Patrick Street - Irish Times

Special Delivery (SPD 1033, 1990)

A much sought-after slice of vinyl from the Irish supergroup, featuring the seemingly ubiquitous Music for a Found Harmonium (if you've not heard it as background music on a range of TV shows in the past year or two, then you mustn't watch much telly!).  The music is great, and brilliantly performed - as you'd only expect from these luminaries: Andy Irvine on vocals, harmonica, mandolin and bouzouki; Kevin Burke on fiddle; Gerry o'Beirne on vocals and guitars;James Kelly on fiddle; Declan Masterson on uilleann pipes, low whistle and keyboards; Jackie Daly on accordion; Arty McGlynn on guitar; and Bill Whelan on keyboards.  Sheer class - and it sounds just wonderful on vinyl.

Track Listing

• Music for a Found Harmonium
• Brackagh Hill
• Brian o'Lynn - The Woods of Old Limerick
• Strokestown
• The Newmarket Polkas
• A forgotten Hero
• Doorus Mill/The Rolling Reel/The Ballygow Reel/Dennis Murphy's Reel
• In the Land of the Patagarange
• Boston o'Connor/John Gaffney's Fling/The Kerryman's Fling
• The Humours of the King of Ballyhooley

Micheal o'Suilleabhain - Oilean/Island

Virgin (VE 40, 1989)

A very unusual album, this - featuring as it does an adventurous mix of Ireland's finest traditional musicians in several original pieces of contemporary orchestral music (plus one trad/arr) by pianist and composer o'Suilleabhain, who is now Professor of Music at the University of Limerick.  This is no lame new-age crossover music, but sparky, rhythmic stuff which makes richly imaginative use of all the musical palettes at the composer's disposal.  At times it's reminiscent of Chick Corea, at others, it's like Bill Whelan's best work with Davy Spillane and in Riverdance.  The core piece on side 2 is "Oilean/Island" a suite in 3 movements.  Musicians on the album include: Matt Molloy on flute; Colm Murphy on bodhran; Mel Mercier on bones; Tony McMahon on accordion; andThe Irish Chamber Orchestra.

Track Listing

• Heartwork
• Ah, Sweet Dancer
• Idir Eatarthu/Between Worlds
• Carolan's Farewell to Music
• Oilean/Island [suite]
• 1st Movement
• 2nd Movement
• 3rd Movement
• Ah, Sweet Dancer

High Level Ranters - Northumberland For Ever

Topic (12T186, 1968)

Tyneside's High Level Ranters were among the most innovative bands on the 1960s traditional folk scene: one of the first groups to give equal weight to songs and instrumental dance tunes.  The line-up on this album is like a who's who of North Eastern folk music at the time: Johnny Handle on vocals, accordion, guitar and piano; Colin Ross on fiddle, whistle, Northumbrian pipes and jews harp; Foster Charlton on fiddle and Northumbrian pipes; Tom Gilfellon on vocals and guitar; and Alistair Anderson on English concertina.  Recorded by Bill Leader and with sleeve notes from no less than A L Lloyd, this is an absolutely classic album which will be of interest to all folk fans, whether or not they're familiar with the Northumbrian and Tyneside traditions.

Track Listing

• Shew's the Way to Wallington/The Peacock Followed the Hen
• The Sandgate Girl's Lament/Elsie Marley
• Bellingham Boat/Lambskinnet
• Adam Buckham
• Meggy's Foot
• The Lads of North Tyne/The Redesdale Hornpipe
• The Hexhamshire Lass
• The Breakdown/Blanchland Races
• The Lads of Alnwick/Lamshaw's Fancy
• Byker Hill
• Whinham's Reel/Nancy
• Because he was a Bonny Lad/Salmon Tails up the Water/Sweet Hesleyside
• Dance to Your Daddy
• Billy Boy
• Nae Guid luck aboot the Hoose
• Mi' Laddie Sits Ower Late Up
• The Keel Row/Kafoozalum/The Washing Day

Peggy Seeger & Ewan MacColl - The Long Harvest, Volume 6

Argo (DA 71, Record Six, 1967)

This rare LP is volume 6 of Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger's ambitious 1960s project to document over 10 albums some of the most significant of traditional ballads in their English, Scots and North American variants.  Tracking the way that songs developed as they travelled across national boundaries and to new continents highlights the fascinating evolution of musical traditions.  MacColl (a Mancunian of Scottish family) and Seeger (an American married to the Scots-Mancunian) were perfectly placed to understand these variants and to perform them in appropriate styles.  The sleeve notes and accompanying booklet are detailed and scholarly, documenting ballad versions in the Child canon as well as to oral sources.

