Coming from a thousand miles and a border apart, Pharis and Jason Romero met in 2007 at an old-time fiddle jam.
Both had been playing music for decades — Pharis her whole life — and both were drawn to early country, old time, blues, bluegrass and fiddle-banjo music.
In 2010 they moved their home and the J. Romero Banjo Company north to Pharis’ hometown, the small interior B.C. town of Horsefly. In this wilderness hamlet they build their finely crafted banjos, and write and sing dreamy old time country — with enough jagged edges to feel modern — playing guitars and clawhammer and fingerstyle banjo to the songs and tunes, new and old, they adore.
They will be performing on Thursday, May 31 in Coombs at Creekmore Coffee, with the show starting at 7 p.m. Very limited tickets are available at Creekmore Coffee.
Writing songs about ageless characters, hard living, loss and love, Pharis’ songs have been played on radios around the world, and she was called a “historical treasure” by the BC Folklore Society.
Jason and Pharis played with the acclaimed Haints Old Time Stringband, with fiddler Erynn Marshall and mandolinist/guitarist/songwriter Carl Jones.
In 2010 Jason and Pharis went on to release their concept recording Back Up and Push. 2011 brought the release of their first duo album, A Passing Glimpse.
A beautiful collection of songs lovingly sourced from old recordings or written by Pharis, it’s an album of acoustic and national guitars, fingerstyle and clawhammer banjo, and plenty of powerful duet singing.