Search - George Pegram :: George Pegram

Joyful music from a bygone era

W. F. Orzo | New York | 01/18/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This CD alternates instrumentals - featuring primarily Pegram on banjo - with Pegram singing solo on classic, old time songs. His singing style is simple and deeply affecting, a voice from the mountains that sounds like it has lived through these songs all its life. The album was recorded at the end of his long career, in 1970, four years before his death at the age of 63.



The instrumentals and banjo solos truly sound great (the unaccompanied Over the Waves Waltz is a fine study in solo banjo, as is the classic "Just Because", which Pegram blazes through in his three-finger banjo style). But I find that Pegram's singing of classic gospel songs steals the show, with definitve versions of "Old Time Religion", "What A Friend We Have in Jesus" and "Will The Circle Be Unbroken?" This is the music you want to hear as you say goodbye for the last time to old friends whom you hope to "meet on that beautiful shore.""