The album contains a superbly researched 12-page booklet detailing each song's history, its international variations, and its lyrics.  A rare and historical document of importance both to understanding traditions and the folk revivalists who helped keep them alive.

Track Listing

• Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight (Child 4)
• May Colvin (Scots)
• Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight (American)
• The Outlandish Knight (English)
• Billy Came Over the Main White Ocean (American)
• The Willow Tree (American)
• Old Woman of Slapsadam and Johnny Sands
• The Wife of Kelso (Scots)
• Rich Old Lady (American)
• Johnny Sands (English)
• The Douglas Tragedy (Earl Brand) (Child 7)
• The Brave Earl Brand and the King of England's Daughter (English)
• The Douglas Tragedy (Scots)
• Earl Brand (American)
• The Lady and the Dragon (American)
• The Maid Freed from the Gallows (Child 96)
• The Prickle Holly Bush (English)
• Hangman (American)

Bob Fox and Stu Luckley, Nowt So Good'll Pass

(Rubber Records, RUB 028, 1978)

This is the first of two rare Fox and Luckley LPs which Colin Irwin rated as "classic".  It's hardly surprising - this album launched a thousand folk club standards.  The songs and arrangements were oft imitated; rarely if ever surpassed.  

Bob Fox's voice is one of the wonders of northern folk music - rich, melodic and powerful.  In any other context, it steals the show, but this is an album of complete arrangements, with voices and instruments interwoven with great musical intelligence.  Stu Luckley's acoustic bass absolutely drives the music and stands out as some of the funkiest playing ever to have derived from the folk scene.  His vocals are also a perfect foil for Fox's.  Bob Fox's own guitar, piano and dulcimer work is also faultless - both intricate and rhythmic.  

The material ranges from Tyneside favourites such as The Bonny Gateshead Lass and Sally Wheatley through to the wider folk tradition in songs such as Reynard the Fox and The Beggin.  Whatever they perform, Fox and Luckley make it their own.  It's hardly surprising that this remains a highly sought-after album.

Track Listing:

• The Bonny Gateshead Lass
• Reynard the Fox
• Gypsy Davey
• The Beggin
• Bonny at Morn
• Row Between the Cages
• Sally Wheatley
• The Sandgate Lass on the Ropery Banks
• Isle of Islay
• Doodle Let Me Go

Roy Bailey - Freedom Peacefully

Fuse Records (CF 386, 1985)

An album of absolutely stunning songs performed by one of the folk scene's finest singers. With sleevenotes by Tony Benn, it's clear that this classic 1985 LP boasts its fair share of politics and songs of social justice: Bailey's genius is to deliver the songs with an elegance and clarity of expression that communicates anger and passion so much more successfully than any amount of 'over-emoting'. The arrangements use a mixture of acoustic guitars, accordion, brass, and backing vocals to bring out the musical colour of each song - and always tastefully emphasizing superb lyrics by great songwriters, notably Charlie Murphy's "Burning Times" and Si Kahn's "What You Do With What You've Got" (also a Dick Gaughan staple).

Andres Segovia - Golden Jubilee

(3-LP boxed set/booklet (Decca Gold Label DXJ 148 (USA), released in 1958))

Containing a wide cross-section of Segovia's artistry, this set is indispensable for classical guitar afficionados, winning for Segovia the 1958 Grammy Award. In researching this album on the internet, I found several comments on the inferior sound encountered when these performances were remastered for CD, which I can only ascribe to overzealous engineering of monaural recordings into stereo for the CD age. Here we have the original sound! Including works by De Murcia (Prelude and Allegro), Sor (Study No. 1 in C; Study No. 9 in A minor; Study No. 20 in G major; Two Minuets), Castelnuevo-Tedesco (Sonata "Homage to Boccherini"), Rodrigo (Fandango; Fantasia para un gentilhombre), Roncalli (Passacaglia; Gigua; Gavotta), Granados (Spanish Dance No. 10 in G), Granados-Llobet (Tonadilla), S. L. Weiss-Ponce (Prelude), Torroba (Pieces caracteristiques - 6 movements), Espla (Antano), Ponce (Allegro in A major; Concierto del Sur), Moussorgsky-Segovia ("The Old Castle" from Pictures at an Exhibition), Roussel ("Segovia"), Segovia (Study),and Tansman (Three Pieces for Guitar). On Rodrigo's Fantasia para un gentilhombre and Ponce's Concierto del Sur , Segovia is accompanied by Symphony of the Air, Enrique Jorda conducting, these two selections taking up the whole of Disc 3. The present album is from my own personal record collection, which I have since mostly replaced with the CD versions. Hence the sale of these much-loved albums.

