Ten Records That Changed My Life

Why does this feel so ... soul-shriving?

Anyway, the list is chronological to the best of my recollection. It begins when I'm 15. It ends in August of 2018. I'm probably forgetting some things. It's been a long time.

Copland: Rodeo/Billy The Kid; New York Philharmonic; Leonard Bernstein, conducting: We were rehearsing selections from Copland's Rodeo in youth symphony. This marked the first time I ever heard a recording of a piece I was rehearsing (God bless my hometown library). The very idea that I was playing music that Leonard Bernstein had conducted was unimaginably powerful. Suddenly, music, which had always been exhilarating was serious business, too.

Thank You, Music Lovers; Spike Jones: I have my dad and, once again, the La Habra Library to thank for this one. A record that, in effect, was the obverse of the Copland, with serious musicians doing unabashedly-silly stuff without ever abandoning classical rigor.

Roses In the Snow; Emmylou Harris: My dad was country. My mother was not. After a 16-year middlebrow reign of terror, during which country music was banned on our stereo and tolerated on the great god, television, this is the record that reminded me I like things twangy af.

Clannad; Self-titled: 1983. On a drive through Mendocino, a friend popped this cassette into the player, and I was instantly smitten. As the reviewer says, I've grown out of this record in favor of stuff that's at once more traditional and more experimental, but this is where my love of Irish folk music began.

Without Clannad, I wouldn't have seen The Chieftains in concert twice, wouldn't have tuned in to Thistle and Shamrock every Saturday night for years. And I wouldn't have understood nearly as much about bluegrass going in.

Sun City; Artists United Against Apartheid: Despite being born into a conservative family, I've been a liberal for as long as I can remember.

My particular brand of liberalism never extended to corrupt charitable efforts, however; the rampant misuse of the monies collected for the No Nukes campaign left me wary of vanity charities. Did they know what they were talking about? Did they care?

A few years later, conservative acquaintances tried to get me to abandon my commitment to Live Aid by sharing stories of foodstuffs left rotting on the docks at Addis Ababa, thanks to self-satisfied rock star incompetence.

It wasn't until years later that those stories were not only proven false, but politically motivated, as well.

When the Sun City record premiered, I hung on to my money, went once again to my local library, and read everything about South Africa I could get my hands on. I satisfied myself that I had a reasonable grasp of the issues, albeit primarily from the perspective of literary and liberal South African whites. You see, apartheid extended to the arts, too.

Armed with this knowledge, I began cautiously to listen to what Artists United Against Apartheid had to say. I devoured every excerpt of this documentary that MTV cared to televise. At last, I satisfied myself that they knew what they were doing, and were fully committed to getting it done. I bought the vinyl and the VHS. I believe my money was well spent.

Whenever some rebel with a cause comes calling, this is, now and forever, how I handle it.

The Peace Album; Paul Horn: I was burned out on music. I would see local bands on stage and go home just-below-boiling jealous. Thank God I had the maturity to ask myself just what I would do up there if I had the chance.

I had no idea.

Then, I heard this record, and got excited about music -- about performing -- again. This kind of choral singing with flutes was what I wanted to do.

So, I tracked down a Conn Multivider just like Paul Horn used -- only to discover that I'd have to drill holes in my flute to connect the thing.

Yeah, no.

i conferred with fellow musicians who were infinitely more tech-savvy than I. Did I really have to risk ruining the flute I'd had since fifth grade to get this sound? They concurred that I did.

Yeah.

No.

I had a funeral in my mind. I'm still not over it.

Roll In My Sweet Baby's Arms; Jimmy Martin: This and the next two records hit me like a ton of bricks. They brought me not only to bluegrass, but back to my musical self. This one had the high lonesome sound, and the punishing bluegrass technique, but it had something more: rock 'n' roll energy. You could do that?

Turns out you could. Music that came up in around the same time frame as my dad did, could be dangerous.

Wait A Minute; The Seldom Scene: This bluegrass wasn't dangerous -- unless you were the kind who stole lunch money and beat up younger kids.

Written by banjoist and L.A. session stalwart, Herb Pedersen. "Wait A Minute" was 70s-sensitive and classically precise (Tenor vocalist, John Duffey, had picked up a few vocal tricks from his dad, who sang in the chorus of the Metropolitan Opera). Just what I, a die-hard fan of 19th century Russian classical music, needed in order to remember myself in the midst of the vernacular.

