Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – August 19, 2025: The Original Sloth Band at 60

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/595/71585.html

Theme: The Original Sloth Band at 60.

The Original Sloth Band – teenaged brothers Chris Whiteley and Ken Whiteley and their friend Tom Evans – played their first gig in 1965. Their band name for that gig was Tubby Fats Original Allstar Downtown Syncopated Big Rock Jug Band but they soon evolved into the Original Sloth Band. Sadly, Tom Evans passed away from cancer in 2009, but, in June, Chris and Ken with some guest musicians played a concert at Hugh’s Room in Toronto to mark the milestone anniversary.

Original Sloth Band- The New Heartbreak Blues

Whoopee After Midnight (Sloth)

Samoa Wilson with The Jim Kweskin Band- (I Just Want to Be) Horizontal

I Just Want to Be Horizontal (Kingswood)

Tony Rice- Temperance Reel

Tony Rice (Rounder)

Jeff Healey- Sheik of Araby

The Best of the Stony Plain Years: Vintage Jazz, Swing and Blues (Stony Plain)

Amos Milburn- Johnson Rag

Rockin’ and Drinkin’: Greatest Hits and More 1946-1959 (Jasmine)

Original Sloth Band- Heaven

Whoopee After Midnight (Sloth)

The Dumptrucks- Stealin’

Selections (Laughing Cactus)

Original Sloth Band- I’m a Vulture (for Horticulture)

Whoopee After Midnight (Sloth)

Leon Redbone- Please Don’t Talk About Me When I’m Gone

Champagne Charlie (Warner Bros.)

Jenny Whiteley- Things are Coming My Way

The Original Jenny Whiteley (Black Hen Music)

Jay McShann- Sunny Side of the Street

Still Jumpin’ the Blues (Stony Plain)

Mose Scarlett- How Long Blues

The Fundamental Things (Pyramid)

Original Sloth Band- Get a Job 

Whoopee After Midnight (Sloth)

Maria Muldaur- Organ Grinder Blues

One Hour Mama: The Blues of Victoria Spivey (NOLA Blues)

Duke Ellington & Ivie Anderson- Get Yourself a New Broom (and Sweep the Blues Away)

Ellington in Order, Volume 5 (1932-33) (Legacy)

Duke Ellington & The Mills Brothers- Diga Diga Do

Ellington in Order, Volume 5 (1932-33) (Legacy)

Jimmy Bracken's Toe Ticklers- It’s Tight Like That

Jack Teagarden: The Definitive Collection (Master Tape)

Original Sloth Band- Shout Baby Shout

Hustlin’ & Bustlin’ (Woodshed)

The Boswell Sisters- Cheek to Cheek

Cheek to Cheek (Classic)

The Central Park Sheiks- Honeysuckle Rose

Honeysuckle Rose (Flying Fish)

Bessie Smith- Gimme a Pigfoot (and a Bottle of Beer)

Bessie Smith: The Absolutely Essential 3 CD Collection (Big3)

Carolina Chocolate Drops- Memphis Shakedown

Carolina Chocolate Drops & Joe Thompson (Music Makers Recordings)

Original Sloth Band- Hustlin’ and Bustlin’ for Baby

Hustlin’ & Bustlin’ (Woodshed)

Ken Whiteley- Fast Freight Train

Unseen Hands: 12 Songs 12 Strings (Ken Whiteley)

Chris Whiteley- I’ve Got to Split

It’s the Natural Thing to Do (Electro-Fi)

Next week: Songs for August and Highway 61 Revisited – Revisited.

--Mike Regenstreif

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – February 27, 2024: Take the ‘A’ Train: A Tribute to Duke Ellington

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/595/64083.html

Theme: Take the ‘A’ Train: A Tribute to Duke Ellington (1899-1974)

Duke Ellington, who died in 1974 at age 75, was born Edward Kennedy Ellington in 1899 in Washington, DC. He was a pianist, bandleader and composer, and arguably, the greatest and most influential figure in the history of jazz.