The 15 page booklet includes a beautiful portrait of Segovia, a poem "The Guitar - for Andres Segovia" by Carl Sandberg and a wonderful essay entitled "The Guitar, that beautiful and mysterious instrument" by Mario Castelnuevo-Tedesco, as well as copious excerpts from Segovia's autobiography, then a work in progress. This is a real collector's item.

Julian "Cannonball" Adderley - Inside Straight

Fantasy Records FT 517 (UK), released by Fantasy USA as F-9435, in 1973 This is one of the best of the late period "Cannonball" Adderley albums, and like the best of the early Riversides and later Capitols, it's a 'live' recording, done at Fantasy's Berkeley California studios, in front of an invited audience, in June 1973.  Holdovers from earlier incarnations of this wonderful group include brother Nat Adderley, cornet, Walter Booker, bass, Roy McCurdy, drums, and recent addition Hal Galper, playing electric piano, and the composer of three of the selections here, "Inner Journey", "Snakin' The Grass", and "Second Son".  Nat and Julian wrote the title track, "Inside Straight", Nat contributes "Five Of A Kind", and everyone just swings their butts off!

Freddie Hubbard - Super Blue

CBS 82866 (UK), (from Columbia JC 35386 USA), released in 1978

Freddie Hubbard is heard here, playing four of his own compositions ("To Her Ladyship", "Take It To The Ozone", "The Gospel Truth", and "Theme For Kareem" (dedicated to Kareem Al Jabbar, the world famous basketball player), as well as "Superblue", the title track composed by B. Ighner, and Gino Vanelli's "The Surest Things Can Change". Critics have tended to dismiss Hubbard's Columbia recorded output as light-weight "fusion", but this is a solid effort, and the material is first-rate. He is joined on this wonderful album by Hubert Laws, flute, Joe Henderson, tenor saxophone, Ron Carter, bass, Kenny Barron, piano, and Jack DeJohnette, drums. Producer Dale Oehler plays additional keyboards on "Super Blue", and the great George Benson guests on and plays the guitar solo on "To Her Ladyship". (I had the pleasure of hearing the Hubbard band at the 1978 Middlesborough Jazz Festival, when many of these tracks were played live, and Larry Klein, later Joni Mitchell's husband, played bass.)

Various Artists – Wild Hills o’Wannie: The Small Pipes of Northumbria

(Topic, 12TS 227, 1974)

A fascinating compilation of Northumbrian piping from Topic Records, with highly informative sleevenotes. The pipers featured include Billy Pigg, whose virtuosity and sound was a key influence on Richard Thompson’s guitar playing; Diana Blackett-Ord, one of the first female pipers to make a mark on the Northumbrian Pipers’ Society; and Joe Hutton, the shepherd whose beautiful music continued to charm audiences across the world right into the 1990s. A breakdown of the players and tunes is as follows:

Billy Pigg
Wild Hills o' Wannie
The Morpeth Rant
Skye Crofters / The Swallow's Tail
The Holey Ha'penny
The Gypsy's Lullaby / The Hawk / Memories / Coates Hall
The Lark in the Clear Air

Joe Hutton
The Midlothian Pipe Band / Charlie Hunter
Lovat Scouts / Roxborough Castle / Bonny North Tyne / Alston Flower Show
Rowley Burn Hornpipe
The Blackthorn Stick / Biddy the Bold Wife
The Humours of Bandon / Saddle the Pony

George Atkinson
The Barrington Hornpipe
The Navvy on the Line / The Friendly Visit / Remember Me / Biddy the Bold Wife / Lamb Sklnnet / De’ll Amang the Tailors
Oh Dear, What Can the Matter Be?

