Little known to the world outside of Bill Laswell’s orbit, guitarist and string instrument specialist Nicky Skopelitis has played on scores of recordings yet has only been a leader on four. Rob Saffer will be joined by record collector Bill Dubilier to showcase recordings featuring this overlooked musician as a bandleader and as an accompanist known more for adding texture and sympathetic rhythms than for playing leads. We’ll hear stylistically wide collaborations with Laswell, of course, but also with the Golden Palominos, Public Image Ltd., Ginger Baker, Hakim Bey, and James Blood Ulmer, among others, that demonstrate Nicky’s prowess on his many instruments: saz; lutes; Coral sitar; oud; baglama; banjo; guitars; dobro; bass; and keyboards, among others. This show was pre-recorded in February and will air when Saffer is en route to cover the Big Ears festival in Knoxville, TN.

Playlist:

Theme: Vitus Labrusca - Ben LaMar Gay

Monday Night - Golden Palominos

Rise - Public Image Ltd.

Interlock - Ginger Baker

Wings - James Blood Ulmer

The Western Lands - Material

Bad Blood - Nicky Skopelitis

Venus - Sonny Sharrock with Nicky Skopelitis

Meet Your Maker - Nick Skopelitis

Poetic Terrorism - Hakim Bey

Eternal Drift - Material

Our Completion - Blind Light

Boka Devotion - Aiyb Dieng

Returning - Arcana

Vishuddha Chakra - Trilok Gurtu

Morning High - Bill Laswell

Encoded - Bill Laswell

Alsema Dub - Bill Laswell, Jah Wobble

Kulta Baba - Okay Temiz

Oman - Bill Laswell“Overlooked” is a show focusing on overlooked and underplayed music of all varieties: jazz, improvisational, international, and other fringe music, ancient to future, familiar to rare, classic to weird. Broadcast live from Overlook Mountain in Ulster County, “Overlooked” offers programs focused solely on newly released music along with others that focus on specific musical themes or history.

Host Rob Saffer is the former Executive Director and Producer of the Creative Music Foundation and Creative Music Studio. While living in Brooklyn for 25 years, he served on advisory boards for Celebrate Brooklyn! and Symphony Space. He also co-curated the Brooklyn Museum’s summer jazz series and helped found The Mingus Big Band with Mingus’s widow, Sue. Rob is also a judge for the annual Downbeat Magazine Critics Poll.