Barking Dog: February 1, 2024
Langston Hughes - Simple Prays a Prayer
He was a poet and author, and perhaps one of the best-known figures from the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s
This is from the 1952 album Sterling Brown and Langston Hughes
It’s an excerpt from his 1950 book Simple Speaks His Mind, which was originally serialised in the Chicago Defender beginning in 1943
Simple is Hughes’ urban folk hero, whom he described as an “ordinary man on the street… who may not always know, but who often lives, those lines from the blues: When you see me laughing, I’m laughing to keep from crying”
Today is Hughes’ 123rd birthday
Jason Isbell & Amanda Shires - If I Needed You
Isbell is a Grammy-award-winning musician from Alabama, known as both a solo musician and as a former member of the Drive-By Truckers
It’s his 45th birthday today
Shires is a musician from Texas who’s a member of the supergroup The Highwomen
This is from the 2017 compilation album Gentle Giants: The Songs of Don Williams
David Rovics - Here At the End of the World
He’s a musician and writer based in Oregon who’s been touring internationally since the 1990s
This is off his 2004 album Songs for Mahmud
Heidecker & Wood - Cross Country Skiing
Tim Heidecker is a comedian and musician from Pennsylvania known particularly as part of the comedy duo Tim & Eric
Davin Wood composed the music for Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!
This is from the first of two albums they recorded together, Starting from Nowhere, from 2011
John Angaiak - I’ll Rock You to the Rhythm of the Ocean
A Yup’ik singer-songwriter born in Nightmute, Alaska in 1941
After serving in Vietnam in the US Armed Forces, he enrolled in the University of Alaska and became active in the school’s indigenous language workshop
This song comes from an album inspired by his work preserving his native language, with the first side entirely in the previously exclusively oral Yup’ik language, and the second in English
It was also included on the 2014 compilation album Native North America
Jesse Matas - Peace River Song
From Manitoba
This is from his 2018 album Tamarock
Laura Veirs - Orphan Mae
She's an American musician based in Oregon who's been playing since the late 1990s
This is from her 2001 album The Triumphs and Travails of Orphan Mae
Dock Boggs - Drunkard’s Lone Child
Influential old-time musician from Norton, Virginia who recorded in 1927 and 1929 but worked as a coal miner much of his life
That one’s from the 1964 album Dock Boggs: Legendary Singer and Banjo Player
Boggs learned it from his friend and brother-in-law Lee Hunsucker in the 1930s
Clarence Ashley - Little Sadie
Clarence Ashley a musician from Tennessee originally known for his performances at medicine shows in the 1920s
He retired from medicine shows in 1943, and interest in his music was revived in the 50s through his inclusion on the very influential Anthology of American Folk Music, released in 1952
Ashley was nowhere to be seen, however, until the folksinger Ralph Rinzler met him by chance in 1960 at a fiddler’s convention
Rinzler set up a recording session in Ashley’s home, and over the next few years, he played at many folk festivals across the country
A 20th century American folk ballad also known as “Bad Lee Brown” and “Penitentiary Blues”
This is the first recording of the song, released in March of 1930
Poor Bill - A Hundred Women
“Poor Bill” was possibly a pseudonym for the musician and actor Josh White’s brother, William White
Recorded in New York City in 1939
Kronos Quartet, Lee Knight - Garbage
Knight is a musician from New York
Kronos Quartet is a string quartet from San Francisco that formed over 50 years ago
The quartet has performed music from many different genres and with many different artists, including Allen Ginsberg, Paul McCartney, and Björk
This is from their 2020 album Long Time Passing: Kronos Quartet and Friends Celebrate Pete Seeger
The song is by California songwriter Bill Steele, who said of it: “Most topical songs quickly become outdated; it’s unfortunate that this one hasn’t”
Pete Seeger - Quiz Show
Seeger was a folk singer and activist from New York who advocated for Civil Rights, environmental causes, and other important issues through his music