Jackie Washington- Take the ‘A’ Train

Keeping Out of Mischief (Pyramid)

Duke Ellington- East St. Louis Toodle-oo

Ellington in Order, Volume 1 (1927-28) (Legacy)

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy- Diga Diga Do

Rattle Them Bones (Savoy Jazz)

Ken Whiteley, Jackie Washington & Mose Scarlett- Mood Indigo

Sitting on a Rainbow (Borealis)

Eva Cassidy- It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing)

American Tune (Blix Street)

Sneezy Waters- Solitude

Sneezy Waters (Sneezy Waters)

Duke Ellington- Stompy Jones

Ellington in Order, Volume 6 (1934-36) (Legacy)

Ella Fitzgerald with Duke Ellington & His Orchestra- Drop Me Off in Harlem

Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook (Verve)

Taj Mahal- Do Nothin’ Till You Hear From Me

Savoy (Stony Plain)

Lambert, Hendricks & Ross- In a Mellow Tone

The Hottest New Group in Jazz (Columbia/Legacy)

Claudia Schmidt- I’m Beginning to See the Light

Out of the Dark/New Goodbyes, Old Helloes (Flying Fish)

Louis Armstrong & Duke Ellington- Duke’s Place

The Complete Louis Armstrong & Duke Ellington Sessions (Roulette)

Duke Ellington- A Tone Poem to Harlem (The Harlem Suite)

Ellington Uptown (Columbia)

Willie Nelson- Don’t Get Around Much Anymore

Stardust (Columbia)

Judy Collins- I Didn’t Know About You

Bread and Roses (Elektra)

Dave Van Ronk- Lucky So and So

Hummin’ to Myself (Gazell)

Thelonious Monk- Black and Tan Fantasy

Thelonious Monk Plays Duke Ellington (Riverside)

Susie Arioli Swing Band featuring Jordan Officer- I Got It Bad (And That Ain’t Good)

It’s Wonderful (Susie Arioli Swing Band)

Catherine Russell- I’m Checkin’ Out, Goom’bye

Strictly Romancin’ (World Village)

Duke Ellington & Count Basie- Battle Royal

First Time! The Count Meets the Duke (Columbia)

Next week: Title Characters.

--Mike Regenstreif

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – Tuesday May 2, 2023: Stompin’ at the Savoy

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

CKCU can be heard live at 93.1 FM in Ottawa and https://www.ckcufm.com/ on the web. 

This episode of Stranger Songs was recorded and can already be streamed on-demand by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/60257.html

Theme: Stompin’ at the Savoy.

The Savoy Ballroom in the Harlem section of New York City was a major music venue from 1926 until 1958, and in the liner notes to Savoy by Taj Mahal, Holger Peterson notes that 13 of the 14 songs on the album would likely have been heard at the Savoy during its long run. And that’s what gave me the idea for this theme. All the songs on this show were performed during that period and might well have been heard at the Savoy at some point.

Taj Mahal- Stompin’ at the Savoy

Savoy (Stony Plain)

Ella Fitzgerald with The Chick Webb Orchestra- A-Tisket, A-Tasket

Swingsation (Verve)

Big Bad Voodoo Daddy- Diga Diga Do

Rattle Them Bones (Savoy Jazz)

Howard Armstrong- Lady Be Good

Louie Bluie (Blue Suit)

Samoa Wilson with The Jim Kweskin Band- He Ain’t Got Rhythm

I Just Want to Be Horizontal (Kingswood)

Taj Mahal- Baby Won’t You Please Come Home

Savoy (Stony Plain)

Catherine Russell & Mike Regenstreif (2007)

Catherine Russell- Is You Is or Is You Ain’t My Baby?

Alone Together (Dot Time)

Taj Mahal- Do Nothin’ Till You Hear From Me

Savoy (Stony Plain)

Barney Bigard & Orchestra- C Jam Blues

The Great Ellington Units (BMG)

Ella Fitzgerald with The Duke Ellington Orchestra- I’m Just a Lucky So-and-So

Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook (Verve)

Jackie Washington & Mike Regenstreif (2008)

Jackie Washington- Take the “A” Train

Keeping Out of Mischief (Pyramid)

Nina Simone- Mood Indigo

Let It All Out (Liberty)

Taj Mahal- Caldonia

Savoy (Stony Plain)

Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown- Salt Pork, West Virginia

Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown Sings Louis Jordan (Black & Blue)

Asleep at the Wheel- Choo Ch’Boogie

Having a Party: Live (Goldenlane)

