Folk Roots/Folk Branches with Mike Regenstreif

Friday, January 2, 2026

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – January 6, 2026: Remembering Tim Williams, Raul Malo, Steve Cropper and Joe Ely

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif finds connections and develops themes in various genres. The show is broadcast on CKCU, 93.1 FM, in Ottawa on Tuesdays from 3:30 until 5 pm (Eastern time) and is also available 24/7 for on-demand streaming.

This episode of Stranger Songs was recorded and can be streamed on-demand, now or anytime, by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/73574.html

Theme: Remembering Tim Williams, Raul Malo, Steve Cropper and Joe Ely.

Remembering Tim Williams (1948-2025)

Tim Williams – who died on November 28, at age 77, following a short battle with cancer – was born in California and had already recorded his first LP before he moved to Canada in 1970. He was based in Vancouver for several years before moving on to Alberta, where he worked for a time as a cowboy and then began a long career as an acoustic blues and folk artist based in Calgary.

Tim Williams- Pallet on the Floor

Evenings Among Friends (Cayuse)

Tim Williams- Alberta In My Dreams

When I was a Cowboy (Cayuse)

Cindy Church- Trying to Rope the Wind

Just a Little Rain (Stony Plain)

Tim Williams- The Ones Who Made the Blues

Indigo Incidents (Cayuse)

Tim Williams- It’s Enough to Be Remembered

Songster, Musicianer, Music Physicianer (Cayuse)

Remembering Raul Malo (1965-2025)

Raul Malo – who died on December 8, at age 60, from cancer – was both a solo artist and the lead singer with The Mavericks.

Raul Malo- Early Morning Rain

The Nashville Acoustic Sessions (CMH)

Raul Malo- You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go

The Nashville Acoustic Sessions (CMH)

Raul Malo- I Guess Things Happen That Way

Dressed in Black: A Tribute to Johnny Cash (Dualtone)

Remembering Steve Cropper (1941-2025)

Steve Cropper – who died on December 3, at age 84 – was a guitarist, songwriter and record producer and as the guitarist in Booker T. & The MGs, was probably the definitive guitarist of Memphis soul music.

Booker T. & The MGs- Green Onions

Green Onions (Stax)

Wilson Pickett- In the Midnight Hour

In the Midnight Hour (Atlantic)

The Staple Singers- The Weight

Soul Folk In Action (Stax)

Otis Redding- (Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay

The Dock of the Bay (Atco)

Steve Cropper- Crop Dustin’

With a Little Help From My Friends (Volt)

Jesse Winchester- Club Manhattan

Gentleman of Leisure (Sugar Hill)

Remembering Joe Ely (1947-2025)

Joe Ely – who died on December 15, at age 78, from pneumonia after a battling Parkinson’s disease and Lewy body dementia – was one of the great Texas singer-songwriters and song interpreters who recorded under his own name and as a member of The Flatlanders.

Joe Ely & Joel Guzman- Because of the Wind

Live Cactus (Rack ‘Em)

Ramblin' Jack Elliott- Me and Billy the Kid

Friends of Mine (HighTone)

The Chieftains & Joe Ely- The Moonshiner/I’m a Rambler, I’m a Gambler

Further Down the Old Plank Road (RCA)

Tom Russell- Indian Cowboy

Tonight We Ride: The Tom Russell Cowboy Anthology (Frontera)

Joe Ely- Gallo del Cielo

Letter to Laredo (MCA)

The Flatlanders- Right Where I Belong

Now Again (New West)

James Talley & Joe Ely- W. Lee O’Daniel and the Light Crust Doughboys

Touchstones (Cimarron)

Tom Russell & Joe Ely- Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues

Folk Hotel (Frontera)

Joe Ely & Joel Guzman- Ranches and Rivers

Live Cactus (Rack ‘Em)

Next week: Lightfoot! Revisited and Kate &Anna McGarrigle Revisited.