Diana Blackett-Ord
Blow the Wind Southerly
Londonderry Hornpipe / Boys of the Blue Hills / Corn Rigs / Harvest Home
Westering Home

Colin Caisley and Foster Charlton
Noble Squire Dacre
Salmon Tails up the Water / The Herd on the Hill / Sweet Hesleyside

Tommy Breckons
Sir Sidney Smith’s March
Fenwick o’ Bywell

Jack Armstrong – Celebrated Minstrel

(Saydisc, SDL 252, 1974)

This album, released 4 years before Jack Armstrong’s death, provides a wide-ranging retrospective of Armstrong’s career as a Northumbrian piper, composer/arranger of tunes, fiddler, and as the leader of the Barnstormers country dance group. Advisors on the compilation included such luminaries as Alan Lomax and Peter Kennedy. The recordings, from the BBC and other sources, are from a range of dates between around 1944 and 1954. They include solo pipe tunes such as Whittingham Green Lane, Noble Squire Dacre, The Wild Hills o’Wannie, and Derwentwater’s Farewell, as well as rousing country dance sets featuring tunes like the Keel Row, Durham Rangers, and Keep Your Feet Still, Geordie Hinney. A very good overview of one of the players who really brought Northumbrian pipes back to prominence and paved the way for stars such as Kathryn Tickell.

Jack Armstrong and his Northumbrian Barnstormers - North Country Dances

(HMV, 7EG 8455, 1959)

This EP, published under the auspices of the English Folk Dance and Song Society, was used to disseminate the joys of community country dancing. The four tracks are The Cumberland Square; La Russe; the Morpeth Rant; and Soldier’s Joy. Armstrong’s Northumbrian Barnstormers were by 1959 quite well-known due to their performances on the radio and TV Barn Dance programmes and this EP is a marvellous snapshot of the music used for these occasions before every other wedding booked a ceilidh band.

Jack Armstrong – Northumbrian Pipe Music

(Beltona, SEP 43, 1969)

This rare EP, autographed by Armstrong himself, is a rare appearance from an English piper on the Beltona label. This EP is filled with famous traditional tunes such as Cheviot Chase, Bobbie Shaftoe, Redesdale Hornpipe, and Border Fray (also known as Buttered Peas). Half a century before Kathryn Tickell brought the Northumbrian pipes to a wider international audience, Jack Armstrong had been approached by Burl Ives with a view to his participation in a (sadly abortive) Hollywood version of the Pied Piper of Hamelyn. Though perhaps not as wildly virtuoso as his contemporary Billy Pigg, Armstrong was very much the face of Northumbrian piping for many years.

Dick Gaughan – No More Forever

(Trailer, LER 2072, 1972)

A young Dick Gaughan in traditional mode here, recorded by the great Bill Leader. Tracks include Rattlin’ Roarin’ Willie; Jock o’Hazeldean; The Green Linnet and The Fair Flower of Northumberland. Gaughan’s fiery guitar is coupled with Aly Bain’s fiddle and, of course, the voice is unmistakeable. Whatever Dick Gaughan performs, he makes his own and this largely traditional set of songs is no exception.

The Easy Club – Skirlie Beat

REL Records, (RELS 483, 1987)

This album (and the percussion-heavy title track) is named after a peculiarly Scottish concoction, skirlie. Like the dish, the Easy Club’s music is a mix of very Scottish ingredients with other flavours. There’s a rock tinge to the mining disaster song, “Augengeich”, while the band’s version of Ewan MacColl’s classic “First Time Ever I Saw Your Face” features some very lovely chromatic harmonica. There’s even the surprise inclusion of an old Kenneth McKellar hit, “The Song of the Clyde” – of course adapted to suit the Easy Club’s unique style. The vocals and instrumental playing are impeccable as ever, and the eclectic arrangements are still a joy even in these days when the likes of Bellowhead have rendered genre-mixing folk quite normal.

Dick Gaughan – A Different Kind of Love Song

(Celtic Music, CM 017, 1983)

With this album, the inimitable Dick Gaughan produced an instant classic. The power of Gaughan’s highly charged, political and very Scottish delivery is matched by his rapid-fire guitar playing. Something about this man’s voice ideally suits the richness of playback on vinyl. This set of songs clearly resonates with the early 1980s opposition to a Thatcherite Britain, and yet the lyrics have a relevance that is timeless. Gaughan’s own “Think Again” has become a folk scene standard. His version of Peggy Seeger’s “Song of Choice” is chilling and thought-provoking. Leon Rosselson’s “Stand Up For Judas” is provocative but powerful. And the album rounds off with a wholly unexpected but brilliant cover version of Joe South’s “Games People Play” (you categorize Gaughan at your peril).