Louis Jordan- Let the Good Times Roll

Louis Jordan and his Tympany Five (JSP)

Taj Mahal- Sweet Georgia Brown

Savoy (Stony Plain)

Dave Van Ronk- Gee Baby, Ain’t I Good to You

Hummin’ to Myself (Gazell)

Oscar Brown, Jr.- One for My Baby (and One More for the Road)

The Voice of Cool (Not Now Music)

Count Basie & His Orchestra- Jumpin’ at the Woodside

The Count Basie Story, Vol. 1 (Columbia)

Cab Calloway- Minnie the Moocher

Are You Hep to the Jive? (Columbia/Legacy)

Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong- Stompin’ at the Savoy

Ella and Louis Again (Verve)

Next week: Remembering Harry Belafonte (1927-2023).

Find me on Facebook. facebook.com/mikeregenstreif

--Mike Regenstreif

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – Tuesday March 22, 2022: Garden Songs

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

CKCU can be heard live at 93.1 FM in Ottawa and https://www.ckcufm.com/ on the web.

This episode of Stranger Songs was prerecorded at home and can already be streamed on-demand by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/55612.html

Theme: Garden Songs

David Mallett- Garden Song
Parallel Lives (Flying Fish)

Sharon Goldman- A Garden
Every Trip Around the Sun (Sharon Goldman)
Deborah Robins- Crows in the Garden
Lone Journey (Zippety Whippet Music)
Kat Eggleston- My Father’s Garden
Second Nature (Waterbug)
Claudia Russell & Bruce Kaplan- Winter Garden
Lover’s Tree (Radio Rhythm)

Ruth Moody- The Garden
The Garden (Red House)
Debi Smith- The Garden
Deep Tracks (Degan Music)

Oliver Schroer- The Garden of Birds and Flowers
Camino (Borealis)

Mike Regenstreif, Anne Hills & Tom Paxton (2001)

Tom Paxton- Whose Garden Was This
The Compleat Tom Paxton (Even Compleater) (Rhino Handmade)
Anne Hills- Gardens
Points of View (Appleseed)
Alice Di Micele- Every Seed
Every Seed We Plant (Alice Otter Music)
Irene Kelley- Garden of Dreams
Pennsylvania Coal (Patio)
Dave Clarke- The Healing Garden
The Healing Garden (Crossties)

Shelley Posen- Fork Garden
Menorah: Songs from a Jewish Life (Well Done Music)
Frpm Both Ends of the Earth- In Mayn Garten
Klezmer (Arc)
Night Sun- Gardening Song
Home (Night Sun)
Fran Avni- Down in the Garden
Eretz (Tara Music)
Frank London's Klezmer Brass Allstars featuring Marjana Sadowska- In Your Garden Twenty Fecund Fruit Trees
Carnival Conspiracy (Piranha)

Diana Braithwaite & Chris Whiteley- In My Garden
Morning Sun (Electro-Fi)
Duke Ellington & Johnny Hodges- Royal Garden Blues
Back to Back: Duke Ellington and Johnny Hodges Play the Blues (Verve)

Rosalie Sorrels & Mike Regenstreif (1993)

Rosalie Sorrels- The Bells of Ireland
Report from Grimes Creek (Green Linnet)
Mara Levine- A Perfect Rose
Facets of Folk (Mara’s Creations)
Susan Crowe- I Stole into a Garden
The Door to the River (Corvus)
Brendan Nolan- If I Had a Garden
Live at the Side Door (Ould Segosha)

Steve Gillette & Cindy Mangsen- Concertina Garden Medley
Being There (Compass Rose)

Next week: The Art of the Long Song

Find me on Facebook. facebook.com/mikeregenstreif

--Mike Regenstreif

Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – Tuesday April 27, 2021

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

CKCU can be heard live at 93.1 FM in Ottawa and https://www.ckcufm.com/ on the web.

This episode of Stranger Songs – Episode #12 – was prerecorded at home and can already be streamed on-demand by clicking on “Listen Now” at … https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/595/51764.html

 

Theme: April in Paris

Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong- April in Paris
Ella and Louis (Verve)
Christine Albert- Mademoiselle de Paris
TexaFrance-Encore! (MoonHouse)
Don Armstrong- Going to Paris
Mother Don’t Give Up on Me Now (Ronstadt Record Co.)

