Kendl Winter’s upcoming album “Banjo Mantras” began as a way to connect with her fans and peers by sharing her daily melodic meditations and explorations on the clawhammer banjo. “The Banjo Mantras” is Kendl Winter’s first solo release in five years and her first foray into highlighting her banjo prowess on an instrumental album. Primarily known as a songwriter and multi-instrumentalist in the Americana duo The Lowest Pair, “The Banjo Mantras” lean into Kendl’s skillful explorations as a banjo player to bring forward an album of intricately textured instrumental compositions. Stemming from an improvisational approach Kendl termed her music “mantras” because of their repetitive and hypnotic nature. Her first single, "Humming Mantra," (released September 8th, 2023) draws inspiration from the vibrant Pacific Northwest summer. Lively clawhammer banjo evokes the tune’s title and contrasts alluringly over a sustained and droning accompaniment on her old archtop hollow bodied guitar. In Kendl’s words: “The banjo mantras started off as morning writings, like morning pages but in musical form, daily pen to paper, fingers to strings, listening, feeling, sliding and thumbing my way around my open back banjo. I might have stumbled upon a new technique or tuning from tab or a friend, even a student, and would implement it into the day’s soundscape, catching happy accidents in stride and weaving them back into the fabric of the melody. I like the idea of the banjo mantras being ultimately formless, though when I went to record them for this project, form had to be contended with, if at least to capture a snapshot of the moving flowing breathing and changing musical motifs.”
