Barking Dog: November 7, 2024
Joni Mitchell - John Hardy
She’s 81 today!
This is her version of the traditional American folk song based on the life of John Hardy, a railroad worker who was living in West Virginia in the Spring of 1893 when he got into a drunken argument during a craps game and killed a man
He was subsequently found guilty of murder and hanged on January 19, 1894
This was recorded at the radio station CFCQ in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan in 1963
Dave Van Ronk - Both Sides Now
Another song by Joni Mitchell, written around 1966
Van Ronk recorded a version with his band the Hudson Dusters during a brief foray into rock music, and that was the first commercial release of the song
He and Mitchell first met in Winnipeg in 1965, when they both appeared on a TV program hosted by Oscar Brand called Let’s Sing Out
They later became friends when Mitchell moved to New York, and he stated that he thought she was the single most talented artist to come out of the 60s folk revival
Mitchell said that his version of “Both Sides Now”—which he called “Clouds”—was her favourite recording of the song
Keb’ Mo’ - Big Yellow Taxi
Keb’ Mo’ is a Grammy-award-winning musician based in Nashville who’s been playing professionally since the 70s
This is off his 2001 album Big Wide Grin
Joni Mitchell released the song in 1970
Barbara Dane - Ramblin’
Dane died on October 20th at the age of 97
She was a folk, jazz, and blues singer from Detroit whose voice was described by Time Magazine as "pure, rich ... rare as a 20 carat diamond"
Though she was invited to tour with the jazz guitarist Alvino Rey’s band as a teenager, she turned him down to instead sing at factory gates, in union halls, and at demonstrations for racial equality, and she remained an activist for the rest of her life
The song is by Woody Guthrie, with music based on “Goodnight, Irene” by Leadbelly
This is from her 1962 album When I Was A Young Girl
Star Thistle - Elimination Day
A brand new one from the Winnipeg artist
Jerron Paxton - It’s All Over Now
Contemporary Los Angeles musician whose style draws from recordings made before World War II
This song is from his new album Things Done Changed, which came out on October 18
He wrote it when he was 16
Bruce Cockburn - Soul of a Man
Singer-songwriter and guitarist from Ottawa who’s been playing professionally for over 40 years
This is a Blind Willie Johnson song, first recorded in 1930
This version is from Cockburn’s 2009 live album Slice O’ Life
Antonia Lamb - Morning and an Oldsmobile
She was a musician, dancer, actor, writer, and astrologer who was active in the Greenwich Village and LA folk scenes of the 1960s
This is from her 1978 debut album Easy to Love Her
Thomas Fraser - The Last Thing on My Mind
He was a Scottish fisherman and farmer who left behind thousands of home recordings when he died in 1978, the majority of which were country and blues songs
His grandson rediscovered the tapes and released the first album of his music in 2002, followed shortly after by two more albums
This is from the 2012 album For the Sake of Days Gone By
The song is by Tom Paxton, who wrote the song in the early 1960s based on the traditional song “The Leaving of Liverpool”
Zeinab Shaath - Don’t Ask Me the Impossible
Shaath was only a teenager when she began recording, and her music was some of the first in the English language to bring attention to the Palestinian struggle
The lyrics are a translated poem written by the Palestinian writer Fouzi El Asmar in 1970
Shaath wrote the song in 1975
David Rovics - The Constitution is My Permit
He’s a topical singer-songwriter based in Oregon who’s been playing since the 1990s
This is from his new album, Jabaliya
Willie Dunn - Louis Riel
Was a Mi’kmaq musician, film director, and politician from Montreal
This is his ballad about Louis Riel, the founder of Manitoba, from his 1972 self-titled album
Gordon Lightfoot - Ballad of Yarmouth Castle
Recorded live in Ottawa in 1966 and released in 1973
It was his first shipwreck song
Interestingly, the shipwreck occurred on November 13, 1965, almost exactly 10 years before the Edmund Fitzgerald sank
Peter Frank - Little Feather
He was a singer-songwriter and bush pilot from Wagmatcook First Nation in Nova Scotia
Recorded in Halifax in 1977
This song was included on the Grammy-nominated 2014 compilation album Native North America
Irving Layton - The Cold Green Element
He was one of several Montreal poets who redefined the postwar Canadian literary scene of the mid 20th century, rejecting the Victorianism of the previous generation
From the 1957 album Six Montreal Poets
He wrote it in 1954
Jesse Fuller - You’re No Good
He was an American one-man band born in Georgia in 1896
He could play multiple instruments simultaneously, using a harmonica holder to hold a harmonica, a kazoo, or a microphone, playing guitar, and tap-dancing or soft-shoeing as he played
Though he had already learned two styles of guitar by the age of 10, he only decided to try making a living from music in the early 1950s
He started by working locally in clubs and bars in San Francisco and other nearby cities, but became better known by performing on TV, and in 1954, when he was 58, Fuller recorded his first album
This one is off his 1972 album Brother Lowdown, though he first released it on his 1963 album San Francisco Bay Blues as “Crazy About a Woman”
Dock Boggs - Down South Blues
Influential old-time musician from Norton, Virginia who recorded in 1927 and 1929 but worked as a coal miner much of his life after pawning his banjo in the 1930s during the Great Depression
The musician and folklorist Mike Seeger sought him out in 1963, coincidentally just after Boggs had recently purchased a banjo and been practising for several months
Seeger persuaded Boggs to perform at a folk festival in North Carolina, and he began recording again and touring throughout the United States
This one was recorded in September of 1963, and Dock learned it from one of several recordings made of it in 1923 by female blues singers
ID Stamper - Down South Blues
Kentucky musician who played harmonica, banjo, guitar, and fiddle, but was known for playing the dulcimer
He worked for 40 years as a miner, then worked a better paying job as a maintenance worker at a children’s hospital, and later, in his retirement, dedicated himself full-time to performing at countless events, including local festivals, college concerts, and national folklife events
This is from his 1977 album Red Wing
Karen O - Hum Hum Hum
She’s a musician from New Jersey, best known as the lead singer for the band Yeah Yeah Yeahs
This is from For the Birds: The Birdsong Project, a collection of 242 songs and poems about birds by countless artists
During the pandemic, Randall Poster, a music supervisor for filmmakers like Martin Scorsese and Wes Anderson, became highly aware of the birds he could hear in his neighbourhood
He and his colleague, Rebecca Reagan, came up with the idea to invite musicians to create music built around birdsong, which resulted in the collection
Billy Connolly - Sergeant, Where’s Mine?