Ronney Abramson- Jukebox of Paris
Jukebox of Paris (Castor Island Music)
Martha Wainwright- Le Métro de Paris
San Fusils, Ni Souliers, à Paris: Martha Wainwright’s Piaf Record (MapleMusic)
Kat Goldman- Letter from Paris
Gypsy Girl (Kat Goldman)
Melody Gardot- From Paris with Love
Sunset in the Blue: Deluxe Edition (Decca)

Buffy Sainte-Marie- Guess Who I Saw in Paris
Illuminations (Vanguard)
Nicki Parrott- The Last Time I Saw Paris
The Last Time I Saw Paris (Venus)
Joni Mitchell- Free Man in Paris
Court and Spark (Elektra)
Gordon Fleming- Parisian Thoroughfare
According to Gordie (Just a Memory)
Andrew Calhoun- A Hoosier in Paris
Shadow of a Wing (Waterbug)

Eric Andersen- Trouble in Paris
The Essential Eric Andersen (Real Gone Music)
Nikki Matheson- It’s Still Raining in Paris
Invisible Angel (Nikki Matheson)
Claribol Stompers- Swing de Paris
Swingattic (Claribol)
Jacques Labrecque- À Paris, sur le petit pont
Folk Songs of France and French Canada (Folkways)

Mike Regenstreif & Erik Frandsen (1976) photo: Felicity Fanjoy

Lenka Lichtenberg with Fray- Pigeons in Paris
Embrace (Sunflower)
The Hot Sardines- I Love Paris
Live at Joe’s Pub (The Hot Sardines)
Erik Frandsen- Another Song About Paris
The Greenwich Village Folk Festival 1989-1990 (Gadfly)
Erroll Garner- Paris Bounce
Paris Impressions (Columbia)

Marianne Faithfull- No Moon in Paris
Negative Capability (BMG)
Jacques Brel- Les Prénoms de Paris
The Very Best of Jacques Brel (Select)
The Swing Commanders- Bye Bye Paris
Steelin’ Back (North Western)

Duke Ellington- Paris Blues
Midnight in Paris (Columbia)

Next week – The Second Stranger Songs Fantasy Concert

Find me on Twitter. www.twitter.com/mikeregenstreif

And on Facebook. facebook.com/mikeregenstreif

--Mike Regenstreif

Tom Russell – Aztec Jazz

TOM RUSSELL & THE NORWEGIAN WIND ENSEMBLE
Aztec Jazz
Frontera Records 
tomrussell.com

Leave it to Tom Russell – who has given us such groundbreaking albums as The Man from God Knows Where, a brilliant folk opera about immigration and the American dream, and Hotwalker, an equally-brilliantly conceived and executed audio collage of original songs, poetry, stories, rants and outside voices that pays tribute to forgotten aspects of American culture, and many other great albums filled with some of the best songwriting of the past 30 years – to raise the art of the live album to a whole new level.

A year ago, Tom and guitarist Thad Beckman, his regular accompanist over the past several years, performed a concert in Halden, Norway with the Norwegian Wind Ensemble, a superb chamber orchestra featuring 21 brass and woodwind players as well as a bassist, drummer and two percussionists under the direction of conductor Frank Brodhal. Swedish composer Mats Hålling wrote orchestral arrangements for 11 of Tom’s songs and the concert was recorded.

The results are absolutely stunning. Tom’s singing and Thad’s lead guitar playing are magnificent and the orchestral arrangements, while uniquely faithful to Tom’s songs, variously recall some of the works of George Gershwin, Duke Ellington, and David Amram, or Gil Evans’ Spanish-tinged chamber jazz arrangements for Miles Davis’ Sketches of Spain, or orchestrated New Orleans second lines or Mexican mariachis.

The album opens with a lush version of “Love Abides,” a beautiful song that contrasts tragedy with blessings, hope and love. It was a perfect finale for The Man from God Knows Where and is an equally perfect way to begin Aztec Jazz.

