Folkadelphia Session: Rosu Lup Performing with an Orchestra

Being named Folkadelphia, you can tell that we love the city we’re in. Of course, we could wax poetic on the multitudinous ways we adore and admire you, oh Philadelphia, but we’ll keep it brief today by saying that we appreciate you, Philly, and your boundless creative spirit and landscape that serves as a breeding ground for diversity and quality in art, music, and culture. When we can support folk musicians, promote the local scene, or help out a newer bands with a recording opportunity, that’s when we are most gratified. If we can do all of those things in one fell swoop, well, that’s a victory if we ever did see one.

The stars aligned for us for this week’s Folkadelphia Session featuring Philadelphia’s Rosu Lup, a fairly new act that has started to figure out their own voice. On their EP Currents, released this past Spring, the band blends a variety of ideas and sounds; inside, I hear the epic qualities of Sigur Ros, the pop sensibilities of Great Lake Swimmers, and the intimate orchestration (genre alert: chamber folk) of Horse Feathers or Lost In The Trees. I also hear something wholly “Rosu Lupine” on the EP – a certain je ne sais quoi that bines the thoughts, ideas, orchestration together for major musical synergy, but perhaps that is why these guys are a band. It’s not about putting instruments in competent players’ hands, it’s about their chemistry and imagination.

Back earlier in 2013, Rosu Lup funded a successful Kickstarter campaign to record Currents at the wonderful Miner Street Studio and to work with an arranger and orchestra to flesh out the songs that comprise the EP. For our Folkadelphia in-studio session, we were lucky enough to reenact this process, inviting the band and a small orchestral section to record a set for us. The result is quite special as the strings glide and guide, the brass highlights, the woodwind underlines and embosses, bringing out the best qualities of a band well on their way to doing good through song.

Make sure to support Rosu Lup and two other Philly acts, Our Griffins and Adrien Reju, on Monday, October 28th when they all perform at the North Star Bar.