Stranger Songs with Mike Regenstreif – CKCU – February 20, 2024: Songs of Chuck Berry

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/595/63977.html

Theme: Songs of Chuck Berry (1926-2017)

Chuck Berry, who died in 2017 at the age of 90, was an influential guitar player, singer and songwriter and one of the founding and foundational figures of rock ‘n’ roll. Berry was a St. Louis blues musician who signed with Chess Records in Chicago and began releasing singles in 1955 and LPs in 1957. It wasn’t long before he was one of the early stars of rock ‘n’ roll.

Chuck Berry- Rock and Roll Music

Best of the Chess Years (Not Now Music)

The Beatles- Roll Over Beethoven

With The Beatles (Parlophone)

The Rolling Stones- Carol

The Rolling Stones (Decca)

Mollie O'Brien- Brown Eyed Handsome Man

Big Red Sun (Sugar Hill)

Ken Hamm- Maybellene

Live ’05 (North Track)

Chuck Berry- Beautiful Delilah

Best of the Chess Years (Not Now Music)

Ronnie Hawkins & The Hawks- Forty Days

The EP Collection (See for Miles)

The Band- Promised Land

Moondog Matinee (Capitol)

Linda Ronstadt- Back in the U.S.A.

Living in the U.S.A. (Asylum)

Chuck Berry- Sweet Little Sixteen

Best of the Chess Years (Not Now Music)

Jim Kweskin & The Jug Band- Memphis, Tennessee

Jug Band Music (Vanguard)

Geoff & Maria Muldaur- Havana Moon

Sweet Potatoes (Omnivore)

Geoff Muldaur & Amos Garrett- La Juanda

Geoff Muldaur & Amos Garrett (Flying Fish)

George Benson- How You’ve Changed

Walking to New Orleans: Remembering Chuck Berry and Fats Domino (Provogue)

The Stephen Barry Band- You Can’t Catch Me

Happy Man (Bros)

Tom Rush- Too Much Monkey Business

Tom Rush/Take a Little Walk with Me (BGO)

Emmylou Harris- (You Never Can Tell) C’est La Vie

Luxury Liner (Warner Bros./Rhino)

Dion- Johnny B. Goode

Born in the Bronx (Dance House)

Chuck Berry- Bye Bye Johnny

Best of the Chess Years (Not Now Music)

Jim Byrnes- Nadine

St. Louis Times (Black Hen Music)

Ry Cooder- 13 Question Method

Get Rhythm (Warner Bros.)

Ann Rabson- School Days

Struttin’ My Stuff (M.C.)

Jerry Lee Lewis- Little Queenie

Jerry Rocks (Bear Family)

Chuck Berry- Let It Rock

Best of the Chess Years (Not Now Music)

Chris Smither- Tulane

Another Way to Find You (Flying Fish)

Geoff Bartley- No Money Down

Hear That Wind Howl (Waterbug)

Gerry & The Pacemakers- Reelin’ and Rockin’

The EP Collection (See for Miles)

Chuck Berry- Downbound Train

Best of the Chess Years (Not Now Music)

Chuck Berry- Berry Pickin’

Best of the Chess Years (Not Now Music)

Next week: “Take the ‘A’ Train”: A Tribute to Duke Ellington.

--Mike Regenstreif

Kathy Mattea – Calling Me Home

KATHY MATTEA

Calling Me Home

Sugar Hill

mattea.com

In a career dating back to the 1980s, Kathy Mattea had a bunch of country hits. In 2008, though, she shucked all commercial pretence and released Coal, a thematic folk and bluegrass album of songs about the lives of Appalachian coal miners. It was her finest work ever. Whether singing about lost ways of life or of lost lives, she found the emotional essence of each song and brought it, sometimes powerfully, sometimes beautifully, to the fore.

Although only a few of the songs on Calling Me Home explicitly deal with coal miners, the album, both thematically and musically, does continue in the vein of Coal and at least equals, if not surpasses, the predecessor’s achievement.

The deep Appalachian roots of the album are signaled from the beginning of the first song, Michael and Janet Dowling’s “A Far Cry,” when the first sound heard is the fiddle and the second is the mandolin. The song itself, memorably recorded years ago by Del McCoury, is a powerful song of regret from the perspective of someone who forsook their life in the Appalachians, and the love they had there.

As noted, several songs deal directly with coal mining issues. Jean Ritchie’s quietly powerful “West Virginia Mine Disaster,” sung from the perspective of a woman whose husband was one of many men lost in the latest mining disaster and who fears a similar fate could await her sons. “Black Waters,” also written by Jean, and equally quietly powerful, is a lament for the environmental devastation the coal industry has wreaked in states like Kentucky, where Jean comes from, and West Virginia, where Kathy comes from. In Larry Cordle’s “Hello, My Name is Coal,” the narrator is coal itself contrasting its virtues and its sins.

Most of the other songs are drawn from writers who are either from the Appalachians like the late Hazel Dickens, or who have immersed themselves in the traditional culture and/or music. Among the most compelling are Si Kahn’s “Gone, Gonna Rise Again,” in which a beloved and wise grandfather is recalled; and Alice Gerrard’s “Calling Me Home,” sung a cappella with chilling harmonies by Tim Eriksen, in which a dying man says his farewells.

The mostly-acoustic arrangements featuring such musicians and harmony singers as Bryan Sutton, Stuart Duncan, Tim O’Brien, Emmylou Harris, Aoife O’Donovan, Mollie O’Brien and Alison Krauss serve the songs perfectly.

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--Mike Regenstreif