Tiny Broken Heart; Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerard: In spite of everything, I felt something was missing from bluegrass. I had no idea what it was until I heard this song. Then and now, bluegrass is at its best when it is sharing the stories of forgotten and downtrodden folks.

All Or Nothing; The Small Faces: A record that simultaneously brought me back to rock 'n' roll, and reminded me of the energy and emotional truth I first heard in bluegrass. Just what I needed after 12 years of forsaking all others for the love of Bill, Ralph, Jimmy, and The Scene.

My standards are exacting, but I do best when my palette is big and varied. Since the Small Faces were virtually unheard of in the States, their music satisfied my urge for discovery. And soul.

I should end things here with some kind of summarizing paragraph. Trouble is, it's not over yet. #Sagittarius

The Best Albums of 2017

This year's records were so good that even I didn't know which way this was going to go until the bitter end. It seems that real country has a fighting chance, real blues is still alive, and Europe cares deeply about what's going on here in America -- so deeply that their art reflected their concern in unsettling ways.

That said, let's get to it.

9. Midland, On the Rocks: The rap on these guys is that their brand of country has an authenticity problem, which is funny for an industry that bestows its highest accolades on guys who do bad Gregg Allman imitations for millennials.

I hear echoes (no, waves) of Keith Whitley (the really good stuff before he left J.D. Crowe and The New South), Glen Campbell, and George Strait.

If there's routine pop with a twang here, blame it on a record company and a willing producer; you don't sing and pick like this if you want to be the next big thing in bro country. Nashville desperately needs these sounds. If music like this is the way back to real, so be it.

8. The Medlars, The Medlars: The contrast is so jarring it's almost unbearable: a delicate, pastoral setting sketched out with banjo, cello, flute, and doleful horns. And then, that voice -- big, brassy, untutored, and raw, singing the harsh realities and rough-hewn joys of English country life.
The pentatonic scale hasn't had a workout this vigorous since the heyday of traditional bluegrass.

7. Karen and the Sorrows, The Narrow Place: There are echoes here of modern country, and Tom Petty's country rock, circa 1980s. Karen Pittelman's vocals take some getting used to. Even so, she reveals herself to be an able writer of tunes that fogies like me still call "real country music".

If you're in a bluegrass or classic country outfit, and you're not thinking of covering one of these songs, you're doing it wrong.

6. Gregg Allman, Southern Blood: Much was made of the fact that Gregg Allman was dying as he recorded this, his final album. In one sense, this was as it should have been; the physical effort alone made him a tragic, heroic figure.

In another sense, that narrative couldn't have been more wrong. At his best, Gregg Allman always sang this kind of music, with precisely this level of world-weary desperation. If we lost anything when he passed, it was the crucial presence of the down-and-out in popular music.

5. Eric Bibb, Migration Blues: A singer and picker of uncommon subtlety and skill, Eric Bibb grabs a listener's attention from the first hushed and urgent notes. Like all true blues people, he has a heart for the oppressed and forgotten, and he's at his best when he's bringing equally-marginalized music, like blues and gospel, to the fore.

This is the kind of music for which the NEA was founded, and for which, so many plutocrats would like to shut its doors. It's no accident that our country was a lot kinder when music like this actively influenced the music in the Top 40.

4. I'm With Her, Little Lies: Separately, I'm With Her got their start in progressive bluegrass bands like Crooked Still and Nickel Creek, but the drive, instrumentation, intensity, chops, and even some of the repertoire on display here have more in common with high-octane traditional grass.

That said, the trio handles contemporary fare with equal skill. This is a band of tremendous versatility; in that, they remind me of the classic Seldom Scene. Next year promises a full CD from them, and I can't wait.

3. Offa Rex, The Queen of Hearts: Although you'll hear strains of Pentangle, Steeleye Span, and Fairport Convention here, with their debut album, Offa Rex has created a sound that's lush, textured, entirely unique, and instantly identifiable as their own.

A collaboration between American indie faves, The Decemberists, and English folk singer, Olivia Chaney, Rex shines brightest when classically-trained Chaney handles the vocals. Decemberists frontman, Colin Meloy, lacks the diction and drive to pull this singing style off, but makes up the lack with crunchy guitar work that sometimes verges into early Black Sabbath territory. Bonus: A cover of "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" that restores the song to its folk roots.

2. Brian Owens, Soul of Cash: With this CD, soul crooner, Brian Owens, gives the music of Johnny Cash a stoned soul makeover, and gives us the album the world has been waiting for since 1962, when Ray Charles released Modern Sounds In Country and Western Music.