--Mike Regenstreif

Friday, December 26, 2025

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – December 30, 2025: My top 10 folk-rooted and folk-branched albums of 2025

This episode of Stranger Songs was recorded and can be streamed on-demand, now or anytime, by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/73491.html

Theme: My top 10 folk-rooted and folk-branched albums of 2025.

These are always hard choices. I started with a list of about 30 of my favorite albums for the year. I’ve been over the list several times in the past couple of weeks and came up with several similar – but not identical – Top 10 lists. This list is the final one. The order might have been slightly different and there are several other worthy albums that might have been included, had one of the other lists represented the final choice.

The annotated and illustrated version of this top 10 list is available on the Folk Roots/Folk Branches blog at … https://frfb.blogspot.com/2025/12/top-10-for-2025.html

10. Suzy Sings Siebel Volume One by Suzy Thompson

Suzy Thompson- Bride 1945

Suzy Sings Siebel Volume One (Suzy Thompson)

Suzy Thompson- Long Afternoons

Suzy Sings Siebel Volume One (Suzy Thompson)

9. Personal History by Mary Chapin Carpenter

Mary Chapin Carpenter- Girl and Her Dog

Personal History (Lambent Light/Thirty Tigers)

Mary Chapin Carpenter- New Religion

Personal History (Lambent Light/Thirty Tigers)

8. Field of Stars by John McCutcheon

John McCutcheon- Tikkun Olam

Field of Stars (Appalsongs)

John McCutcheon with Windborne- Blessing

Field of Stars (Appalsongs)

7. Woody At Home – Vol 1 + 2 by Woody Guthrie

Woody Guthrie- This Land is Your Land

Woody At Home – Vol 1 + 2 (Shamus)

Woody Guthrie- Peace Call

Woody At Home – Vol 1 + 2 (Shamus)

6. Hardscrabble Hope by Maria Dunn

Maria Dunn- Another Year

Hardscrabble Hope (Distant Whisper Music)

Maria Dunn- Leave It All On the Ice

Hardscrabble Hope (Distant Whisper Music)

5. unentitled by John Gorka

John Gorka- First Snow on the Mountains

unentitled (Red House)

John Gorka- Particle Wave (Goodness in the World)

unentitled (Red House)

4. Every Town: More Songs by Michael Smith by Anne Hills

Anne Hills- Crazy Mary

Every Town: More Songs by Michael Smith (Hand & Heart Music)

Anne Hills- Sure Has Grown

Every Town: More Songs by Michael Smith (Hand & Heart Music)

3. Bones of Trees by Tim Grimm

Tim Grimm- Broken Truth

Bones of Trees (Vault)

Tim Grimm- Up in the Attic

Bones of Trees (Vault)

2. Dark Ages by Eliza Gilkyson

Eliza Gilkyson- Times Like These

Dark Ages (Realiza)

Eliza Gilkyson- Holy

Dark Ages (Realiza)

1. David Amram Honors Guthrie and Ochs: Old Souls by The David Amram Quintet

The David Amram Quintet- Talking Subway

David Amram Honors Guthrie and Ochs: Old Souls (Guthrie Legacy)

The David Amram Quintet- When I’m Gone

David Amram Honors Guthrie and Ochs: Old Souls (Guthrie Legacy)

Next week: Remembering Raul Malo, Tim Williams, Joe Ely and Steve Cropper.

--Mike Regenstreif

Wednesday, December 24, 2025

Top 10 for 2025

Here are my picks for the Top 10 folk-rooted or folk-branched albums of 2024. I started with a list of about 30 superb albums released over the past year and I’ve been over the list several times over the past couple of weeks and came up with several similar – not identical – Top 10 lists. Today’s list is the final one. The order might have been slightly different and there are several other worthy albums that might have been included, had one of the other lists represented the final choice.

