Barking Dog: June 16, 2022
Victor Jara - Una Palabra Solamente
He was a Chilean musician, poet, teacher, theatre director, and activist who was tortured and killed in 1973 during the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet
His work is widely remembered and celebrated throughout the world for its focus on peace, love, and social justice
The title of this song translates to “Only One Word,” and seems to impart a message of solidarity specifically to Cubans
Kacy & Clayton - Henry Lee
From Wood Mountain, SK
Dick Justice’s recording of this song was included on Harry Smith’s very influential 1952 Anthology of American Folk Music as the opening track
This ballad has its origin in Scotland, where it’s known as Young Hunting
Lattie Murrell - Rollin’ and Tumblin’
A Tennessee musician nicknamed “The Wolf” because of all the Howlin’ Wolf songs he played
A version of Roll and Tumble Blues, first recorded by Hambone Willie Newbern in 1929
Walter Ferguson - Carnival
He is a Costa Rican calypso singer born in 1919 who has spent almost his whole life in Cahuita, a small fishing village
He started recording his music on tapes in the 1970s after one of his sons gave him a tape recorder, and he sold his music to travellers from around the world
Ferguson did this until the 1990s, when he retired from music
In 2018, to recover some of his lost music—since each tape was unique and he never wrote down his lyrics—one of his sons put out a call for help to find more of his tapes in preparation for his 100th birthday, which resulted in a worldwide effort and several volumes of newly discovered music
Dewey Corley & Walter Miller - Just a Dream I Got on My Mind
Recorded in Memphis, Tennessee in the summer of 1967 by the field researcher and festival curator George Mitchell
“Just a Dream” is a Big Bill Broonzy song first released in 1939
Harrison Kennedy - Everybody Ought to Treat a Stranger Right
Juno-award-winning roots artist, active since the 1960s
That one is from his 2017 album Who U Tellin’?, but this specific recording is from Hamilton, Ontario’s 2021 Winterfest
It’s a Blind Willie Johnson song originally recorded in 1930 by Johnson and his wife, Willie B. Harris
Tony Schwartz - Country Auctioneers
He was an agoraphobic sound archivist who spent much of his life documenting the sounds of his neighbourhood in New York City, though he also collected recordings from around the world by corresponding with international musicians
This one is off his 1954 album Millions of Musicians, which documents the music of everyday life
On this track we hear an auctioneer working at a Vegetable Auction near Peekskill,
N. Y., both at regular speed and slowed down
Shortbuckle Roark & Family - I Truly Understand, You Love Another Man
George "Shortbuckle” Roark was a banjo player and singer from Pineville, Kentucky
He recorded two pieces for Victor and two pieces for Columbia Records in 1928, and also made 32 recordings for Columbia professor Mary Elizabeth Barnicle in 1938
That’s one of his 1928 recordings, which has been included on box sets of the Bristol Sessions recordings, which are considered the “Big Bang” of country music
However, the first Bristol Sessions took place in 1927 and led to commercial success for many of the artists involved, while the 1928 sessions did not manage to draw the same level of attention, and Roark remained largely unknown
That’s the first recording of that song, which is a traditional American folk song
It shares some lyrics with The Storms Are on the Ocean and Long Lonesome Road
We hear his family provide additional vocals on that one
Hedy West - Drowsy Sleeper
She was a folk singer from Georgia, known particularly for writing the song 500 Miles, who was heavily influenced by her upbringing in a creative, politically active family
American folk ballad, likely with origins in Britain
Variants of the song include Katie Dear, Molly Dear, and Silver Dagger
Roscoe Holcomb - Single Girl
Was a construction worker, coal miner, and farmer much of his life
He was an older artist who became popular during the folk revival, though wasn’t known at all before then - though he was born in 1912, he was first discovered by John Cohen of the New Lost City Ramblers playing on his front porch in Daisy, Kentucky in 1958
This is a song popularized by the Carter Family
We’ll hear a more contemporary version after it
Advance Base - Single Girl, Married Girl
The solo project of Chicago musician Owen Ashworth, whose previous project was called Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
His website states that the project is named for the Antarctic meteorological station & “psychedelic death trap” that nearly killed Admiral Richard E. Byrd during the winter of 1934
That one is from his 2012 album, A Shut-In's Prayer
Nick Ammerman, Edward Crouse, and Jody Weinmann join him on that one
Old Man Luedecke - Joy of Cooking
From Chester, NS
Off his 2006 album Hinterland
Essie Mae Brooks - I Got So Much to Talk About
She’s a gospel blues singer from Georgia who began writing her own songs at the age of 9
She is now in her 90s and still avidly writes music and sings with her church
This song is originally off her album Rain In Your Life from 2000, though backing instrumentation was added for the 2018 Music Maker Foundation album Grotto Sessions
BBK Stringband - One Time
Off a 1999 album of 25 years of selected field recordings from a rainforest community in Papua New Guinea
This song is sung in the Tok Pisin language, an English-based creole
Its theme and meaning are relevant only to the song leader, who was a relative visiting from another town
The band wanted to commemorate his visit, so they invited him to record a couple of songs with them
Stan Rogers - Harris and the Mare
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 the summers of his childhood
Rogers recorded it for his 1979 album Between the Breaks Live!