The songs are entirely familiar, yet completely reconstructed. There's not a predictable moment on the record, so it's impossible to choose highlights. The closing track, initially disappointing because it's not a Cash tune, serves as Owens' raison d'être for anyone who, in these polarized times, wonders why he bothered.

1. Judy Dyble and Andy Lewis, Summer Dancing: It's been said that crisis reveals character, and any casual observer of current events has seen character revealed in surprising ways since Donald Trump became the 45th president of the United States.

What I didn't expect was the way character was revealed in ... home design.

Ikea teamed with Hay Designs for rooms that looked like kindergarten classrooms doing double duty as funeral homes. Liberty of London's noisy-scary florals with their goth backgrounds and muddy, clashing colors brought Maurice Sendak kicking and screaming into the Donald Trump era.

There were black houses, and black rooms -- the kind of places that might have inspired this record of sun-dappled nightmares.

Art is the first world's great escape, but Dyble and Lewis won't stand for it. They insist that adult problems be faced in an adult way, which usually means they're never quite solved.

Yet, in Dyble and Lewis's psychedelic world, as in the real one, dew still sparkles on the grass. The sun still shines. We still get our silly moments after nights without sleep, and those casually-vicious betrayals that add up. All aspiring adults must face the fact that it's never either/or, but both/and -- both climate change and Summer Dancing.

An Idiosyncratic Duo Makes the Perfect Pair At Habitat For Humanity Benefit

Oftentimes, benefit concerts fall victim to less-than inspired collaborations, but a recent benefit for a North Carolina chapter of Habitat For Humanity saw one of the oddest yet most inspired pairings ever. Phil Cook's banjo is every bit as rich and expressive as Nnenna Frelon's vocals -- so much so that I wish there were more clips available from their set.

Here are jazz chanteuse, Nnenna Frelon, and banjoist, Phil Cook (Hiss Golden Messenger, Megafaun, Alice Gerard) with a dreamy, meditative version of the Stephen Foster standard, "Oh! Susannah".

Fiddlin' John Carson wrote and recorded this one some time in 1923 -- during Prohibition, interestingly enough.  Yeah, it seems that Prohibition was so ineffective that folks were writing songs about being kind to raging alcoholics. So much for legalism.
 
Fast forward to 2012, and this fine interpretation by Foghorn Stringband. Sammy Lind's fiddle work is as rambunctious as can be, and the band continues to amaze with its versatility. All four are strong singers, and they manage to vocalize in all possible combinations while still sounding like Foghorn Stringband.

In this case, the singers are Caleb Klauder and Nadine Landry. The song is "Be Kind To A Man While He's Down."

If only it were this easy for an alcoholic, an addict, or anyone, really, to change their destructive behavior.

Sadly, healing never proceeds in a straight line, and never comes about because of a dream. After all, if we're paying attention to those promptings from our subconscious, we're probably not behaving in self-destructive ways to begin with.

I'm saying this as much for alcoholics and addicts as for their co-dependents who, alarmingly enough, have a disease not unlike that of the alcoholic or addict they're so desperate to rescue.

Foghorn Stringband, with a suitably-raw delivery of "The Drunkard's Dream".

The women of Foghorn Stringband take center stage with a song about the life-altering consequences of trusting in faithless friends -- a twist of fate that more grievously impacts the most marginalized and vulnerable people in our society, including women.

Back in the day when old time was popular music, songwriters told the truth about how easy it is to be safe and secure one day, and completely alone in the world, the next. If people lack compassion these days, one reason might be that artists are no longer affected by, or personally in touch with, those on the margins. Our cultural dialogue is all the poorer for it.

This is Foghorn Stringband with "Bring Back My Blue-Eyed Boy To Me".

A "Yay, Heaven!" song with a difference: none of the obnoxious and entirely-unwarranted triumphalism that you hear in so many of these things.

Caleb Klauder -- he's the mandolin picker -- wrote this one, and it has a quality that gospel is sadly lacking these days: it is an absolute blast. The Cajun feel that comes from Sammy Lind's fiddle, and is underscored by Nadine Landry's rollicking bass line, has a lot to do with that.

It seems that Foghorn Stringband think so, too; they look and sound as though they're having the time of their lives.

Here they are with "Innocent Road".
 

