Orpheum Bell is an American band, but in 21st Century America, those words can carry a lot of baggage, both musical and cultural. The five band members write songs that know no boundaries, laying down skewed grooves that skitter around the globe, absorbing beats and meters from Europe, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean. Imagine a Ukrainian gypsy band playing cowboy tangos in a smoky bar in Havana and you’re on the right track. “I’m from Ukraine, Serge our bass player is from Holland, our fiddler Henrik is from Armenia, Michael is from Ohio and Katie’s a Michigan native,” says singer, composer and guitarist Aaron Klein. “Serge, Henrik and I grew up outside the States and, while our music isn’t specifically coming from any one of those places or cultures, the sounds and songs we heard early in our lives get mixed into the songs we’re writing now.”

The band’s influences include Don Gibson, The Clash, Django Reinhardt, the Boswell Sisters, Russian poet and folksinger Vladimir Vysotsky, Dock Boggs, and Bob Wills and you can hear unmistakable elements of them in the music the band makes. The Old Sisters’ Home is their third album and the first featuring drums and percussion, but their elegant, folk inspired sound remains intact. They cut the album at Big Sky Studios in Ann Arbor, using analog tape and a collection of old mics to help capture the band’s warm, intimate feel. “Our songwriting was more spontaneous and collaborative this time,” Serge van der Voo states. “The songs took shape with everyone contributing solos, melodic themes and lyrics.”

“Poor Laetitia” opens things up with a stomping tango beat, featuring clattering banjo and muted trumpet: Klein’s gritty, sneering vocal is supported by the wailing harmonies of Katie Lee and Jennie Knaggs. “Whatever Shines So Bright” sounds like a samba from a 40s musical, with Klein and Lee’s carefree boy/girl duet accented by ukulele, marimba and muted trumpets. “Daddy’s Crying” is based on an early R&B three chord turnaround, but moaning string bass, tearful female vocals and poetic lyrics suggest Eastern European despondency. “Skinny Bird” is a gypsy tune sung in growling Russian by Klein and driven into overdrive by a galloping snare drum.

The album’s instrumentals are just as adventurous. Dark bowed bass notes open “The Old Sisters’ Home,” while Latin and Eastern European rhythms entwine to provide a background for Henrik Karapetyan’s melancholy gypsy fiddling. “Parade” is more sprightly, sounding like a bluegrass group sitting in with a Hungarian wedding band.

The band’s broad influences may set them apart from their peers in Ann Arbor, but they’re in the vanguard of a new kind of music that honors many of the styles bubbling in the American melting pot.  The band came together in 2005 when Klein and van der Voo sprang songs from a Gibson archtop and an upright, joined later by accordions, violins, horns, utensils and even proper suits.  “We pretty much have unlimited options when we start arranging a song”, Klein explains.  Several tracks from their second release Pearls (‘09) were selected for the art documentary soundtrack ‘The Life of Chris Roberts-Antieau’ by Brookbank Productions.  The film was featured at Baltimore’s American Visionary Art Museum in 2010.

They’re planning to tour the US to support The Old Sister’s Home and eyeing a European tour for 2013.

Aaron Klein - vocals, banjo, ukuleles, and guitars
Henrik Karapetyan - violins
Katie Lee - vocals, violin, banjo, ukulele, pump organ, percussion
Michael Billmire - accordion, trumpets, mandolin, xylophone, glockenspiel, pump organ, shepherd harp
Serge van der Voo - double bass, foot percussion