“Nina Simone,” another quiet, song, lushly arranged for the Norwegian Wind Ensemble follows. The song is about finding what you need in a voice that understands. For Tom, once in a bar in San Cristóbal, Mexico, it was the voice of Nina Simone on the juke box. I know I’ve heard Nina Simone cut through to my soul when she sings about being “lost in the rain in Juarez” in a way I think Bob Dylan would appreciate. Sometimes my own “Nina Simones” have been Rosalie Sorrels or Billie Holiday or a dozen other singers who understand. Update, June 16: Video of Tom Russell and Thad Beckman performing “Nina Simone” with the Norwegian Wind Ensemble.

The pace picks up with “East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam,” in which Tom recalls 1969 when – as the war in Vietnam raged, Neil Armstrong took his small step onto the moon, and 500,000 people sat in the Catskills mud for a three-day music festival – he went to Nigeria as a young academic to teach. Update, June 14: Video of Tom Russell and Thad Beckman performing “East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam” with the Norwegian Wind Ensemble.

“Goodnight, Juarez” is a Tex-Mex lament for Jurarez’s descent from an open tourist town to the battleground it’s become. The song looks at contemporary Juarez, remembers when it was a very different place and imagines how it could be so again. “Juarez, I had a dream today/ The children danced, as the guitars played/ And all the violence up and slipped away/ Goodnight, Juarez, goodnight,” Tom sings with mariachi tinges to the orchestral arrangement.

“Criminology” documents a series of harrowing experiences Tom lived through in the late-‘60s and early-‘70s in Nigeria and Canada. The arrangement features some nifty West African guitar fills by Thad and R&B horn punctuation by the Norwegian Wind Ensemble.

“Guadalupe,” done beautifully here with some gorgeous guitar lines by Thad and an orchestral arrangement highlighting the oboes, is a song that reveals more every time I hear it. And I’m not necessarily referring to new layers of understanding of what Tom was thinking when he wrote it. I mean what I hear and understand about my own truths and my own quests filtered through Tom’s words and the gorgeous melody.

“Stealing Electricity,” with the orchestra at full throttle, has a hook that could have made it a hit back when pop music was about real songs. Tom tells us that reaching out for love is like stealing electricity, sometimes you’re going to get burned.

“Finding You” is a beautiful love song written for Nadine Russell, Tom’s wife, and is lushly arranged for the orchestra.

“Mississippi River Running Backwards,” is about a world out of whack – the kind of stuff TV evangelists might attribute to an angry God. It’s a song perfectly suited to the big, New Orleans-style horn arrangement it has here.

While most of the material on Aztec Jazz is drawn from recent Tom Russell albums, “St. Olav’s Gate,” is one of my favorites of Tom’s early songs. It was chosen for this album, I assume, because its setting is in Norway. The song recalls a single night and a broken promise. Most of us have been that drunken man waiting in vain at St. Olav’s Gate, even if our personal St. Olav’s Gate wasn’t in Oslo.

The album concludes with “Jai Alai,” a brilliant, fast-paced flamenco piece about passion: for the game of jai alai – and for love. The Norwegian Wind Ensemble offers a deeply layered and exciting arrangement and Thad’s guitar echoes the intensity of the flamenco masters.

Although these songs might already be familiar to followers of Tom's music, the way they are reimagined and reinterpreted with the Norwegian Wind Ensemble makes Aztec Jazz an essential Tom Russell album.

Aztec Jazz will be released in June but can now be ordered via Village Records. 

Note: Some of my comments about the songs are drawn from reviews I’ve written about the Tom Russell albums they originally appeared on or from my booklet essay for Veteran’s Day: The Tom Russell Anthology.

Pictured: Thad Beckman, Mike Regenstreif and Tom Russell in Montreal (2012).

Find me on Twitter. twitter.com/@mikeregenstreif

And on Facebook. facebook.com/mikeregenstreif

--Mike Regenstreif

Catherine Russell – Strictly Romancin’

CATHERINE RUSSELL

Strictly Romancin’

World Village Records

catherinerussell.net

Catherine Russell has been just about my favourite present-day jazz singer ever since she finally released Cat, her debut album, in 2006 following a long career as a back-up singer for a variety of artists. The daughter of Luis Russell – who served as band leader for Louis Armstrong back in the day – and Carline Ray, a pioneering woman jazz musician, Cat is a great singer who brings out the best in classic and traditional jazz and blues tunes. Writing in the Montreal Gazette, I called that first album “glorious.” So too have been all of her subsequent releases.

