While studying jazz at Berklee, Tev Stevig fell in love with the music of the Eastern Mediterranean and became determined to fuse Balkan rhythms with jazz improvisation. He took up the fretless guitar, playing in the heavily down-stroked “claw hammer” style associated with old time American folk music. The resulting convergence can be heard on his CD for solo guitar, Jeni Jol, which covers arrangements of traditional Turkish music with original compositions. The meditative melodies coupled with often-stark rhythms often recall the mood (but not the method) of early John Fahey and Leo Kottke recordings.