Senator Robert Byrd's "Mountain Fiddler" Remastered

Robert Byrd was a self-taught fiddler who learned traditional fiddle tunes while growing up in the hill country of West Virginia. Eventually, he became the U.S. Senate Majority Leader, and the longest-serving member of the Senate, but he never gave up playing the fiddle.

In 1977, Sen. Byrd recorded this album in his office, backed by members of The Country Gentlemen -- Doyle Lawson on guitar, James Bailey on banjo, and Spider Gilliam on bass.

The result was an album filled to the brim with true, traditional mountain music -- joyful, authentic, and totally raw. Some of the tracks are introduced by Sen. Byrd's anecdotes recounting the first time he heard these age-old tunes, the musicians he learned them from, and the places and occasions where they were played. It's fascinating stuff from a born raconteur.

The band jelled seamlessly, and it shows, especially on the instrumentals, "Forked Deer" and "Red Bird".

One of the most intriguing things about Mountain Fiddler is that Sen. Byrd provides a lead vocal on many songs that are played as instrumentals these days. "Cripple Creek", "Turkey In the Straw", "Old Joe Clark", and "Cumberland Gap" are among these.

Sen. Byrd's vocal delivery is just as raw and untutored as his fiddle playing on these songs. By contrast, he gives moving, inspired readings on story songs like "Wish I Had Stayed In the Wagon Yard", "Rye Whiskey", and the album's countrified standout, "Come Sundown She'll Be Gone".

Sen. Byrd also takes some bluegrass standards out for a spin, including "Don't Let Your Sweet Love Die", "There's More Pretty Girls Than One", "Roving Gambler", and "Will the Circle Be Unbroken".

Both old-time and bluegrass musics have largely strayed away from this sound, and lost a lot of their emotional impact in the process. Mountain Fiddler is a study in the real deal for musicians and fans of  those genres.

When a song’s title ties your stomach up in knots …

Invariably, I listen to songs like this with a ready finger on the Stop button. “Old-time” in this context so often means “fire and brimstone”, used to threaten everyone but those for whom Jesus meant it.

What Finley Peter Dunne once said about newspapers is often applied to the clergy these days: they’re supposed to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. This song manages that in a subtle way, as a man who’s seen it all and had most of it uses the truth of his experience to decide that “I’d Rather Be An Old-Time Christian”.

Here are Norman and Nancy Blake to tell the story.

Here we have two versions of one song, neither of which has sold me.

I think Sarah Jarosz and her peach-fuzzed cohorts need to wait for 15 years or so, until they understand the song; and that Tom Waits sounds like he needs a trip to the hospital to clear the excess gunk from his lungs.

I've posted Jarosz's version -- a rare misfire for her -- because Waits' version (he's the songwriter, btw) is so nauseating that I can't get through more than two lines of it. So, I'm squeamish; so, sue me.

Here's Sarah Jarosz with "Come On Up To the House".

A DIY Murder Ballad

Yes, you can write your own murder ballad.

Abigail Washburn says this one began when she tried out some funk riffs on a recently-acquired cello banjo. Those experiments with her husband and musical collaborator, Bela Fleck, led to this tune.

Lyrically, Washburn's goal was to reverse the roles in a traditional murder ballad by giving the woman the desire to do away with some traitorous man. Her child-like, sing-song delivery is more suggestive of a child who uses fantasy as a way to escape an oppressor who is much bigger and stronger. What could be more frightening than that?

Here are Bela Fleck and Abigail Washburn with "Shotgun Blues".

Probably because it is a.k.a. Child Ballad #73, this tune usually gets an English-accented folk treatment – even in the bluegrass world.

Mike and Peggy Seeger did something extraordinarily different with it. In their hands, Child 73, better known as “Lord Thomas and Fair Ellender”, sounds as though it came to life in the hills and hollers of Appalachia.

First off, I cannot recommend this box set enough. If you are fanatical about bluegrass and old-time music, you must have this in your library. It includes sets by The Stanley Brothers, The New Lost City Ramblers, Cousin Emmy, and Roscoe Holcomb, among others, from a package tour they did in Germany.

That said, let me focus on one song in particular.

They didn’t have the language for it back then, but this is as clear an example of sex addiction or love addiction as you could hope to find. “I’m a three-time loser,” Carter Stanley sings, so you know he’s been here before, for the exact same reason: “All for the love of another man’s wife”, regardless of the consequences.

Carter Stanley knew a little something about addiction; he was an alcoholic for most of his touring life. This show was recorded in the spring of 1966; Carter Stanley would die on December 1 of that year.

