Heart of steel and string
When I lived in Houston, I was fortunate enough to see a number of amazing experimental musicians, including Susie Ibarra, Evan Parker, and Susan Alcorn, who is pictured above. Alcorn, a pedal steel guitarist, was and is, by far, one of my favorite Houston-area musicians. Her music is haunting, the sort of thing that sticks in your brain for weeks — or in my case, years. Alcorn has a single track up on her website, a tremulous and eerie version of “New Orleans 1927,” which I highly recommend listening to.
At one point several years ago, I had the opportunity to interview Alcorn. She was gracious and a bit reserved, not in a way that suggested she was hiding anything or didn’t want to bother talking to me, but in a way that suggested that she carries herself carefully and likes to weigh the things she’s saying. I believe that quality comes through in her music; sure, it’s experimental, but it’s also tightly controlled, and the pacing often seems to be that of statements made in carefully-measured words, spent exactly as they should be spent.