1. The David Amram Quintet – David Amram Honors Guthrie and Ochs: Old Souls (Guthrie Legacy). There is no other musician quite like David Amram. Over the course of more than 50 years, I have seen David play at folk festivals and clubs and at jazz festivals and clubs. I have also seen him in tails conducting symphony and chamber orchestras as they perform his classical compositions in concert halls. On this set of five Woody Guthrie songs, and one by Phil Ochs, David offers innovative, jazzy arrangements of familiar lyrics that make them sound new and fresh. At age 95 – OK, he was only 94 when he recorded the album – David has lost none of the magic I’ve seen from him over the years.

2. Eliza Gilkyson – Dark Ages (Realiza). On many of the songs on this this sometimes subtle, sometimes direct, collection of mostly topical songs, Eliza Gilkyson insightfully explores the darkness wrought by the forces that have taken control of her country and beyond, and offers hope and inspiration that we will find our way past these times.

3. Tim Grimm – Bones of Trees (Vault). As both a folk-rooted songwriter and interpreter of other songs, Tim Grimm has taken his place as one of our finest artists over the past 25 years. Tim once did a whole album of Tom Paxton songs and Tom’s influence can be heard in such great topical songs as “Broken Truth” and “Woody’s Landlord Revisited,” an updated version of a song Tim first released in 2016, as well as more haunting songs like “Up in the Attic.”

4. Anne Hills – Every Town: More Songs by Michael Smith (Hand & Heart Music). If “The Dutchman” had been the only song that Michael Smith (1941-2020) ever wrote, he’d still have to be on any list of great songwriters. But Michael wrote so many more great songs. Anne Hills has long been one of Michael’s finest interpreters. October Child, her first album of Michael Smith songs, came out in 1993 and Paradise Lost & Found, an album of their duets, came out in 1995. While every one of these songs is a gem, highlights include “Ballad of Elizabeth Dark,” “Crazy Mary” and a gorgeous duet with John Gorka on “Spoon River.”

5. John Gorka – unentitled (Red House). John Gorka has an excellent body of work recorded over the past four decades and this collection of wise and perceptive songs might just be his best yet. Among my favorites are “Particle Wave (Goodness in the World,” a beautiful song about finding hope in these dark times, “First Snow on the Mountains,” a reflection on early winter and late-in-life love, and an exquisite interpretation of Stan Rogers’ “Harris and the Mare.”

6. Maria Dunn – Hardscrabble Hope (Distant Whisper Music). As I’ve said before, Maria Dunn’s inspiring original songs, deeply rooted in folk and Celtic music traditions, capture the good in the human spirit and the essence of communal common cause. Maria captures that spirit and essence beautifully in songs like “Walking the Miles” and “Another Year.” And in songs like “Coal is a Thirsty Business,” she sings insightfully about the consequences of greedy endeavours on our planet.

7. Woody Guthrie – Woody at Home – Vol 1 + 2 (Shamus). This collection of home recordings made in 1951 and ’52 by Woody Guthrie is a fascinating look at Woody’s songwriting process and includes some familiar material and some songs being heard for the first time. Some songs – like a version of “This Land is Your Land” with verses that are quite different from the ones he wrote more than 10 years earlier – are both familiar and new. Another is “Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)” with Woody’s own tune which is different from the melody composed years later by Martin Hoffman. Among the unfamiliar songs is “Back Door Bum and the Big Landlord,” which I’m sure must have been inspired by the landlord Tim Grimm referred to in “Woody’s Landlord Revisited,” and the very clever “My Id and My Ego.”

8. John McCutcheon – Field of Stars (Appalsongs). John McCutcheon offers yet another superb collection of insightful, often-poignant that have much to say about the state of the world and human relations. While I like the whole album, a couple speak very directly to me. “MS St. Louis” is about the shipload of more than 900 Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany who were refused entry by Cuba, the United States and Canada. Ultimately, many of them were murdered in the Holocaust, while “Tikkun Olam” is inspired by the Jewish concept of repairing the world. Other highlights include “Field of Stars,” co-written and sung with Carrie Newcomer, and “Too Old to Die Young,” a song for those of us among John’s generation who are at that age.