At this point, he just sounds plumb wore out, and his profound weariness suits the song to sad perfection.

This is The Stanley Brothers with “Stone Walls and Steel Bars”.

More than a few artists have covered this song, but no version comes close to this one by The New Lost City Ramblers.

Just listen to the tempo – like a rattletrap Ford hitting every bump in the road; the relentless picking that makes it sound as though the instruments could fall apart any second; Mike Seeger’s fixed, maniacal lead vocal – less reflective of a dispassionate narrator than the drunken driver himself.

The whole thing sounds almost itchy, as though the drunk in the title is scratching at imaginary bugs – an illusion brought on by the delirium tremens symptomatic of late-stage alcoholism. In that sense, this track reminds me of Pete Seeger’s version of “Darling Corey”; they both have that climbing-the-walls quality.

This is The New Lost City Ramblers with “Drunken Driver”.

This song reveals some ugly history you don’t hear much about anymore. I’ll let the uploader explain:

“My family got paid in ‘script’ and I’ve seen some old papers…the ‘script’. It could just be spent in the Company Stores which were owned by the mines. Items were much higher priced in these stores …but they didn’t get money to spend in other stores. This song reminds me of the stories I heard as a child.”

ICYMI, that means the company enforced a system of slave labor. Then, the unions came along.

This is Tim Eriksen on guitar and Riley Baugus on banjo with “The Company Store”.

It’s Christmas, but, well, I hate Christmas and most Christmas music.

I do not, however, resist the nostalgia that comes over me at this time of year. Hence, a favorite from youth symphony that began my life-long love affair with the music of Aaron Copland.

Conductor Leonard Bernstein was one of Copland’s running buddies. Perhaps that’s why he understood Copland’s music so well. For my money, Bernstein’s recording of Copland’s music for Agnes deMille’s ballet, Rodeo, is the best one ever made.

This is the final “dance episode” from that work. For you bluegrass and old-time fiddlers wracking your brain for the source material, it’s Ruth Crawford Seeger’s recording, on piano, of “Bonaparte’s Retreat”.

This is Leonard Bernstein, conducting the New York Philharmonic in Aaron Copland’s “Hoedown”.

From Mike Seeger's Collection

This hymn was originally collected by Mike Seeger on an album titled Close to Home:  Old Time Music from Mike Seeger’s Collection, 1952 – 1967. The Primitive Quartet also recorded an upbeat, bluegrass-inflected version, but I much prefer this one.

The group is variously referred to as The Stacer/Stancer Quartet, and though this is not a shape note hymn, it has the same stark, modal quality.

This is “He Said, If You Love Me, Feed My Sheep”.

The Discovery of Roscoe Holcomb and the High Lonesome Sound

Geeking out on bluegrass roots today.

“The Discovery of Roscoe Holcomb and the ‘High Lonesome Sound’" is full of well-disguised microaggression toward rural Southerners (what else from The New Yorker?), and equally-brimming with invaluable musical insights.

The author cites Holcomb’s upbringing in the Old Regular Baptist Church as a primary influence on his singing style. Here’s a musical example of the style of singing Holcomb – and Ralph Stanley, btw – grew up with there.

The author also links Holcomb to Gaelic psalm singing on Isle of Lewis, Scotland. Here’s a haunting example of that style – and this one will blow you away. The roots of bluegrass singing, as exemplified by the first generation of bluegrass performers, could not be clearer.

I talked the other day about one band that puts on an entertaining, high-energy show while still playing traditional bluegrass. Here’s another.

The Punch Brothers display astonishing versatility in this mini-set, moving easily from 20th century Irish folk music to hardcore bluegrass to Americana.

The set begins with “The Auld Triangle”, continues with a wonderful vocal from Critter Eldridge on “Don’t Give Your Heart To A Rambler”, moves on to a lightning-quick version of “Wheel Hoss”, and ends with Gillian Welch’s “Wayside”.

Leadbelly, Alan Lomax, and the Relevance of a Renewed Interest In American Vernacular Music

Dom Flemons saves the day as revisionist history rears its ugly head.

So, The Lomaxes – champions of African-American vernacular music, or cheap white exploiters?

Flemons, formerly with The Carolina Chocolate Drops, and now thriving as a solo artist, sets the record straight with a thoughtful, even-handed and, most importantly, well-researched piece, entitled
Leadbelly, Alan Lomax, and the Relevance of a Renewed Interest In American Vernacular Music.