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Violinist from Ashland returns for concert By BILL VARBLE When Lila Sklar was a student at Ashland High School in the early 1990s, she listened to Pearl Jam and the Red Hot Chili Peppers with her friends, natch. She listened alone to The Beatles. And she turned classical for her violin lessons with Sherry Kloss, a then-Ashland-based violin teacher who had studied with the great Jascha Heifetz. "I felt like I had a split personality," Sklar says. These days, Sklar, 26, is the violinist in the pickPocket Ensemble, a San Francisco Bay area trio that plays original pieces based on European cafe music of the 1930s and '40s. The ensemble headlines a show scheduled for 8 p.m. Oct. 13 at the Unitarian Center, Fourth and C streets, Ashland. The Noe Venable Trio opens. The unique ensemble was formed in 1998 by accordionist Rick Corrigan. Sklar came along a year or so later. The group plays a mix of Italian folk and Eastern European styles with jazz, swing and gypsy influences thrown in. Corrigan calls it "cafe music for dreamers." Playing at clubs such as Radio Valencia near San Francisco's Mission District, the band often features Sklar's violin and Corrigan's accordion playing in harmony. They'll trade phrases back and forth in what Sklar calls "little question-and-answer things." There's the occasional jazzy violin solo or accordion solo, jazz-improv style. In a telephone interview from Berkeley, Calif., Sklar says she started violin studies at age 4. She played in the orchestra at Ashland High School, where she graduated in 1993, and in the Rogue Valley Symphony while still in her teens. She got interested in Middle Eastern music when she went to Portland State University. The school is noted for its classical music program, and Sklar always seemed to be prevented by scheduling problems from getting the jazz class she really wanted to take. One day fate stepped in when she threw her back out of alignment in orchestra class and went to see a chiropractor. "He knew a belly dancer and this Middle East music troupe looking for a violinist," she says. "I went to play with them and faked my way through what I thought sounded Middle Eastern. I played a lot of harmonic minors." She wound up traveling through Greece, Turkey and Morocco with a tape recorder, collecting indigenous music, dropping out of college and playing with the Portland-based Gypsy Caravan for a couple of years. She toured with a rock band called Land of the Blind. "It was sort of Sinead O'Connor meets Cyndi Lauper," she says. Sklar now works with half a dozen bands in the Bay area, ranging from a Balkan/World Music group to a marimba-based Latin/reggae band. "It's not hard to keep them separate," she says. "And when you mix them, it's probably a good thing. "Most of the groups aren't traditional. There's a lot of room for solos and personal style." Reach reporter Bill Varble at 776-4478 or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.