9. Mary Chapin Carpenter – Personal History (Lambent Light/Thirty Tigers). As the title implies, this is perhaps the most personal album in Mary Chapin Carpenter’s career. Highlights include “Girl and Her Dog,” a reflection on life, love and contentment, “The Night We Never Met,” which captures feelings most of us have had at one time or another, and “Paint + Turpentine,” which recalls being inspired by Guy Clark.

10. Suzy Thompson – Suzy Sings Siebel, Volume 1 (Suzy Thompson). Paul Siebel (1937-2022) was a brilliant singer-songwriter who recorded just two albums in the early-1970s. His first album, Woodsmoke and Oranges remains one of my all-time favorite LPs. On this collection, Suzy Thompson, who has long been known for mostly playing traditional music, offers 10 of Paul’s songs, including seven from Woodsmoke and Oranges, two from Jack-Knife Gypsy, and one that Paul himself never recorded. I think Paul would have been pleased with Suzy’s fine interpretations. I’ll mention that some of my favorite Siebel songs – including “My Town,” Then Came the Children” and “Legend of the Captain’s Daughter” – are not in this set. So I’m looking forward to Volume 2.

I will be featuring songs from each of these albums on Stranger Songs, Tuesday December 30, 3:30-5 pm (ET), on CKCU. The program is now available 24/7 for on-demand streaming at this link.

–Mike Regenstreif

Tuesday, December 23, 2025

Saturday Morning with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – December 27, 2025

Saturday Morning is an eclectic roots-oriented program on CKCU, 93.1 FM, in Ottawa on Saturday mornings from 7 until 10 am (Eastern time) and available for on-demand streaming anytime. I am one of the four rotating hosts of the Saturday Morning show.

This episode of Saturday Morning was recorded and can be streamed on-demand, now or anytime, by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/128/73437.html

Mike Regenstreif & Maria Dunn (2017)

Maria Dunn- Another Year

Hardscrabble Hope (Distant Whisper Music)

Herdman, Hills & Mangsen- At the Turning of the Year

At the Turning of the Year (Hand & Heart Music)

Rod MacDonald & Mike Regenstreif (2005)

Rod MacDonald- The Coming of the Snow

After the War (Blue Flute Music)

The Tony Rice Unit- Girl from the North Country

Live at the Birchmere (Acoustic Disc)

Maggie’s Wake- Song for a Winter’s Night

Close to Home (Maggie’s Wake)

Bill Garrett & Mike Regenstreif (2014)

Bill Garrett- A Winters Night

Seems to Me (Borealis)

Mike Regenstreif & Orit Shimoni (2025)

Orit Shimoni- Soft Like Snow

Soft Like Snow (Orit Shimoni)

Mike Regenstreif & Bill Morrissey (2005)

Bill Morrissey- Birches

The Essential Collection (Rounder)

Mike Regenstreif & Lynn Miles (2013)

Lynn Miles- This Heart That Lives in Winter

Winter (Lynn Miles)

Rags Rosenberg- Song of the Bricoleur

Song of the Bricoleur (Coyote Gulch)

Sneezy Waters & Mike Regenstreif (2013)

Sneezy Waters & His Very Fine Band- Visions of Johanna

Live (Sneezy Waters)

Laura Smith & Mike Regenstreif (2013)

Laura Smith- Song of the Candle

Remembering Stan Rogers: An East Coast Tribute (Brookes Diamond Productions)

Madeleine Peyroux- Everybody’s Talkin’

Half the Perfect World (Rounder)

Julie Adams & The Mountain Stage Band- Say What

Live (Gadfly)

Mike Regenstreif & Jesse Winchester (2009)

Jesse Winchester- Reckon On Me

Talk Memphis (Stony Plain)

Chris Smither- Talk Memphis

Up On the Lowdown (HighTone)

Jennifer Warnes- Famous Blue Raincoat

Famous Blue Raincoat: The Songs of Leonard Cohen – 20th Anniversary Edition (Shout! Factory)

