, as Tammerlin, they keep a busy schedule playing at festivals, colleges, coffeehouses and concert halls. I once even saw them open for The Band (minus Robbie Robertson). Their fourth CD, One Kind Favor, has just been released on Binky Records.
The Interview
Bill: Aren’t there some really grisly stories in some of those old, traditional folk songs?
Arvid: Oh, yeah. A perfect example is a song on our new CD. The song is a murder ballad, called “Naomi Wyse." It’s a song from Clarence Ashley that…
Lee: No, it’s not.
Arvid: Not what?
Lee: It’s not a Clarence Ashley song. He didn’t write it.
Arvid: No, I know he didn’t write it. I got it from Clarence Ashley. He recorded it. Bill knows what I mean.
Bill: Who wrote it?
Lee: Nobody knows who wrote it. It’s a traditional mountain song. Arvid associates it with Clarence Ashley but it’s in the public domain.
Bill: What’s it about?
Arvid: It’s about a…roguish man who seduces a young lady. Then, instead of marrying her, he drowns her. And we found out that it’s actually based on a true story. But the guy wasn’t convicted. He got off due to lack of evidence.
Bill: Bogus. Got any more stories?
Lee: We do. In fact, we unearthed a song which evidently hadn’t been heard in a long time. The song is called “I Saw A Sight All in A Dream" sung and played by two brothers, Dave and Jim Couch from Harlan County. We found it while we were looking for another song.
Bill: What song were you looking for?
Arvid: Another song by the Couch family called “Hiram Hubbard." It’s a song we did on the Wind Horses CD.
Lee: Right. We were looking for “Hiram Hubbard" by searching through archive tapes at Berea College in Berea, Kentucky. They have all these old tapes where historians went out and recorded music. We found a 1955 recording by the Couch brothers called “I Saw A Sight All In A Dream." We did extensive research but no one ever heard of it, not even the Library of Congress.
Arvid: So we reintroduced a forgotten song to the world.
Bill: From 1955?
Lee: The recording was done in 1955, but from the style and content, we believe it was written in the 1800’s, the Victorian Era. It’s a sad song.
Bill: What’s it about?
Arvid (drolly) : It’s a downer. It’s part of an old genre known as “dying mother songs."
Lee: We gave new life to it.
Arvid: On our version, there is a stunning violin performance by Darol Anger.
Bill: How do you classify your music?
Lee: “Roots" music. Roots based.
Bill: I guess a lot of people would call it “folk" music. That’s the broad term. So where does the “Celtic" label come in?
Arvid: We don’t really do much Celtic music. It’s a hard label to shake. I mean, it’s good music but it’s not all we do.
Lee: I really like the American Appalachian Mountains traditional music. Celtic music comes from Scotland and Ireland. Even when we were called “Celtic" we did mostly English traditional, which is not the same thing. There are two English songs on our new CD, One Kind Favor.
Bill: I remember you mentioning before that you like the Appalachian Mountain music. But you also write a lot of songs. Who does most of the writing?
Arvid: I’ve written one song.
Lee: I write a lot of the songs. When I write the lyrics, I also compose the music to the songs I write.
Bill: I’d like to talk about the rock band, the Great Invisibles. Arvid, you played guitar with them before teaming up with Lee. They were…different, but very popular.
Arvid: That was during the time of “New Wave." I think we were the hottest band in town for about two weeks.
Bill: Oh, it was more than two weeks. A lot of bands' goal was to open for you guys. Why didn’t the Great Invisibles last?
Arvid: The typical reasons. Different personalities. One guy thought he was a hard-core punk, two of them had solid jazz training, and I was doing abstract, experimental electric guitar. It was interesting for a while but we all moved on.
Bill: Lee, what were you doing during this time?
Lee: I never saw the Great Invisibles. I was in a whole other world from that scene. I had met Arvid, but I was busy getting a degree in biology. I was really into jazz. Then, I went to study percussion under Charlotte Mabrey at the University of North Florida.
 Charlotte Mabrey
Bill: Charlotte is remarkable.
Arvid: She is, indeed.
Bill: At various times I saw you each play as part of Craig Spirko’s band, Soul Guardians. Did you ever play with Soul Guardians at the same time?
Arvid: Oh, yeah. A few times. That’s how we met.
Lee: That’s not exactly how we met.
Arvid: Well, sort of.
Bill: You tell me, Lee. How did it happen?
Lee: Shakespeare at the Met. What happened was, Theatre Jacksonville was doing a Shakespeare series at Metropolitan Park. Arvid was doing the music for Macbeth.
Arvid: That’s right. I needed a percussionist so I asked Charlotte Mabrey. She was too busy , so she recommended one of her students, which was Lee.
Lee: And Craig Spirko was recording the production. That’s how we all met.
Arvid: Which led to us sitting in with Craig’s band, Soul Guardians.
Bill: Wasn’t that production of Macbeth directed by Michael Emerson, the actor who plays William Hinks in The Practice TV show?
Arvid: Yes, that was Michael. Very nice guy. Very talented.
Bill: He’s in that new movie, called Saw. I have video footage of Michael directing a music video for Soul Guardians. You were in that, too!
Arvid: Yep.
  Michael Emerson (in checkered sweater) directs a Soul Guardians video
  Left: Arvid playing guitar with a violin bow Right:Soul Guardians (Arvid, Roy Peak, Colin Westcott, Craig Spirko, Lauren Finchum, Scott Carpenter)
Bill: So you two met each other working with Craig Spirko and Michael Emerson and William Shakespeare.
Lee: And the rest is history!
Bill: Speaking of history, Arvid, you played on a John Fahey tribute album.
Arvid: That was a long time ago! Yeah, John Fahey is a stellar figure in music. He was a pioneer in blues and folk music. This record company out of Berkley, California, Kicking Mule Records, wanted several musicians to record songs by Fahey as a tribute to him, and they sought me out to be a part of it. I recorded the songs in Gainesville, FL and sent them a tape, which they used on the album. I’m very proud of those cuts. It was a joy to do his music.
Bill: I understand you have a gig at the European Street Café on February 10, to celebrate the release of your new CD, One Kind Favor, on Binky Records.
Arvid: It should be a good show. We’ll have Daron Ronan on drums, Landon Walker on bass, Drew Dixon on mandolin and violin, and Charlotte Mabrey will be there.
Bill: I’ll be there, too.
Click her for Tammerlin's Web Site
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