Happy Traum – Just for the Love of It

HAPPY TRAUM

Just for the Love of It

Lark’s Nest Music

happytraum.com

Ten years ago, reviewing Happy Traum’s then-new album, I Walk the Road Again, in Sing Out! magazine, I noted, “It’s been much too long, more than two decades, since Happy Traum, a former editor of Sing Out! magazine, released a solo album. Happily, the long wait has resulted in a very sweet gem of a CD.”

Another decade has gone by, but the wait for Just for the Love of It, another very sweet gem of a CD, was worth it. As usual, Happy has impeccable taste in choosing a program of great traditional folk and blues songs or contemporary songs written in the tradition and even better taste in the way he arranges them with both reverence for his sources and the originality of his always creative fingerpicking guitar and warm singing. He also surrounds himself – track to track – with just the right set of supporting musicians for each song and arrangement.

Because I have multiple versions of every one of these songs in my collection (in some cases many versions) there’s an instant familiarity to every track. But, despite, that familiarity, Happy made each and every one of them sound fresh the first time listened to the album – and they still sound fresh no matter how many times I’ve played the CD.

The album kicks off with Happy’s interpretation of Brownie McGhee’s version of the traditional “Careless Love Blues.” I have versions of Brownie playing the song solo and with Sonny Terry on harmonica. With Happy doing a great job on guitar and vocals, John Sebastian does an equally great job on harmonica.

Other favorite tracks include the traditional “Deep Blue Sea,” learned from Pete Seeger and featuring David Amram on pennywhistle and terrific harmonies by Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams; a contemplative, solo version of Pete’s “Sailing Down My Golden River”; an arrangement of the traditional “Things Are Coming My Way” that is, like so many Georgia Sea Island songs, completely infectious; and a defiant-sounding version of Woody Guthrie’s classic “I Ain’t Got No Home,” that also features a great harmonica part by John Sebastian.

There is also a full-on version of Bob Dylan’s “Crash on the Levee (Down in the Flood),” featuring Happy’s son, Adam Traum on slide guitar and harmony vocals. This song was one of several duets Happy recorded with Dylan in 1971 for Dylan’s Greatest Hits, Vol. 2 album.

There are another eight songs on Just for the Love of It. I could just as easily have cited any of them as a highlight. I hope it’s not another decade before Happy decides to do another album.

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--Mike Regenstreif

Dave Ray – Legacy

DAVE RAY

Legacy

Red House Records

redhouserecords.com

After Bob Dylan, the most significant musicians to come out of the folk scene around the University of Minnesota, circa 1960, was the trio of Koerner, Ray & Glover – guitarist-singers “Spider” John Koerner and Dave “Snaker” Ray and harmonica player Tony “Little Sun” Glover. Along with such seminal figures as Dave Van Ronk in New York and Eric Von Schmidt in Cambridge, Koerner, Ray & Glover paved the way for all of the blues revivalists who followed in their footsteps.

The tracks on classic Koerner, Ray & Glover albums like Blues, Rags & Hollers and (Lots More) Blues, Rags & Hollers only occasionally featured all three musicians. Most songs had one or another of the trio performing solo or in duos with one of the others and Ray’s cuts highlighted the sets.

Ray went on to a long career working occasionally with Koerner and Glover – I remember meeting and hearing them at the Winnipeg Folk Festival in the 1980s – as well as in duos with Glover, fronting his own bands, and as a solo artist. Ray, who died of lung cancer in 2002 at age 59, kept on playing until the end.

Legacy is an exhaustive 3-CD set that collects 55 recordings – most of them previously unreleased – made over the course of his 40-year career. We hear him mature from a teenaged guitarist trying to imitate Lead Belly to a fully developed master of both rural and urban blues styles.

The recordings on the first CD cover the years from 1962 to 1987. While early tracks like “Alabama Women” and “Fannin Street” sound imitative, we quickly hear him find his own blues voice and begin to offer more fully developed interpretations of songs like Brownie McGhee’s “Lonesome Road,” with Glover offering more than credible Sonny Terry-style harp, and Blind Blake’s “Fighting That Jug.”

The 21 songs on the second CD were recorded between 1988 and 1994 and are highlighted by Jimmy Reed’s “Take Out Some Insurance,” with Ray on electric guitar, Tommy Johnson’s “Big Road,” on which he plays an electric 12-string, and Blind Willie McTell’s “Statesboro Blues,” on which he plays acoustic 12-string. All three tracks, and many others on the disc, feature some excellent harp work by Glover.