Strictly Romancin’, Cat’s fourth album, is appropriately enough, being released on Tuesday, Valentine’s Day, as most of the songs, most of them classics, some of them obscure-but-great classics, deal with one aspect or another of romance.

There are, of course, different sides to the love relationship. There’s the ready-for-Valentine’s Day woman singing “I’m in the Mood for Love” and “Romance in the Dark”; the hopeless romantic singing “Ev’ntide”; and the spurned or out-of-love woman singing “Under the Spell of the Blues” and “No More.” Whether it’s an inherent loneliness in “Under the Spell of the Blues” or the anticipation of “Romance in the Dark,” Cat nails the appropriate feelings and emotions expressed in each song.

Among my very favourite tracks are humour-laced songs like Duke Ellington and Billy Strayhorn’s kiss-off song “I’m Checkin’ Out, Goom’Bye,” an arrangement highlighted by the playful interaction between Cat and John Allred’s trombone, “Satchel Mouth Baby,” Mary Lou Williams’ shout-out to Louis Armstrong, and “Everybody Loves My Baby,” a fun, swinging tune made famous by the Boswell Sisters.

Certainly one of the most special tracks is the Sister Rosetta Tharpe-Marie Knight spiritual “He’s All I Need.” Backed by Mark Shane’s gospel piano, Cat and her mother, Carline Ray, sound positively inspired.

Cat’s arrangements are perfectly suited to each of the tunes and feature a terrific group of ace musicians – both the core members of her touring band and guests who contribute to select tracks. In addition to those already mentioned, some of the instrumental highlights include Matt Munisteri’s guitar solo on “Don’t Leave Me,” Joe Barbato’s romantic Paris café accordion on “I’m in the Mood for Love,” and Dan Block’s playful clarinet on “Everybody Loves My Baby.”

Catherine Russell draws on the influences of many great singers of bygone years to create a unique voice of her own and to make classic material seem as fresh and vital as ever. Kudos to Cat, to all of the musicians, and to producer Paul Kahn, for another in her series of excellent albums.

Click here for my review of Catherine Russell’s 2010 album, Inside This Heart of Mine.

Pictured: Catherine Russell and Mike Regenstreif at CKUT during Folk Roots/Folk Branches (June 28, 2007).

--Mike Regenstreif

Sneezy Waters in concert and on CD

Until last night, it must have been the better part of 20 years since the last time I saw Ottawa legend Sneezy Waters do a full evening’s concert. It was too long a wait, but a wait that was richly rewarded last night at the National Arts Centre’s Fourth Stage as Sneezy and his five-piece back-up band put on one of the best shows I’ve seen this year.

Sneezy is yet another artist I’ve seemingly known forever. He played often in the 1970s at the Golem, the Montreal folk club I ran back then. In fact, he was the second artist and the first out-of-towner to play there after I took over the Golem in 1974.

Then, of course, there was his long run brilliantly starring in the stage show (and film adaptation) of Hank Williams: The Show He Never Gave, a show I saw several times in Montreal, Toronto and Ottawa during its 13-year run from 1977 to 1990.

But, over the past couple of decades, Sneezy hasn’t toured very much and his hometown concerts have become special events. Last night’s concert – a celebration of his new CD (see below) – sure was.

Sneezy put together a fabulous band for the occasion. Joining him on guitars were Vince Halfhide and Dave Bignell, Ed Bimm on keyboards, Ann Downey on bass – all of whom play on the new CD – and Alistair Dennett on drums. There was no hint that this was any kind of a pick-up or special occasion band. They sounded like they’ve been playing together for years. Theirs was a full, varied, often-creative sound that never needed to overpower the audience with volume. They stretched out and soloed like veteran jazz players on many of the tunes.

The Fourth Stage at the NAC was completely sold out and most of the audience seemed to be Sneezy fans from way back when. When he launched into familiar songs from the old days like “You’ve Got Sawdust on the Floor of Your Heart,” written by his brother, M. John Hodgson, but forever associated with Sneezy, or “I Saw the Light,” the Hank Williams classic, the audience needed no prompting on when to sing along in just the right places.

And it was a varied repertoire that encompassed, mixed, matched and blended strains of jazz, blues, folk, country, rock, reggae and even African music in an eclectic repertoire that drew on all of those traditions.