This is a live recording from a concert Seeger gave at Bowdoin College in Maine in 1960
As we hear him say, the song is by Georgia songwriter Ernie Marrs, who once claimed to have written more than 15,000 songs
The song refers to Charles Van Doren, a writer who became reigning champion of the TV quiz show Twenty One in 1956, which made him a celebrity
In 1959, he confessed under oath to Congress that the questions and answers had been provided to him beforehand
Marrs used the scandal as a metaphor for the House Un-American Activities Committee, and he took the melody from the folk song “Sweet Betsy from Pike”
Kaia Kater - Maggie May
Based in Toronto
Traditional Liverpool folk song that was also widely circulated by skiffle bands in the 1960s
Jim Henson, Raymond Scott - Limbo: The Organized Mind
Henson was an artist known particularly for creating the Muppets
Scott was a composer from New York who got his start as a pianist for the CBS Radio house band, and later established Manhattan Research Incorporated, an organisation that he described as “More than a think factory—a dream centre where the excitement of tomorrow is made available today”
Manhattan Research released a series of three albums designed to soothe babies, created audio for commercials, and developed devices like doorbells, vending machine, and ashtrays that had their own electronic music scores
In the late 1960s, Scott began collaborating on experimental films with Jim Henson
We heard the audio from the 1966 film of the same name
Jean Carignan - Carpenters’ Reel
Born in Levis, Quebec
Made a member of the Order of Canada in 1974 for being “the greatest fiddler in North America”
Marcel Roy provides piano accompaniment on this one
It’s a French Canadian tune
Steve Gunn, Bridget St. John - Rabbit Hills
St. John is an English musician who’s been playing professionally for over 50 years
Gunn is a musician based in Brooklyn who previously played guitar in Kurt Vile’s band
This is from the 2023 album Light in the Attic & Friends, a compilation of a decade’s worth of recordings from Light in the Attic’s Covers series
The song is by British musician Michael Chapman
Stan Rogers - Bluenose
Born and raised in Ontario, but known for his maritime-influenced music that was informed by his time spent visiting family in Nova Scotia during his childhood
This is one of his better-known songs
He wrote the song for the 1977 short film Bluenose in the Sun, and it was apparently his least favourite of his maritime-themed songs
It’s off the live album Home in Halifax, recorded in March of 1982 and released in 1993
Vashti Bunyan - Trawlerman’s Song
She’s an English musician who began playing in the 1960s but quit in 1970 after her debut album sold few copies
The album slowly built a cult following, however, and Bunyan began playing and recording again in the early 2000s
She’s since released 2 more albums, the last in 2014
This one is from that first album, though, which is called Just Another Diamond Day
She co-wrote the song with her then-partner Robert Lewis
Shannon Quartet - The Sidewalks of New York
They were a barbershop quartet that formed in 1917
Recorded for Victor Records in Camden, NJ in 1924
This song began as a pop song written in 1894 by vaudeville actor Charles B Lawlor, with words by James W Blake
It’s an idealised, nostalgic song about childhood and lost places, and it became popular right after it was published
Unfortunately the two composers sold its copyright for $5000, and both died penniless a few decades later
It’s also known as “East Side, West Side,” and as we’ll hear, it’s been recorded by many different artists in a wide range of styles
Unspecified - Sidewalks of New York
From a 1961 album called Music of the Carousel, played on the calliope
Sid Hemphill - The Sidewalks of New York
He’s known as a fife and drum bandleader, and he was described as the “musical patriarch of the Mississippi Hill Country” and "the best musician in the world”
The roots of Black fife and drum music have been traced back to the American Revolutionary War, when the bands accompanied local militias, though by 1959, they played exclusively for entertainment at local events
He recorded the song in Dundee, Mississippi in 1942
Old Man Luedecke - Kingdom Come