The 18 songs on the third CD date from 1995 to 2002. By this time, Ray was a fully developed blues artist. His versions of such pieces as Tommy McClennan’s “Shake ‘Em On Down,” Joe Callicott’s “Fare Thee Well,” Blind Blake’s “That Will Never Happen No More,” and even a bluesified version of Bill Monroe’s bluegrass classic “With Body and Soul” are a constant delight. And, again, all of those tracks feature great contributions from Glover on the harmonica.

Legacy is a great reminder of an important, if under-appreciated, artist no longer with us. The 32-page booklet includes photos and an excellent essay and song notes by Glover.

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--Mike Regenstreif

Dave Van Ronk – Live in Monterey

DAVE VAN RONK
Live In Monterey
Omnivore Recordings 
omnivorerecordings.com

I’ve written several times before about my valued friendship with the late, very great Dave Van Ronk (1936-2002), the legendary folk-blues-jazz-cabaret singer, guitarist and songwriter, including in reviews of Down in Washington Square, the marvelous 3-CD collection released last fall, and my book review of his memoir, The Mayor of MacDougal Street, (completed brilliantly in Dave’s words by Elijah Wald).

My last opportunities to spend extended periods of time with Dave were in 1998 when he came to Montreal to perform at the Montreal International Jazz Festival (and sit down with me for an extensive interview on the Folk Roots/Folk Branches radio program), and then later that same summer when I was MCing and he was performing at the Champlain Valley Folk Festival in Burlington, Vermont.

Dave was pretty damn great when he started out in the 1950s – by the early-‘60s he was a major influence on Bob Dylan and just about every other singer, guitarist and songwriter who passed through the Village folk scene – and just kept getting better and better as time went on. The concerts and workshops I saw him in do in Montreal and Burlington in 1998 were all superb – Dave was at the peak of his form.

A couple of months before his great Montreal Jazz Festival concerts, Dave was in similarly fine form when he performed in Monterey, California. An edited version of that concert has now been released as Live In Monterey.

Dave’s repertoire that night seems like a pretty typical Dave Van Ronk concert. Almost all of the 16 songs are numbers I heard him do many times over the years but all are songs I never got tired of hearing him sing and play. For one thing, there were always different nuances and developments in his vocal phrasing and guitar playing that made every version of every song unique. For example, “St. James Infirmary” (sometimes known as “Gambler’s Blues’) is a song I heard him do in almost every show I ever saw him do – and there were many – and I’ve got 10 different recordings of Dave doing the song, but I hear something new and exciting in every one.

And the same goes for the other songs in the set. It is a treat to hear his whisper-to-a-growl-to-a-shout voice and inspiring, always-intricate guitar arrangements on such classics as Jelly Roll Morton’s “Winin’ Boy Blues,” Reverend Gary Davis’ “Cocaine Blues,” “Candy Man” and “Jesus Met the Woman at the Well,” Brownie McGhee’s “Sportin’ Life Blues,” his beautiful version of “He was a Friend of Mine,” adapted by Dave, Dylan and Eric Von Schmidt, from the traditional “Shorty George,” Mississippi John Hurt’s “Spike Driver Blues,” Tom Paxton’s tribute song, “Did You Hear John Hurt?” and all the rest.

Some of these songs – including “Cocaine Blues,” “Candy Man,” Bessie Smith’s “You’ve Been a Good Old Wagon,” and his own “Losers” – are infused with Dave’s patented humor while others, including “Jelly Jelly,” “St. James Infirmary” and “Winin’ Boy Blues” are informed by jazz, particularly the traditional New Orleans jazz that Dave loved and sang so well.

Although almost all of the repertoire on Live In Monterey was from the standard Van Ronk canon, the set ends with an extraordinary and beautiful version of Ian Tyson’s classic “Four Strong Winds.” Although, Dave recorded the song on To All My Friends In Far-Flung Places, I don’t recall ever hearing him perform it in concert.

The CD booklet includes words from co-producer Rick Chelew and a great essay by Happy Traum, who knew Dave from the mid-1950s on and recalls vividly their friendship from the early days in Washington Square forward, as well as Dave's importance as a musical innovator and mentor to many.

About the only thing I miss on Live In Monterey are most of the asides and stories that typically punctuated a Dave Van Ronk concert. I assume they were edited from this recording to make it a purely musical experience.

I return often to many of Dave’s albums and this is one that will certainly be among those for years to come.

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--Mike Regenstreif