Barking Dog: October 13, 2022
Bruce Cockburn - Foxglove
Canadian singer-songwriter and skilled guitarist who’s been playing professionally for over 40 years
From his 2005 album Speechless
Mississippi John Hurt - Pay Day
American country blues singer and guitarist who taught himself guitar around the age of nine
This is his own song, though he takes a bunch of lyrics from the song Rabbit on a Log and Red Rocking Chair
Cathy Fink - Time Draws Near
Cathy Fink is from Maryland, but began her career in the early 70s, busking and playing folk music in Canadian coffeehouses
She’s known for playing as a duo with her wife, Marcy Marxer, who she met in Toronto in 1980
Together, they have released about 35 albums and received 14 Grammy nominations and 2 Grammy awards
This is a traditional song that was found in the Ozarks and the Appalachian region after the American Civil War
Most of the lyrics used today come from Carl Sandburg’s 1927 book The American Songbag, and many versions seem to be influenced by Tommy Jarrell’s 1978 recording
Star Thistle - Starting Over
A project from the mind of Winnipeg artist Uncle Sinner
Off his debut album The Best of Star Thistle, from 2021
Larry Estridge - Spirits of the Revolution
He was a writer, musician, painter, and sculptor from New York who was a protest organiser at Harvard in the 1960s and a political activist for his entire life
This one is from 1973
Pete Seeger - How About You?
Seeger was a folk singer and an activist who advocated for Civil Rights, environmental causes, and peace through his music
This one was written by the miner and folksinger Jim Garland of Kentucky in 1932
He wrote this song because after 6 months of work in the mines he still wasn’t able to afford to buy his wife a pair of slippers
He and the other miners went on strike but they received an injunction stating that they would likely have to face the Federal Courts
So this song describes his feelings on the matter
El Teatro Campesino - El Picket Sign
The Farm Workers' Theater was a satirical theatre company formed by the strikers of the Delano grape strike, which protested the exploitation of farm workers between 1965 and 1970
Old Man Luedecke - Long Suffering Jesus
From Chester, NS
Off his 2012 album Tender is the Night
June Lazare - Westfield Disaster
This is from a 1981 album of New York City folksongs from the mid 19th century
It’s a song by A. W. Harmon about a steamboat accident that occurred in July of 1871
The boat was still in the harbour when the fireman heard a hissing sound below deck, and went to investigate
Before he could get to the boiler, it exploded and tore a huge hole in the hull, throwing people into the air and water
Assistance was readily available since they were still in harbour, but 40 people were killed and 200 injured
Despite the tragedy, human nature persisted, and the harbour was soon filled with sightseeing boats for those who were curious about the rescue efforts
Heavenly Gospel Singers - Walk This Lonesome Valley
Gospel quartet originally from Spartanburg, SC, but which largely formed in Detroit in the 1920s
Many popular doowop groups of the 50s were musically descended from prewar groups like the Heavenly Gospel Singers
American traditional gospel folk song first recorded by old-time musician David Miller in 1927
Ella Mae Wilson, Lillie B Williams, Richard Williams - Motherless Children
Off an album of field recordings made in Florida of African American traditional music between 1977 and 1980
Blues standard first recorded by Blind Willie Johnson in 1927
Ferron - Shady Gate
She’s a Canadian musician and poet from the same generation as people like Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, and Bruce Cockburn, though she’s less widely known even within Canada
From her 2009 album Boulder, though she first released the song on a 1992 live album
Taj Mahal, Toumani Diabaté - Catfish Blues
Taj Mahal is a Grammy-award-winning blues musician from New York City whose career has spanned over 50 years
Toumani Diabate is a Malian kora player who performs both the traditional music of Mali and collaborates across genres with musicians from around the globe
This is from their album Kulanjan from 1999
The song is credited to Robert Petway, an American blues musician, based on the fact that he was the first to record it in 1941
Willie Thrasher - Silent Inuit
Inuit musician from Aklavik, NWT
He was born into the traditional Inuit hunting culture, but he was taken from his family and placed into residential school from the age of five until he was 16
After playing in several rock bands in his youth, Thrasher was approached by an elderly man at a show he played in the 70s, who asked him why he wasn’t playing music that reflected his culture
From there, he began to study Inuit music and turned to personal songwriting, joining other artists in Canada like Willie Dunn and Buffy Sainte-Marie, who explored their Indigenous heritage in song and advocated for Indigenous rights
Several of his songs were included on the 2014 compilation album Native North America, which resulted in more publicity for Thrasher, and provided more touring opportunities for him
This song is from his 1981 album Spirit Child, which was reissued in 2015
Tomoya Takaishi - The Red Jacket of Memories
He’s a Japanese folk singer who’s been active since the 1960s
While studying at Rikkyo University, he started singing folk songs that he translated from Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger recordings to earn money for school expenses
The lyrics for that song are by Heisaburo Kikuchi, with music by Masahiko Misawa
