The Cincinnati-area duo Over the Rhine will perform “An Acoustic Christmas” on Saturday, December 7 , at 8 p.m. at The Ark, 316 South Main St., Ann Arbor.
Linford Detweiler and Karin Berguist are both vocalists and musicians who play multiple instruments.
“We have recorded three Over the Rhine Christmas albums over three years and draw a wintry mix of songs from these recordings for special year-end concerts,” Detweiler said.
Mant consider their musical genre to be “Americana,” but even that spans a great deal of influences.
“Maybe the simplest definition of Americana is just to think of it as a melting pot of American musical influences: folk, jazz, gospel, blues, acoustic music,” Detweiler said.
At The Ark performance, they will be using their grand piano and a other acoustic instruments.
“It’s a mystery why some songwriters are drawn to Christmas music,” Detweiler said. “For us, it’s a mixture of nostalgia, loss of innocence, and the dream we grew up with as children, of angels singing about the possibility of peace on earth. So many Christmas songs have already been written. We, as songwriters, are curious about the ones that haven’t been written.”
As far as the duo’s songwriting collaboration is concerned, they each contribute to the songwriting process.
“For the most part, I write about a third, Karin writes a third, and we collaborate on the remaining third,” Detweiler said. “We also help edit each other and provide feedback. That can be tricky for a married couple, but we’ve come to trust each other. Even if it’s hard to hear, we want unvarnished feedback.”
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The duo are reportedly influenced by a range of artists, musicians and even places.
“Artists and writers like Robert Frost, or Georgia O’Keefe, or Flannery O’Conner, or Wendell Barry were all deeply rooted in a particular place,” Detweiler said. “Karin and I never ran off to Nashville, or NYC, or LA — even though we’ve worked in all three cities from time to time. We wanted to live where it felt like we had some roots. In the end, we settled on a small farm east of Cincinnati.”
The duo always dreamed of owning their own venue as well, which they now do.
“A place where we could perform concerts and then walk across the driveway and sleep in our own house,” Detweiler said. “We ended up restoring an 1870s barn with the help of our followers and a community of music lovers. We host concerts throughout every year now in the loft of the barn, along with an annual music festival on our property called ‘Nowhere Else Festival’.“
They said they were excited to return to Ann Arbor and looking forward to the show.
“The Ark is one of America’s premier listening rooms,” Detweiler said. “A place where the audience is 100% focused on the music, and Ann Arbor always feels so festive during the holiday season.”
Donna Marie Iadipaolo is a writer, journalist, and State of Michigan certified teacher, since 1990. She has written for national publications like The Village Voice, Ear Magazine of New Music, Insurance & Technology, and TheStreet.
She is now writing locally for many publications, including Current Magazine, Ann Arbor Family, and the Ann Arbor Independent. Her undergraduate degree is from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where she graduated with an honors bachelor’s degree and three teacher certificate majors: mathematics, social sciences, English. She also earned three graduate degrees in Master of Science, Master of Arts, and Education Specialist Degree.
