Rootsy Music

“Baby the Rain Must Fall” was written for a movie (a Steve McQueen vehicle), by the same name. Interesting fact is that the song ran over the credits with McQueen lip-synching to the vocals of Bill Strange. The “McQueen moving his lips thing” is pretty damn cheesy, or maybe it was fine for its time. I couldn’t resist posting as a bonus below.

[No slight to Bill Strange, who was a a session musician with the famed Wrecking Crew, and was inducted into the Musicians Hall of Fame and Museum in 2007.]

Writing credits for “Baby the Rain Must Fall” go to Elmer Bernstein (music) and Ernie Sheldon (lyrics). Bernstein is known for a list of movie scores longer than you can imagine – “The Magnificent Seven”, “The Great Escape”, “The Ten Commandment” and on and on.

The better known version of “Baby the Rain Must Fall” was recorded by Glen Yarborough after he left the Limeliters to go solo. Not much doubt it was his best known song, despite a long list of work with the folk group. It charted relatively well in early 1965, reaching #2 on the adult contemporary chart and #12 on the Billboard chart.

In his 2006 obit in the New York Times, his voice is referred to as a “silvery, lyric tenor,’ and I’ve heard it called elsewhere “velvet.” It was, in any case, one of the best voices of the folk revival. It may be true that Yarborough could have sung the phone book with success but, with a Bernstein tune to work with, it’s pretty high quality stuff all the way around. A personal favourite.

The path to finding songs can be oddly circuitous. I was doing some research on The Chad Mitchell Trio, specifically the years during which John Denver was a member. I was curious about how the group changed once Denver joined, so listened to what I think is the first album on which he participates, a 1965 offering called “The Way It’s Going to Be.” I was intrigued to see a cut called “Song for Canada.”

The lyrics were obviously political in some sense, but I couldn’t quite figure out the context. A bit more research led me to a Globe and Mail (a Toronto daily) article which appeared in 2000.

The song was written in the mid-1960s, by Ian Tyson (of Ian & Sylvia) and well known Canadian media personality Peter Gzowski. As the Globe piece explains, “after the Quiet Revolution was under way in Quebec …the song has English Canada speaking to French Canada, asking for tolerance and understanding and promising a future together.”

For those unfamiliar with Canadian history, the Quiet Revolution is a name given to a period in 1960s of major social and political changes in the province of Quebec, including the secularization of Quebec society and government, the creation of a welfare state, and political realignment of the politics of the province into federalist and separatist factions, i.e., those who wanted to remain a part of Canada and those who wanted to move towards independence – a question that has not been fully resolved to this day.

With that context, the lyrics make sense, and I continue to learn things about a country I have called home for almost forty years.

How come we can’t talk to each other anymore?
Why can’t you see I’m changing too?
We’ve got by far too long to end it feeling wronged
And I still share too much with you

This is live version by Ian & Sylvia at the Newport Folk Festival, though I am not sure of the year.

For fans of country rock, and I am definitely one, Bustin’ Out, the second album released by Pure Prairie League, is a classic. The odd thing about it is that it was released in 1972 but didn’t get much notice for about three years until country rock and southern rock started to become a thing in the middle of the decade.

The best known song on the LP these days is “Amie,” though originally no one cared, even after it was released as a single in 1973. At some point, however, college radio stations got onto it, major radio station air play followed, and it became something of a classic, always welcome around the campfire.

There is so much to choose from on Bustin’ Out including “Boulder Skies” and “Call Me, Tell Me” with their gorgeous string arrangements, but for some reason “Early Morning Riser” has always been my favourite cut.

For this album, Pure Prairie League was Craig Fuller (bass guitar, electric guitar, vocals), George Ed Powell (electric guitar, vocals) and William Frank Hinds (drums). Also a cast of thousands helped out in the studio, including the aforementioned strings and arranger. Over the 10 album history of the group, and a successful history at that, it’s very difficult to keep track of all the personnel changes, though the quality remained.

Here’s a fun little bit: the band is named after a women’s temperance group in the 1939 Errol Flynn movie Dodge City. 

No disrespect to the Eagles, but they weren’t the only ones doing this kind of music, and doing it well in the 1970s and 1980s.

In 2006, Bruce Springsteen released an album called We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, which consists of 13 songs made popular by folk icon and social activist Pete Seeger (made popular, but not written by Pete, because what is the folk process if not popularizing songs people need to know?).

Perhaps not surprisingly, as an offering by Mr. Springsteen, the album did very well, winning a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Folk Album in 2007, and selling well enough.

In a very positive review at All Music by Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the album is characterized like this:

Not only does We Shall Overcome feel different than Bruce‘s work; it also feels different than Seeger‘s music. Most of Seeger‘s recordings were spare and simple, featuring just him and his banjo; his most elaborately produced records were with the Weavers, whose recordings of the ’50s did feature orchestration, yet that’s a far cry from the big folk band that Springsteen uses here. Bruce‘s combo for the Seeger sessions has a careening, ramshackle feel that’s equal parts early-’60s hootenanny and Bob Dylan and the Band‘s Americana; at times, its ragged human qualities also recall latter-day Tom Waits, although the music here is nowhere near as self-consciously arty as that. Springsteen has truly used Seeger‘s music as inspiration, using it as the starting point to take him someplace that is uniquely his own in sheer musical terms.

Now that Pete is gone, I hope people give this album another listen. The point of folk music is not simply to repeat what others have done but interpret and inspire. This is exactly what Springsteen has done here.

“Lonesome Valley” is a traditional American gospel folk song, first recorded in the 1920s. It has for a long time been pretty standard fare for country artists, including the Carter Family early on, and then the Monroe Brothers and the Statler Brothers, among others. Woody Guthrie also famously took a turn.

One of my favourite versions is by Mississippi John Hurt (1883-1966) because I can’t get enough of that particular variant of fingerstyle guitar, and his vocals are so real. Hurt was of course a bluesman from Avalon, Mississippi, who first recorded in the 1920s, though continuing to work as farmer, and then was”discovered” during the folk revival in early 1960s, adding so much to that experience.

As is well known, Elvis liked his gospel music and recorded “Lonesome Valley” a couple of times. It’s interesting to place him side-by-side with the Hurt version, which I do below by the Million Dollar Quartet (Presley, Perkins, Lewis and Cash).

You’ve got to walk that lonesome valley
Well you gotta go by yourself
Well there ain’t nobody else gonna go there for you
You gotta go there by yourself

I have been enjoying Pokey LaFarge‘s music the past several years, after I discovered him, probably surfing the net late one night. It’s right in the sweet spot for me: old time blues, string band stuff, with a clarinet and a harp thrown in. Just fantastic.

Some highlights from his bio tell us that Mr. LaFarge is “a musician, songwriter, bandleader, entertainer, innovator and preservationist.” He plays a “mix of early jazz, string ragtime, country blues and western swing.” He was born Andrew Heissler in Bloomington, Illinois, in 1983, where he developed an early interest in American literature and history, as well as roots music of the 20th century. After high school he hit the road, often playing on street corners, and meeting others with similar interests which led to the formation of a band and a recording career including ten studio albums since 2006.

This song below, “Garbage Man Blues,” appeared on a 2013 album called Pokey Lafarge – Live. The performance was done at Music City Roots, a live radio program out of Madison, Tennessee. Yes, this is the thing.