Clarence Edwards, Cornelius Edwards, Butch Cage - Stack O’ Dollars
Cage was a fife, guitar, and fiddle player originally from Mississippi, though he moved to Louisiana in the 1920s as a result of the Great Mississippi River Flood of 1927
Clarence and Cornelius Edwards were brothers and blues musicians from Louisiana who first began playing in bands together in the 1950s
Clarence became more widely known in the 1980s, when he performed at blues festivals throughout the country
This one was recorded at the home of Butch Cage in Zachary, Louisiana by the musicologist Harry Oster in either the late 50s or early 60s
Hubby Jenkins - Corrina
American multi-instrumentalist from New York City
He was a member of the now-defunct Carolina Chocolate Drops, a contemporary stringband
This is a country blues song first recorded by Bo Carter in 1928
Sam Amidon - Reuben
Contemporary folk artist from Vermont
Off his 2021 self-titled album
This song is interesting because he calls it Reuben, and uses the melody of the railroad song Reuben, but the lyrics are entirely from Georgia Buck, an old-time southern banjo breakdown
Snooks Eaglin - Going Back to New Orleans
Eaglin an American musician who played a wide range of styles and claimed to know about 2500 songs
Recorded in 1958 in New Orleans, LA by Harry Oster & Richard Allen
Joseph Spence - Down by the Riverside
Joseph Spence was a Bahamian musician known for vocalising and humming while playing guitar, and he influenced artists like Taj Mahal, The Grateful Dead, and John Renbourn, who recorded versions of his gospel arrangements
This track was included on the recently released Smithsonian Folkways album Encore: Unheard Recordings of Bahamian Guitar and Singing
American spiritual that dates to before the American Civil War
Has often been used as an anti-war song
George Herod - I Shall Not Be Moved
This is from a 1956 album of field recordings of older musicians from the southern United States made by Frederic Ramsey, Jr.
Herod was about 64 years old when this album was made, and he was the retired leader of the Lapsey Brass Band
This recording was made in Alabama in May of 1954
This is a spiritual that became popular as a protest song and a union song during the Civil Rights Movement
Molly Galbraith - Barbara Allen
From an album of Saskatchewan folk songs collected by Barbara Cass-Beggs and released in 1963
Old Scottish ballad that has been collected all over North America and the British Isles
Galbraith was an Irish woman who came to the community of Forget, Saskatchewan in 1924
Rick & Lorraine Lee - As I Walked Out
Were a Massachusetts-based married duo who recorded a diverse album of folk songs in 1975
Rick a banjoist and pianist, Lorraine a skilled dulcimer player
They divorced in 1989 but both continued to play music
Rick died in 2014, and Lorraine is still playing, now in a duo with her second husband
This is a traditional American song
David Francey - Saints and Sinners
Scottish-born Canadian folksinger who started to pursue music as a career at the age of 45 after working as a carpenter and in railyards for 20 years
From his 1999 album Torn Screen Door
Brownie McGhee, Sticks McGhee - Precious Lord
Brownie was a folk and Piedmont blues musician from Tennessee, best known for his collaborative work with Sonny Terry
Sticks was his brother, and he earned his nickname as a child, as he used a stick to push his brother around in a wagon after he contracted polio
American gospel song, the words of which were written by Reverend Thomas A Dorsey in 1932 after the loss of his wife and infant son during childbirth
Alphabetical Four - Precious Lord, Hold My Hand
NYC Jubilee gospel quartet that recorded between 1938 and 1943
They were known for imitating instruments with their voices, which we hear on this recording from 1938
Harrison Kennedy - Judgment Day
Harrison Kennedy a Hamilton artist with a career in blues and roots music spanning over 50 years
From his 2014 album This is From Here
Neil O’Brien - All ‘Round My Hat
A Nova Scotia singer recorded by Helen Creighton for her album Maritime Folk Songs from the Collection of Helen Creighton
She notes that “It took over fifteen years to find enough singers to put their bits and pieces together and make a complete song”
Creighton recorded 4 other versions of the song throughout Nova Scotia during her travels
It’s an English song from the early 19th century
Memphis Jug Band - KC Moan
American pre-war style jug band active from the 20s to the late 50s
This appears to be their own song, and KC refers to the Kansas City Railroad Company
Lightnin’ Hopkins - Honey Babe
Was a country blues musician from Texas who gained a broader audience with the folk revival of the 1960s after recording and performing around Texas in the 40s and 50s
His debut performance was at Carnegie Hall in October of 1960, and he shared the bill with Pete Seeger and Joan Baez
He continued to tour and record throughout the 60s and 70s, and was Houston, Texas’s poet in residence for 35 years
From 1958
Lonesome Ace Stringband - Don’t Get Trouble in Mind
Contemporary stringband based in Toronto
This is an American old-time tune of uncertain origin
Alan Mills & Jean Carignan - Reel du Pecheur
Carignan was from Levis, Quebec, and Mills was from Lachine, Quebec
Both were made members of the Order of Canada in 1974, Carignan for being “the greatest fiddler in North America” and Mills for his contributions to Canadian folklore
This is from their 1961 album
Daniel Koulack & Karrnnel - The Paddle and the Hat
Pharis & Jason Romero - Five Miles from Town
Helen Bonchek Schneyer - I Know Moonlight