Fiver - Song of the Mournful Millionaire
Stage name of Toronto-based artist Simone Schmidt
This is the first single off their new recording "Soundtrack to A More Radiant Sphere: The Joe Wallace Mixtape"
It was commissioned for the recent documentary "A More Radiant Sphere," which tells the story of Joe Wallace, a Canadian communist, political prisoner and poet who was largely ignored within the country but admired in Eastern Europe and Russia
This song is by Wallace, and it was written in 1950
Schmidt says of the song, “When I read the poem for the first time in 2020, I was struck at how apt a roast it was of today's oligarch space colonists”
Nathan Doucet, Nick Dourado, and John Showman also play on this recording, and you can find it anywhere you get your music
Bud Grant - Trouble in Mind
He was a blues musician from Thomaston, Georgia who field researcher and festival curator George Mitchell recorded in 1969
The title of that song comes from two earlier Black spirituals, but the song itself was written by jazz pianist Richard M Jones in the vaudeville blues style, and first recorded by Thelma La Vizzo in 1924
John Lee Zeigler - Going Away
He was a guitarist from Kathleen, Georgia, who played guitar upside down to accommodate his left-handedness
That one was recorded in 1995 by Tim Duffy, a cofounder of the Music Maker Relief Foundation
Vernon Dalhart - Oh Captain, Captain Tell Me True
He was a popular country musician from Texas who was initially a classical singer who performed in the opera Madame Butterfly and recorded over 400 tracks for Edison Records between 1916 and 1923
In the 20s and 30s, Dalhart used a wide array of pseudonyms to record over 5000 sides for numerous labels, including a recording of the ballad "Wreck of the Old 97" in 1924 which was the first country song to sell a million copies
That particular recording spurred Victor Records to attempt to recreate its success, which resulted in the Bristol Sessions, a series of recordings sessions that are considered the “big bang” for modern country music and resulted in several country music stars
This is a different recording by Dalhart, which he made in 1925
It comes from a traditional British broadside ballad called The Sailor Boy, which has several narrative variations
We’ll hear a couple different variants after this
Rufus Crisp - Fall, Fall, Build Me a Boat
He was a banjo player from the mountains of eastern Kentucky, and that one is from his 1972 self-titled album
It takes its refrain from The Sailor Boy, but turns it into what sounds like a song for a party game
Joan O’Bryant - A Sailor’s Life
We just heard three different variants of the British ballad The Sailor Boy, that last one by Joan O’Bryant, a Kansas folksinger and folklorist who taught folklore and English at the University of Wichita
The album that song is from was recorded in 1958, when O’Bryant was only 26 years old
She learned her version from Mary Jo Davis of Fayetteville, Arkansas, and of the three variants we heard, that one is likely closest to the original broadside ballad
The ballad ends with stanzas that are apparently borrowed from "The Butcher Boy", in which the grief-stricken narrator requests a pen to write a song and gives instructions on how she should be buried
Pura Fé - Pigeon Dance
She’s a musician from New York City and a member of the Tuscarora Indian Nation of North Carolina who co-founded the internationally renowned native women's a cappella trio, Ulali
She now lives in Northern Saskatchewan, where she is raising her grand nieces and nephew
This one is from her 2004 album Follow Your Heart’s Desire
Uncle Sinner - Red Rocking Chair
From Winnipeg
Off his 2008 album Ballads and Mental Breakdowns
Traditional American old-time song known variably as Sugar Baby, Honey Babe Blues, and Red Apple Juice, amongst other names
Mississippi Fred McDowell - Don’t Mistreat Nobody (Cause You Got a Few Dimes)
He was a hill country blues musician originally from Tennessee, though he moved to Mississippi in 1928 and continued to farm there full-time while playing music on the weekends
His music caught the attention of producers and blues fans in the early 1960s due to the recordings Alan Lomax and Shirley Collins made of him while travelling across the southern states to collect field recordings
