Beginning with delicate guitar-work, Timothy Jaromir slowly and gently draws us into this tale of the 1972 Mississippi Flood, which saw 700,000 people evacuated to escape the inundation. The themes of migration and displacement in ‘River on the Rise’ are common in Jaromir’s songs. His perspective is informed by his father’s experience of fleeing Czechoslovakia for Switzerland in 1968. Jaromir himself is well-travelled, which reinforces the restless mobility and the sense of place in his work.
This single, recorded with the support of Singer-songwriter Reza Dinally and Michael Flury (trombone), is central to his new album, ‘Hiraeth’. The title of Jaromir’s fourth album is a Welsh word that cannot be easily translated but stirs feelings of nostalgia and bittersweet homesickness, a long for a home that may not exist. It’s the perfect word to accompany Jaromir’s tales of loss, of seeking refuge, of searching for something that is missing, of hope. Ten years since his first solo album, ‘Salton Sea’, Jaromir is still searching.
The new album was put together in Switzerland with local musicians. A sign of Timothy Jaromir’s quality as a performer is the fact that his guitar and vocal parts were all recorded in one take. Impressive stuff.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0j1v-F3RRac