In addition to many of the songs on the new CD, concert highlights included “Blue Light Boogie,” the show opener which had Sneezy cast as a 1940s jump blues jazzbo, “Cold Cold Heart,” which proved Sneezy is still the best Hank Williams interpreter around, and the encore song, a bouncy version of Tony Bird’s “Bird of Paradise.”

 And, generous band leader that he was, Sneezy played some fine back-up guitar and provided harmonies on five songs, scattered throughout the concert, featuring band members Vince Halfhide and Ann Downey on two songs each and Ed Bimm on one.

SNEEZY WATERS

Sneezy Waters

sneezywaters.com

Sneezy Waters has never been a prolific recording artist. By my count, the eponymously titled Sneezy Waters is only his fourth album in a career that stretches back more than four decades, and the first new recording since 1997’s A Letter Home. It’s an album that was well worth waiting for and showcases Sneezy as a mature singer, relaxed in his repertoire, who knows just how to communicate the essence of a song. Just listen to him pull off an a cappella version of Duke Ellington’s “Solitude.” I can’t even think of any jazz singers I’ve heard do that (or who would have the guts to try).

Sneezy is an interpretive singer rather than a typical singer-song-writer. But, there is one almost-original song here. “(When I’m Loving Them) I Only Think of You,” which sounds like it could have come straight out of The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams, and could be a new country classic (if only there were still such a thing) was written by his brother, M. John Hodgson. Speaking of country classics, Sneezy’s version of “I Heard the Bluebirds Sing” has all the requisite harmonies.

There are a lot of other highlights to this 13-song collection. Sneezy beautifully captures the late-night loneliness inherent to Tom Waits’ “Invitation to the Blues,” and with a one-word lyric change at the end of Willie P. Bennett’s “Me and Molly,” turns the song into a poignant elegy for Willie.

There’s a lot of fun to be had in such numbers as Leroy Carr’s “Papa’s On the Housetop,” Mance Lipscomb’s “Buckdance,” a guitar instrumental that’s made even more fun by Brian Sanderson’s sousaphone playing, and “Ever Since You Told Me That You Loved Me (I’m a Nut),” a very early Tin Pan Alley novelty tune.

Sneezy also very effectively brings “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime,” the Yip Harburg-Jay Gorney Depression-era classic, back to life.

My favourite track on the CD is the album-ending version of Mary McCaslin’s “Circle of Friends,” a song that brings me right back to my Golem days when friends like Sneezy and Mary and Willie (and so many more) would ply their song-sharing trade on the small stage.

--Mike Regenstreif

Diana Braithwaite & Chris Whiteley -- DeltaPhonic

DIANA BRAITHWAITE & CHRIS WHITELEY
DeltaPhonic
Electro-Fi Records
braithwaiteandwhiteley.com

The pairing of singer Diana Braithwaite with multi-instrumentalist and singer Chris Whiteley was almost certainly a match made in blues heaven. On DeltaPhonic, their third CD as a duo, Diana and Chris continue to create vital, contemporary blues mostly in the traditions of 1930s and ‘40s when the blues had migrated from the rural south to the urban north and acquired a sophisticated, jazzy hue. This time, though, some of the tunes begin to take on the harder edge of Chicago blues in the post-war years.

All but two of these songs – including one instrumental – were composed by Diana and Chris. Among my favourites is “Midnight Stroll,” a swinging, Basie-like tune that begins with Chris’s guitar trading licks with the horn section before Chris and Diana start trading lines in the verses. I particularly like both the horn arrangement – featuring Phil Skladowski on baritone sax, Jonathon Wong on tenor sax and Chris on trumpet – and the vocal interplay on this number.

Another is “Border Patrol Blues,” a slow, blues that begins with Chris on guitar in a musical conversation with his son, Jesse Whiteley, at the piano before Diana comes in with the vocals and her riding-on-the-train and crossing-the-border verses. Chris also offers a great harmonica solo on this track.

Along with their original material, Diana and Chris also offer up a fine version of Tampa Red’s blues standard, “It Hurts Me Too,” and a sublime version of the jazz ballad, “It Was a Sad Night in Harlem,” a song that Ivie Anderson sang with the Duke Ellington Orchestra back in the 1930s. It’s a beautiful number to end the album with.