Connolly may be better known as a comedian and actor, he started out as a folksinger with a comedic persona in the 1960s
Connolly wrote the song in the mid-1970s, and the Dubliners later popularised it
He wrote it during the Troubles in Northern Ireland from the perspective of a wounded soldier recalling the recruitment ads of the time that promised adventures in exotic places
Connolly included it on his 1974 album Cop Yer Whack for This
Keiichi Sokabe - She’s a Rider
He’s a Japanese musician known as a member of the band Sunny Day Service and as a solo artist
This is a live recording made in February of 2022, and the name of the album it song comes from translates to Songs that lovers sing after they fall asleep
Leon Bibb - Turn! Turn! Turn!
He was an American-Canadian folksinger and Broadway actor who was active during the folk revival of the 1950s and 60s, and, though he was blacklisted during the McCarthy era, he remained active as a musician and activist, performing on Hootenanny and the Ed Sullivan Show and recording albums throughout the 1960s
He’s also the father of roots musician Eric Bibb, who we often play on the show
Pete Seeger adapted this song from the Book of Ecclesiastes, and the music was written in the late 1950s
Luther Magby - Blessed Are the Poor
This comes from the 2010 compilation album Really the Blues? A Blues History 1893-1959, Volume 1
Magby was a gospel musician from South Carolina who recorded two songs for Columbia Records in Georgia in 1927
Great Lake Swimmers - I Will Never See the Sun
They’re an Ontario band that have been performing since the early 2000s
This comes from their 2024 album In Pieces: An Acoustic Retrospective
It came out on October 4, and it’s a collection of acoustic re-recordings of songs from their 8-album catalogue
The song was originally included on their 2003 self-titled debut album
Margaret Avison - Excerpt from work in progress
From the 1958 Folkways album Six Toronto Poets
Avison was a poet from Ontario who worked day jobs including as a librarian, editor, and social worker, choosing jobs that left her free time to write
During her career, she received a Guggenheim fellowship, won two Governor General’s Awards, and became an Officer of the Order of Canada for her contributions to Canadian literature
Bob Dylan - Talking Merchant Marine
This is a recording from his first concert, given at the Carnegie Chapter Hall on the fifth floor of Carnegie Hall on November 4, 1961, just 11 months after he arrived in New York
As he states, the song was written by Woody Guthrie
Gary Óg, Sean Lyons - This Land Is Your Land
Óg is a musician from Glasgow who’s been playing Irish rebel folk music for over 30 years
Lyons is a British guitarist and songwriter
This is off their 2003 album Songs of Rebellion
The song was written by Woody Guthrie but this version has been adapted to refer to Irish geography and politics
Dyad - Gathering Wildflowers
From Victoria, BC
Off their 2006 album No Pedlars or Preachers
They got the song from Dillard Chandler of Madison County, North Carolina, a folksinger who knew hundreds of traditional ballads from his region
Emerson Woodcock - The Backwoodsman
From an album of songs from the Ontario lumber camps, collected by Edith Fowke and released in 1961
Sung by Emerson Woodcock of Peterborough, who was 58 when this was recorded, and thus the youngest of the men who sung on the album
The liner notes describe it as “the tale of a country boy’s night out”
It was widespread in lumber camps across the United States and Canada, and Fowke expresses curiosity at the song’s popularity given that there is nothing “unusual or particularly dramatic about the story”
Joe Hickerson - Woad
Folk singer and songleader from Illinois
He was Librarian and Director of the Archive of Folk Song at the American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress for 35 years
Known for his work as a lecturer, researcher, and performer
Hickerson says “For those unacquainted with the mysteries of ancient colouration, Woad refers to a brassicaceous plant and to the bluish-purple dye derived therefrom, which was used by ancient Britons at the time of Julius Caesar for ritualistic purposes”
Fraser Union - The Bridge Came Tumbling Down
They’re a BC folk group that formed in 1983
This is off their 2009 album BC Songbook, and it was written by Stompin’ Tom Connors in honour of the 18 construction workers who were killed in 1958 when a crane collapsed during the construction of the Second Narrows Bridge in Vancouver, later renamed the Ironworkers Memorial Bridge
Memphis Willie B - Brownsville Blues
He was a Memphis blues guitarist, singer, and harmonica player who was initially known as a member of the Memphis Jug Band
He spent some time away from the music industry after serving in the army during the Second World War, but began playing again in the 1960s, and recorded two albums, played at folk festivals, and toured coffeehouses across the United States before abruptly stopping in the late 1960s and living a quiet life until his death in 1993
Daniel Koulack - Train Song
From Manitoba
Off a compilation album of banjo music from 2007 called Old Time Banjo Festival