Colleen Rennisson- Some Things You Lose

Persephone (Outlaw Soul)

Tom Rush- One More Time Around the Sun

Gardens Old, Flowers New (Appleseed)

Kate MacLeod- The Longest Night

Perennial (Westmoon)

Tom Russell & Mike Regenstreif (2018)

Tom Russell- Landed On Your Feet Again

Mount Olive (Frontera)

Bonnie Dobson & The Hanging Stars- On a Morning Like This

Dreams (Loose Music)

John Gorka & Mike Regenstreif (2012)

John Gorka- Particle Wave (Goodness in the World)

unentitled (Red House)

Mike Regenstreif & Anne Hills (2001)

Anne Hills- We Become Birds

Every Town: More Songs by Michael Smith (Hand & Heart Music)

Boreal- Winterbirds

Winterbirds (Boreal)

Sierra Hull- Truth Be Told

A Tip Toe High Wire (Sierra Hull)

Jory Nash & Mike Regenstreif (2024)

Jory Nash- Tell Your Heart Not to Slow

The Light Still Shines on the Main (Thin Man)

Mr. O’Muck- Long Tall Mama Suite

Home Field Recordings: The Ancient Blues of Mr. O’Muck (Muck-O-Phone)

Woody Guthrie- Back Door Bum and the Big Landlord

Woody At Home – Vol 1 + 2 (Shamus)

Mike Regenstreif & Tim Grimm (2025)

Tim Grimm- Woody’s Landlord Revisited

Bones of Trees (Vault)

Mike Regenstreif & David Amram (2017)

The David Amram Quintet- Oklahoma Hills

David Amram Honors Guthrie and Ochs: Old Souls (Guthrie Legacy)

Dave Carter & Tracy Grammer- Way Over Yonder in the Minor Key

Little Blue Egg (Red House)

Rob Lutes- That Bird Has My Wings

Come Around (Lucky Bear)

Melanie Peterson- Have You Ever Seen the Rain

Read It on the Radio – Vol. 2 (Melanie Peterson)

Paul Winter Consort & Gary Brooker- A Whiter Shade of Pale

Everybody Under the Sun: Voices of Solstice – Volume 1: The Singers (Living Music)

Amy Speace- On a Monday in London

The Blue Rock Session (Windbone)

Chaim Tannenbaum- London, Longing for Home

Chaim Tannenbaum (StorySound)

Rufus Wainwright- Shenandoah

Folkocracy (BMG)

Kate & Anna McGarrigle, Mike Regenstreif, Chaim Tannenbaum (1976) photo: Felicity Fanjoy

Kate & Anna McGarrigle- Matapedia

Matapedia (Hannibal)

Bill Keith & Jim Rooney- Auld Lang Syne

Something Auld, Something Newgrass, Something Borrowed, Something Bluegrass (Rounder)

I’ll be hosting Saturday Morning next on January 24. I also host Stranger Songs on CKCU every Tuesday from 3:30-5 pm.

--Mike Regenstreif

Wednesday, December 17, 2025

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – December 23, 2025: A Christmas Concert with Odetta and More Songs for the Holiday

This episode of Stranger Songs was recorded and can be streamed on-demand, now or anytime, by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/73359.html

Theme: A Christmas Concert with Odetta and More Songs for the Holiday.

Odetta – who died in 2008 less than a month before her 78th birthday – was one of the most influential folksingers of her time. In the late-1950s, a teenaged rock singer in Minnesota named Robert Zimmerman decided to pursue folk music after hearing an Odetta album, and later arrived in New York City calling himself Bob Dylan. Others, among many, who have cited Odetta’s influence include Joan Baez, Nina Simone, Janis Joplin and Harry Belafonte. Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. referred to Odetta as “the voice of the civil rights movement.

Odetta was accompanied throughout the concert by pianist Seth Farber and, on a couple of songs, by The Holmes Brothers.

Odetta with The Holmes Brothers- This Little Light of Mine