Barking Dog: September 25, 2025
This Week’s Theme: Songs of Love
Folk and roots songs take on a wide range of subjects, from murder to nuclear power to trains and even meat balls, but one common theme in all music, and one we’ve never covered before in a themed show, is that of love. So here are some songs about love from around the world and from here at home.
Rosalie Sorrels - I Think Of You
She was a folksinger and collector of folk songs from Idaho who began traveling around America in the 1960s, establishing herself as a performer and making connections with other musicians, writers, and artists
The song is by Sorrels’ friend Utah Phillips
This is from the 2004 Grammy-nominated album My Last Go Around, her last album, which Sorrels recorded live at Harvard University in 2002 with some of her friends, including Jean Ritchie, Peggy Seeger, and Patrick Sky
Stan Rogers - 45 Years
He was a musician from Hamilton, Ontario, whose music was largely inspired by Maritime folk music and the lives of working-class Canadians
This song is off the live album Home in Halifax, recorded in March of 1982 and released in 1993
Lisa Null - Will You Love Me in the Morning
Null was a folk musician who performed around the Washington, DC area for more than 40 years
This is from her 2015 album Legacies, released by Folk Legacy Records
Her partner, Charlie Baum, wrote the song, and he sings the melody on it
He woke up with the song in his head one morning, saying that it came to him in a dream
Jack Owens - I Love My Baby
Owens was a blues musician from Mississippi
He learned several instruments as a child but his chosen instrument was the guitar
He never really aimed to become a professional recording artist, and instead farmed and ran a juke joint for much of his life before being recorded during the folk and blues revival of the 1960s when the musicologist David Evans learned about him from other blues musicians from his region
He toured throughout the US and Europe during the last decades of his life, often with his harmonica-playing friend Bud Spires
This is from their album It Must Have Been the Devil from 1971
Star Thistle - Lost and Found
A project from the mind of Winnipeg artist Uncle Sinner
Off his 2021 debut album The Best of Star Thistle
George “Bongo Joe” Coleman - Crazy with Love
He was a street musician from Florida known for his drum kit, which he made from 55-gallon oil drums and perfected over the years as he performed around Texas
Coleman was well-respected and was often offered performance time at venues that would have paid more than street shows, but he preferred to play on the streets rather than the stage
This is from the only album he recorded, George Coleman: Bongo Joe from 1968, produced by Chris Strachwitz of Arhoolie Records
David Nzomo - Kana Ngwenda (A Girl I Love)
He’s a musician from Kenya who recorded six albums of traditional Kenyan songs for Folkways records while he was studying at Columbia University in the 1960s and 70s
This is from his 1965 album Songs from Kenya, all of which were composed by Nzomo in the late 50s
This one is about a man proposing to the woman he loves so they can spend their lives together singing
Arthur Russell - Close My Eyes
He was a cellist, singer, composer, and producer from Iowa who was part of the New York avant garde scene in the 1970s
He died from AIDS in 1992 at the age of 40 when his work was still somewhat obscure, but rereleases, books, and a documentary about him brought more attention to his work throughout the 2000s, and more of his recordings have been released over time
This is from the posthumous compilation album Love Is Overtaking Me, released in 2004
Charlie Panigoniak - Meepay
He was an Inuk songwriter and musician from Nunavut who began recording in the 1970s
This is a recording from 1975, made by the CBC Northern Service, and it’s a love song to his wife
Tracy Chapman - For My Lover
This is from a 1986 issue of Fast Folk Musical Magazine that focuses on the Boston folk scene
Fast Folk was a cooperative that was dedicated to reinvigorating the New York folk scene, and released over 100 magazine-albums between 1982 and 1997
Chapman is a well-known musician from Ohio who’s been writing music since she was around 8 years old
This song was also included on her 1988 self-titled debut album
Yusuf / Cat Stevens - How Can I Tell You
This is a demo from his 1971 album Teaser and the Firecat
Algia Mae Hinton - Snap Your Fingers
She was a Piedmont blues musician from North Carolina who learned to play the guitar from her mother, an expert in the Piedmont fingerpicking style who often played at local parties and gatherings
Hinton met the folklorist Glenn Hinson in 1978, who arranged for her to perform at the North Carolina Folklife Festival
She gave several concerts outside of North Carolina after that, even travelling to Europe to perform in 1998
This is off the 1999 album Honey Babe
Naselesele village group - Au Bau Via Talanoa (I want to tell a story)
From a 2014 album of string band field recordings from Fiji that were made in 1986
This is an old song about love and marriage from Vanua Levu island
This recording was made on a veranda in Naselesele village
Ed Young, Emma Ramsay - Chevrolet
This is off a 2006 Smithsonian-Folkways compilation album of recordings from the 14 concerts that the Friends of Old Time Music organization presented in New York City between 1961 and 1965, which brought many well-known traditional musicians to the city for the first time
This recording was made in April of 1965
Young was Mississippi fife player and a member of the Southern Fife and Drum Corps, which he started with his two brothers
Ramsay was a member of the Georgia Sea Island Singers, a folk music ensemble that’s been around since the early 1900s
Young and his brother Lonnie originally recorded the song in 1959, and at the Friends of Old Time Music concert, performed it as a dialogue with Ramsay
The song was originally recorded as “Can I Do It for You?” by Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe in 1930
Malvina Reynolds - Love Is Something (The Magic Penny)
