String Planet

about

String Planet is an eclectic instrumental duo (or trio) featuring violist Novi and Chapman Stick player Larry Tuttle. In their music, classical chops and a pop sensibility combine with a serious groove - fun, loose, colorful and ever-so-slightly twisted. String Planet's musical attitude comes from an exotic instrumentation (most people have never even seen the Chapman Stick before, much less in combination with electric viola) and an optimistic science fiction-ized “one planet” outlook on life. Their “Songs From the Home Planet” show and new CD features original takes on some of the great music from Planet Earth - from The Beatles to Prokofiev to who knows what - you never know what's going to show up, or how it's going to sound when it gets there. Larry and Novi met when they formed the instrumental group Freeway Philharmonic with guitarist Robert Stanton. FREEWAY PHIL recorded four albums -- FREEWAY PHILHARMONIC, CAR TUNES, SONIC DETOUR and ROAD TO JOY - and toured incessantly for fifteen years. Now with STRING PLANET, their years together show a deep affinity for each other's playing and their uncanny entwining-interplay within each song. "I often can sense what Larry is going to play," states Novi. "I love to move around within a song playing the melody, then a counter-melody, then a harmony part, and maybe adding some coloring and inner voices. We try for lots of dynamics. Our passion is the sound of strings working together." Novi has a long list of cr