--Mike Regenstreif

Catherine Russell -- Inside This Heart of Mine

CATHERINE RUSSELL
Inside This Heart of Mine
World Village
catherinerussell.net

In the spring of 2006, an album called Cat by Catherine Russell, a singer I’d never heard of before, landed on my desk. As a radio host and producer, and as a music reviewer for Sing Out! and several other publications, a lot of albums by artists I’ve never heard of before land on my desk. Every once in a while, one of those albums jumps out at me from the first track and I know I’m hearing someone special.

And so it was with Catherine Russell. She grabbed me from this first track, an old jazz tune called “Sad Lover Blues.” Cat’s version – Cat, short for Catherine, has been her nickname since childhood – blends classic blues, swing, R&B and country influences into something a jazz-loving folkie like me was going to take to right away. As I listened to the other 14 songs on the album, it quickly became obvious that this was a great singer who’d certainly been exposed to all of those kinds of music and much more.

It was easy to tell – from the sound of her voice and the maturity of her delivery, and from the pictures on the CD cover that showed an attractive, middle-aged woman – that Cat couldn’t be a newcomer to the world of music. But why, I wondered, hadn’t I heard of her before? How could it be that this 50-year-old singer was releasing her very first album?

Montreal has the world’s largest jazz festival and in my review of Cat for The Montreal Gazette, I said, “Russell needs to be here at the jazz festival next year.” Somebody at the jazz festival was paying attention and there she was, in June 2007, wowing a crowd of 10,000 or more at the Montreal International Jazz Festival. And her trip to Montreal for the jazz festival gave me the opportunity to sit down with Cat and find out about this fabulous singer I’d never heard of before that album landed on my desk.

I found out from Cat that she’d spent the first three decades of her career as a side person, helping make other artists sound good. “People ask me all the time why I waited so long to do my first record,” she said. I wasn’t waiting. I was a side person.”

Those are the opening paragraphs to “Blues & Country & All That Jazz: The Genre Fusing Music of Catherine Russell,” an article I wrote for the Winter 2008 issue of Sing Out! Magazine.

When I interviewed Catherine Russell on Folk Roots/Folk Branches and for that Sing Out! article, Cat was preparing to record Sentimental Streak, her second CD. Released about the same time as the article was published, Sentimental Streak was every bit as good as that inspired debut that grabbed me in 2006.

I could say the same about Cat’s third release, Inside This Heart of Mine. But, I won’t, because, if anything, it’s even better. Her alto, sounding even more relaxed and confident than before, pulls you right into this set of mostly classic jazz and blues tunes anchored by inventive arrangements steeped in all of the kinds of music she grew up listening to – her parents are the late Luis Russell, a jazz legend who was Louis Armstrong’s bandleader in the 1930s and ‘40s, and Carline Ray, a bass player and singer, who was a member of the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, a band that made history in the 1940s as the first all-female big band – and all the different kinds of music she’s played and sung over the years.

I love the whole album, but if I had to pick a few highlights they’d certainly include what is now my all-time favourite version of Willie Dixon’s oft-recorded “Spoonful,” featuring some wonderful blues banjo playing by Matt Munisteri (who’s heard on guitar for most of the album and on banjo on a couple of others) and the tuba of the always-wonderful Howard Johnson; “We the People,” a delightful Fats Waller tune from 1938 that swings like mad that I’d never heard before; “Long, Strong and Consecutive,” a sassy song filled with double entendres which seems like it could be a Bessie Smith song but was actually written by Duke Ellington in the 1940s; and “Struttin’ With Some Barbecue,” a great old tune that Cat’s father must have played hundreds of times with Louis Armstrong.

Along with the classic material, Cat also includes a couple of great contemporary songs that fit right in. “November,” is a sad song of separation written by producer Paul Kahn; and “Just Because You Can,” written by Rachelle Garniez, sounds like something Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli might have played (if Reinhardt played banjo).

Catherine Russell is always a joy to listen to. Inside This Heart of Mine will be released on April 13.

Pictured: Catherine Russell and Mike Regenstreif at CKUT during Folk Roots/Folk Branches (June 28, 2007).

--Mike Regenstreif