She was a folksinger from California known particularly for writing the song “Little Boxes,” though she wrote and recorded a large catalogue of music during her career
This one is from her 1967 album Malvina Reynolds Sings the Truth
Snooks Eaglin - I Got a Woman
Eaglin an American musician who played a wide range of styles and claimed to know about 2500 songs
This recording was made by Harry Oster in New Orleans in 1961
The song was co-written and first recorded by Ray Charles in 1954, and Eaglin sometimes even called himself “Little Ray Charles” at the start of his career because of his similar vocal style
Old Man Luedecke - Yodelady
From Chester, NS
This is from his 2015 album Domestic Eccentric, which he recorded inside a cabin he built in his backyard
Joseph Spence - The Glory of Love
Joseph Spence was a Bahamian musician known for vocalising and humming while playing guitar
This track was included on the 2021 Smithsonian Folkways album Encore: Unheard Recordings of Bahamian Guitar and Singing
It’s a widely recorded song composed by pop songwriter Billy Hill
Low - …I Love
They were a band from Duluth, Minnesota
This is from their 2016 collection of B-sides and demos called A Lifetime of Temporary Relief
It’s a song by country musician Tom T Hall
Verdell Primeaux - Dreamz
He’s an Indigenous musician based in Arizona, and he’s known as half of the duo Primeaux and Mike, along with Johnny Mike
This is from his 2009 album Lost and Lonely
Beck - True Love Will Find You in the End
Contemporary American musician who got his start as a teenager performing folk music on city buses in Los Angeles
This is his cover of one of Daniel Johnston’s best-known songs, from 1984
Dillard Chandler - Gathering Flowers
He was an Appalachian folksinger from North Carolina who knew hundreds of traditional ballads from his region
He was described by other locals as a “mysterious man" who "didn't live in one specific place, but would just show up from time to time”
This recording was made in 1965
It’s a snippet of a murder ballad that’s been recorded under the name “Gathering Flowers from the Hillside” by groups including the Carter Family and the Delmore Brothers
Sam Amidon - Saro
Contemporary folk artist from Vermont
From his 2008 album All Is Well
This is one of several folk songs that died out in England but was rediscovered in the Appalachian region in the early 20th century, preserved through the strong oral tradition of that area
Bruce Cockburn - Love Song
Singer-songwriter and guitarist from Ottawa who’s been playing professionally for over 40 years
From his 1970 album High Winds White Sky
Norman Rosten - Futurama Love Song
He was a poet, playwright, and novelist from New York City
This is from the 1963 Folkways album The Poems of Norman Rosten
Pharis & Jason Romero - You Are the Best Thing
Married duo from Horsefly, BC
From their 2018 album Sweet Old Religion
Darryl Holter - Love and the Shorter Work Week
Holter is a musician and historian from Minneapolis
This is from his 1989 album Stickin’ with the Union: Songs from Wisconsin Labor History, which he recorded with Wisconsin’s Labour Poet Laureate Larry Penn
This song is based on another song Holter heard at a rally for unemployed workers in 1970
It’s about the difficulties of young workers who would like to be able to spend time with their loved ones, but find it impossible because they’re working different shifts and alternate weekends
In the song, Holter suggests the solution of reducing the work week to 30 hours
David “Honeyboy” Edwards - You’re the One for Me
He was a Delta blues musician from Mississippi who began his career as a travelling bluesman at the age of 14 with Big Joe Williams
He played with other Delta blues musicians like Charley Patton and Tommy Johnson, and became close friends with Robert Johnson—his account of Johnson’s death has since become the definitive version of events
This is off his 1979 album Mississippi Delta Bluesman
It’s his own song
McKinley Peebles - Give Me a Heart to Love
A street preacher and blues singer also known as “Sweet Papa Stovepipe”
He was originally from the Virginia‐North Carolina border but moved to New York City in the 30s or 40s
This is from a 2003 album of home recordings made in 1953 by a young John Cohen, later of the New Lost City Ramblers, at the home of Reverend Gary Davis, Peebles’ friend and associate
This is either his own composition, or it was a popular gospel song in Harlem at the time
Sarah Wood - Hard for to Love
She’s an old-time banjo player and traditional ballad singer from Kentucky
This song is off her 2017 album 25 Tunes for Old Time Banjo and Singing, Vol. 1
She seems to have gotten this song from Hayes Shepherd, also known as the Appalachia Vagabond, who recorded it in 1930 for Vocalion records
The Wailin’ Jennys - Keep Me in Your Heart
Folk group formed in Winnipeg in 2002
From their album Fifteen from 2017
The song is by Warren Zevon
David Francey - Come Rain or Come Shine
Scottish-born Canadian folksinger who began a career in music at the age of 45 after working as a carpenter and in railyards for 20 years
From his 2003 album Skating Rink
Stanley Triggs - Brown Eyes
He’s a folksinger, photographer, and anthropologist from BC
“Brown Eyes” is a popular song likely of Irish origin
This is a rural version that Triggs learned in Salmo, BC
It was common there and in other parts of the Kootenays
Joni Mitchell - Ten Thousand Miles
Recorded at her parents’ house in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan in 1965
Her version of the 18th century folk ballad also known as “The Turtle Dove” or “Fare Thee Well”
The earliest published version of the song appeared in England in 1710
Joe Thompson, Tommy Thompson - Love Somebody (Soldier’s Joy)
Joe Thompson was an acclaimed African American fiddle player from North Carolina, while Tommy Thompson was a white North Carolina banjo player known as a member of the Red Clay Ramblers
This song is described as “one of Joe and Tommy’s early attempts to reach across their traditions and play a familiar tune together”