Within a couple of years of this attention, he became a professional musician and recording artist who played at folk festivals and toured clubs around the world
That one is included on the recent Smithsonian Folkways album The Village Out West: The Lost Tapes of Alan Oakes, which is a collection of field recordings from the 1960s California folk scene
The Golden Gate Quartet - Gabriel Blows His Horn
They are a vocal quartet formed in Virginia by four high school students in 1934
They are still active today, but have obviously undergone several changes in membership
This one is from 1937
It’s the first of three songs we’ll hear about the angel Gabriel and his horn
The McIntosh County Shouters - Blow, Gabriel
This is from an album of Slave Shout Songs, a tradition involving call-and-response singing, percussive dance, and Christian belief, localized largely to the coast of Georgia
That one was recorded in 1983, and in the song, the singer urges the Gabriel to blow his trumpet on the Day of Judgement;
It’s the antecedent of later spirituals on the same theme
The song we heard before that may in fact be one of those later spirituals, even though it was recorded earlier
Rev. Gary Davis - Blow, Gabriel
Born 1896 in Laurens, SC
In the 20s he moved to Durham, NC, which was a centre of Black culture at the time
Taught Blind Boy Fuller, collaborated with a number of Piedmont blues artists
Was ordained a Baptist minister in 1933, and began to prefer gospel music
Was first recorded in 1935 for the American Record Company
Moved to New York in the 40s, career revived in the 1960s with the American folk revival
Played at the Newport Folk Festival and was an important figure in the Greenwich Village scene, teaching artists like Dave Van Ronk, Bob Weir, and Tom Winslow
He recorded his version of the song in 1956, though we heard a later recording that follows an older tradition before that, performed by
The Sterling Jubilee Singers - The Spirit of Phil Murray
They were a group of Black steelworkers from Bessemer, Alabama who wrote and recorded that song in 1952 to honour their union president, Philip Murray, after he died
Joe Glazer includes the original recording of the song on his 1975 album Songs of Steel and Struggle: The Story of the Steelworkers
Herbert Sills - O Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie
All I know is that he was a member of the Regina folk choir in the 1960s when this album was recorded
Another version of The Cowboy’s Lament
The person who collected this song got it from a Saskatchewan cowboy
Blind Boy Fuller - Lost Lover Blues
He was a popular North Carolina Piedmont blues artist known for his masterful guitar playing and expressive singing
That one is from 1940
Paralee McCloud - The Little Ship
We’re going to hear three different versions now of a song often called The Golden Vanity, though this version is called The Little Ship
It’s also known as "The Sweet Trinity" and "The Golden Willow Tree"
Off a 1984 album of traditional music and songs from Northern Georgia
Recorded in 1980
A classic British ballad and sea shanty, the earliest surviving version of which is from around 1635
The ballad is also popular in the Appalachian region of the US
McCloud learned this version from her father, who played the melody of it on an organ in unison with his singing
Joe Kelly - The Golden Vanity
From a 1958 album of field recordings of Ontario folk music, made by the folklorist Edith Fowke
This one sung by Joe Kelly of Downer’s Corners near Peterborough
This version largely follows the older versions, though the last two verses were added on more recently by someone who didn’t like the original ending
It’s possible this version circulated in the Canadian lumbercamps, because those verses were also recorded from someone in Quebec
Pete Seeger - Golden Vanity
We just heard 3 different versions of the Golden Vanity, that last one by Pete Seeger
Seeger was a folk singer and an activist who advocated for Civil Rights, environmental causes, and peace through his music
That version is a live recording from 1975
Fraser Union - Coal Town Road
They’re a BC folk group that formed in 1983
This song is from their 2003 album Hello, Stranger
It’s by Allister MacGillivray, a Nova Scotia musician and music historian, who wrote it about the lives of Cape Breton coal miners
The Wakami Wailers - Joys of Quebec / Devil’s Dream