The Easy Club – Chance or Design

(REL Records, RELS 479, 1985)

An absolutely gorgeous album which blends Scottish folk music with a Django-esque jazziness. The virtuosity of the playing and singing is easily understood when the line-up is made up of Jack Evans, John Martin, Rod Paterson and Jim Sutherland, but the sum is, if anything, greater than its parts. There’s a real musical alchemy in this album, all the way from the opening gentle swing of “Black is the Colour” (a version I prefer to Cara Dillon’s rather more famous recording) to the album’s final track, Jim Sutherland’s technically stunning bodhran solo.

Simon Thoumire and Ian Carr, Hootz

Black Crow (CRO 225, 1990)

This is the 1990 debut album by Thoumire and Carr, now mainstays of the UK folk scene and a duo who paved the way for a vibrant new generation of traditional musicians. Simon Thoumire (a Scotsman who brilliantly plays English concertina!) won the BBC Radio 2 Young Tradition Folk Award in 1989. He brings a jazziness and humour to his performance that sits incredibly well alongside a deep understanding of the traditions from which the music hails. Ian Carr is rightly one of the country’s most in-demand virtuoso guitarists, with a wonderful feel for syncopation and harmony. He has toured with the likes of Eddi Reader and John McCusker, was a lynchpin of the Old Rope String Band, and was a key component of Kate Rusby’s group as she stretched beyond the folk clubs and into mainstream TV and broadsheet recognition. This album is, as you’d expect from two young talents on their first vinyl outing, full of energy, vibrancy, and experimentation. More traditional fare such as “The Mason’s Apron”, “Old Hag You Have Killed Me” and “Master Crowley’s” sit alongside unexpected gems such as “St Louis Blues” and even that well-known English concertina piece (NOT!) “Lullaby of Birdland”.

A rare opportunity to hear two young musicians at the top of their game, but with their careers ahead of them.

The Oscar Peterson Trio at the Stratford Shakespearean Festival

Verve Records V-8024 (USA) released in 1961; original issue: 1957

The Oscar Peterson Trio, heard here in a live concert in 1957 from the Stratford Shakespearean Festival in Stratford, Ontario, Canada, had existed since the early 1950's. with guitarist Herb Ellis stepping in to replace original guitarist Barney Kessel in 1953. The great Ray Brown, bassist extraordinaire, has been present almost from the beginning. The empathy between these three musicians verges on the telepathic, and Oscar has recounted that Ray and Herb would often get together after hours just to play time together, without the pianist!
In any case, this is one of those special albums where everything's perfect, the venue, the audience, and of course the Trio. Selections include "Falling In Love With Love", "How About You", "Flamingo", "Swinging On A Star", "Gypsy In My Soul", "How High The Moon" (with a superlative bass solo from Ray Brown; a written transcript of his solo is included), Ellington's "Love You Madly", and the bebop anthem "52nd Street Theme", taken at a breakneck pace.

Gerry Mulligan and the Concert Jazz Band on Tour / Guest Soloist: Zoot Sims

Verve V-8438 (mono) (USA), released 1962

Just a year and a few months after the formation of his Concert Jazz Band, baritone saxophonist Gerry Mulligan took the guys on a European tour, recording them 'live' in several major cities, including Milan, Italy, Berlin, Germany, and then back home in Santa Monica, California. Along with his own formidable arranging skills, Gerry utilised the arranging talents of Bill Holman and Johnny Mandel, and the soloists were mainly Gerry himself, Bob Brookmeyer on valve trombone, the great Zoot Sims on tenor saxophone, along with underrated trumpeter Don Ferrara on "Barbara's Theme". Mandel wrote that one, along with Theme from "I Want To Live", a film starring Susan Hayward. Sims contributed "The Red Door", there are two treatments of Ben Webster's "Go Home", and a Mulligan original called "Apple Core". The band numbers fourteen musicians, and it sounds like more, such is the quality of the writing.