By Michael Swanger michael@dmcityview.com

Alison Brown juggles work, parenthood and all that jazz-grass

The next time you feel like your world is spiraling out of control as you struggle to balance your day-to-day life, pop a copy of Grammy-winning jazz-grass banjo player Alison Brown's new album "Stolen Moments" into your CD player. It's not only is a tranquil mix of spacious acoustic tunes that calm the soul, but it is also a subtle, comforting reminder that you're not alone in juggling a chaotic lifestyle.

Brown says the album's title is a nod to the task of balancing work and parenthood with her own creativity. Since founding Compass Records 10 years ago, she and her bassist-husband Garry West have amassed a catalog of more than 200 releases by dozens of artists and maintained an international touring schedule - all while raising their 3-year-old daughter, Hannah.

"We had to steal time to write the music and get into the studio," Brown says. "I think anyone who's a working parent knows what the juggle is about."

None of the tunes on "Stolen Moments," however, reflect Brown's frenzied pace. It is a fluid collection of genre-bending songs melding folk, jazz, Celtic, Latin and bluegrass in such a way that one style doesn't dominate the others. For Brown, who began her career as a bluegrass musician and played banjo with Alison Krauss and Union Station from 1989 to 1991, "Stolen Moments" best reflects the breadth of her musical aesthetic.

"I'm really pleased with it," she says. "I think it's the first time we've achieved a good synthesis of all the styles we like to play as a band."

To help achieve that goal, Brown recruited an impressive list of guest musicians to participate in the making of "Stolen Moments." They include bluegrass greats Sam Bush (mandolin) and Stuart Duncan (fiddle), as well as Irish mavericks John Doyle (guitar) and Seamus Egan (flute) and ex-Pretenders and Paul McCartney Band guitarist Robbie McIntosh. Brown also enlisted a handful of her favorite female singers to lend their voices to the project, including the Indigo Girls ("Homeward Bound"), Beth Nielsen Chapman ("Angel"), Andrea Zonn ("One Morning in May") and Mary Chapin Carpenter ("Prayer Wheel"). Teamwork, Brown says, is the essence of her sound.

"It's a feminine approach to the banjo in that it's very melodic and very ensemble-oriented music," she says.

Brown's art might favor a feminine perspective, but she learned her business skills in the masculine world of finance, earning degrees from Harvard University and UCLA before working as an investment banker. She says her unusual mix of business know-how and sensitivity to the needs of artists is an asset.

"Having an MBA is valuable in the general sense of getting the label launched and having the discipline to focus on numbers," she says. "If you don't know how to do that you won't last. But on the flip side you also have to know how to communicate with musicians."

Brown says she and her husband have learned a few hard lessons over the years about the rigors of an ever-changing music industry. She says the advent of computerization, the obliteration of independent record stores and consolidation at every level of the business, which makes it difficult to distribute and promote artists and albums, has rearranged the industry's landscape. And when you consider the fact that 98 percent of all albums sell fewer than 5,000 copies, it puts the music industry into perspective.

"The fact that we're still here putting out music is proof that we've progressed," she says. "The music industry is a moving target these days, so it's incredibly challenging."

But there have been plenty of pleasant surprises along the way, too. Brown says she could have only dreamed of counting artists like Paul Brady, Beth Nielsen Chapman and Fairport Convention among her stable of artists when she launched Compass Records.

"We would have been shocked and amazed to work with so many people who are icons in their field," Brown says.

Brown says small, independent record labels like Compass Records play an important role in servicing discerning music fans. It's a poignant reminder when she feels like she's being pulled in several directions.

"There's people out there willing to support it who buy the records and go to the shows and hear things you won't see on 'American Idol' or read about in Entertainment Weekly," she says. "There's a sense of discovery, and I hope they feel entertained and edified." CV

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