From Chester, NS
Off his 2012 album Tender is the Night
Missouri-Pacific Diamond Jubilee Quartette - Study War No More
They were a quartet presumably formed by employees of the Missouri Pacific Railroad, and they recorded for OKeh Records in St. Louis in 1927
Reverend PJ Minefield provides the mini-sermon in the middle of that recording
This is an American spiritual that dates to before the American Civil War
It’s often been used as an anti-war song
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 2021 Smithsonian Folkways album Encore: Unheard Recordings of Bahamian Guitar and Singing
Ian & Sylvia - Un Canadien Errant
Ian & Sylvia were a married duo who performed together from 1959 until their divorce in 1975, and each continued their music careers after their divorce
They’re known for performing a number of songs including “Someday Soon,” “Early Morning Rain,” and “Four Strong Winds”
Song written in 1842 by Antoine Gérin-Lajoie after the Lower Canada Rebellion of 1837
Ian & Sylvia included it on their 1962 self-titled debut album
Uncle Sinner - Jack Ain’t Had No Water
From Winnipeg
Off his 2014 album A Pocketful of Glass Eyes
He learned it from Jack Owens’ recording
The Men of No Property - Wishing the Brits Would Go Home
This is from the 1977 Folkways album Ireland: The Final Struggle
The Men of No Property were Belfast-born college students who took part in protests and marches in Northern Ireland in 1969 during the Northern Ireland civil rights campaign
Bob Dylan - I Shall Be Free
This is an outtake from December of 1962 recorded during the sessions for his 1963 album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan
It’s a reworking of “We Shall Be Free,” recorded by Lead Belly, Woody Guthrie, Cisco Houston, and Sonny Terry, which we’ll hear after this
Lead Belly, Woody Guthrie, Cisco Houston, Sonny Terry - We Shall Be Free
This is a “talking blues” song recorded in 1944 for Asch Records, which later became Folkways Records, and some of its lyrics come from the very first talking blues song, recorded by Chris Bouchillon in 1926
The chorus that Lead Belly sings comes from the “Mourner, You Shall Be Free” song family, a very broad group of songs that all use the same chorus
William S Burroughs - No More Stalins No More Hitlers
Burroughs was a writer and artist known as a member of the Beat Generation
That’s from his 1990 album Dead City Radio, a collection of readings set to music
GB Grayson, Henry Whitter - Tom Dooley
Whitter was an early recording artist born in 1892 in Virginia
He played a number of instruments, though was largely known for his harmonica and guitar playing
Grayson was a fiddler born in 1887 who was mostly blind from infancy
He wrote much of his own material but was also an important adaptor of traditional ballads
The duo met in 1927, just three years before Grayson’s death
Their music remains some of the most emulated old-time music
This is the first recording of “Tom Dooley,” from 1929—it’s not uncommon to find that Grayson and Whitter were the first to record a traditional tune
It’s a North Carolina folk song about the 1866 murder of Laura Foster by the confederate soldier Tom Dula
A local poet named Thomas Land wrote a poem about the events soon after they took place
Henry Morrison - Lazarus
From an album of Alan Lomax recordings from the southern states from between 1959 and 1960
This is an African American prison ballad about a man who breaks into the commissary then flees
Angelo Dornan - When I Wake in the Morning
Folksinger from New Brunswick who lived most of his life in Alberta
Retired to his birthplace in his 60s, where researcher Helen Creighton collected about 135 traditional songs from him in the 1950s for use in her book of New Brunswick music
He could only remember two verses of this song when Creighton collected it
Richard Lerman - Promenade Version
This is from the 1982 Folkways album Travelon Gamelon: Music for Bicycles by American audio artist and composer Richard Lerman
This is the sound of amplified bikes moving together to create music, recorded in July of 1979 at the opening of the Boston Museum of Transportation
Olle Skold - Manual for Interdimensional Travel
Kenneth Faulkner, Edmund Henneberry - Rafferty’s Calls and Reels
