Search - Various Artists :: American Roots

Some of the history of American folk music, anyway

Jerome Clark | Canby, Minnesota | 08/13/2000

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Odd that something with a title and subtitle so grandiose as this collection's has no songs by African-American artists on it. After all, black Americans have played a huge role, from spirituals to blues and all points between, in the creation of our country's folk and vernacular music. Here, as far as I can tell, only two African-Americans appear, and in secondary roles on disc four: Sonny Terry and Josh White. For the sort of racial integration that more truly defines our grassroots music, you'll have to go to Yazoo's splendid ongoing series on Early Rural American Music.That -- no small consideration -- aside, American Roots is a good deal, financially of course, but also artistically. The no-frills packaging assures the absence of a fat (or even thin) booklet of liner notes, explaining what compiler Tony Watts's selection criteria were. They're certainly unusual, though they shouldn't be; unlike many of his colleagues, Watts apparently has no trouble seeing that Gene Autry, Roy Acuff, and Merle Travis have as legitimate a claim to a place on the folk-music spectrum as do the Carter Family, Uncle Dave Macon, and Fiddlin' John Carson, whose archaic styles are more obviously tied to earlier Southern traditions. Watts documents the debt early country innovators had to the sounds that came before them as well as the creative, personal approach they contributed as they invented a more modern music. And listening to Travis's flat-picking instrumental "Cannonball Rag," you can hear the music coming full circle; Travis pupil Doc Watson would make Travis's jazz-inflected city sound into something most people assume to be organic Appalachiana.Disc four moves from the South to New York City, where the Communist Party's Popular Front and singing Stalinists Pete Seeger, Lee Hays, Cisco Houston, and Woody Guthrie created the urban folk revival. This disc contains one of American Roots' two genuinely repellant songs (the other is on disc one -- Vernon Dalhart's "The Runaway Train," bearer of what passed for humor in 1931 but seven decades later comes across as crude and stupid racism). In a 1940 reworking of the traditional "Liza Jane" into an anti-war agitprop exercise, we are reminded that during the Hitler-Stalin pact, Seeger, et al., cravenly followed the Soviet line, which was that World War II was all about the machinations of British capitalists and none of America's business. Later, in the same disc, Seeger and the Almanac Singers are performing a vigorous, full-throated, chirrupy anti-Hitler tune, "Deliver the Goods," done in 1942 after Hitler had attacked Russia and it was okay to oppose Hitler again. The hypocrisy is not pretty to hear. Side four also serves to remind us that where sheer talent is concerned, Guthrie was head and shoulders above the rest.The sound quality on all four discs is decent on the whole. Inexplicably, however, there is annoying surface noise on Burl Ives's "The Big Rock Candy Mountain," hardly a rare recording. But for the price, I guess it's churlish to demand perfection. Anyone who loves American folk music, or at least that part of it sung by European Americans with (mostly) Southern accents, should have this worthwhile and entertaining anthology in his or her CD collection."

Oh, I wish for more from Disky--hurrah, hurrah!

Lee Hartsfeld | Central Ohio, United States | 02/18/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This wonderful, very low-priced collection from Holland's Disky label features 104 tracks of country and pop-folk music from the late 1920s to the mid-1940s. The unusually good sound quality on the earliest tracks, to say nothing of the radio-style intros on several numbers, lead me to suspect that much of this was recorded for, or from, radio broadcasts. For example, one of the Carter Family tracks is entitled "Jimmie Rodgers Visits" and features classically hokey Opry-style banter. Unfortunately, there are no liner notes, though at least recording years are listed on the inserts. Contrast the casual nature of this European "roots" collection with the pretentious hoopla that normally accompanies domestic issues of the same type. Strange and, in a way, refreshing.The best material is the earliest, and this includes tracks by Uncle Dave Macon, the meter-challenged Fiddlin' John Carson, the elegantly-named Earl Johnson's Clodhoppers, The Carter Family, and Gene Autry, among others. Early Bluegrass abounds, and long before it is alleged to have existed--check out Byrd Moore and his Hot Shots from 1930, Hayes Shepherd's 1927 bluegrass banjo playing, and Uncle Dave Macon's "Sail Away Ladies," also from 1927, a call-and-response number in pure Bill Monroe/Carl Story style. Early country crooning is represented by Jimmie Rodgers, Vernon Dalhart, and Gene Autry--the latter sounding atypically downhome on 1931's "High-Steppin' Mama." Elsewhere, Moonshine Kate makes like Bessie Smith on "My Man's a Jolly Railroad Man" ("His engine's number eleven"), and Riley Puckett offers a smooth, cowboy-crooner rendition of "Red Wing," which was an oldie even then (1927, again). These tracks are superbly representative of the earliest recorded country.The third and fourth CDs feature more commercially familiar string-band styles, 1940s bluegrass, highly nimble Django-Reinhardt-influenced guitar picking by Merle Travis, and the "Crazy Tennesseeans" of Roy Acuff. Of particular interest are Travis' "Pigmeat Strut," which was ineptly lifted, in part, by Scotty Moore on Elvis Presley's "Just Because," and a song called "Oklahoma Hills," the melody better-known as "Cottonfields." Woody Guthrie, Cisco Huston, Peter Seeger and the Almanac Singers, and other pop-folk greats close the collection. The highlights: A lovely, mixolydian-mode melody on Guthrie's 1941 "House of the Rising Sun;" Pete Seeger's energetic banjo workout "Cumberland Bear Chase" (1944), a version of a tune-with-narrative recorded in the 1920s by the Hill Billies; and Seeger's "Talking Union" (1941). "Talking Union" found new life many years later as Dick Feller's apolitical rant against bad customer service, "The Credit Card Song."Sound quality ranges from acceptable to fabulous. An incredible deal. I wish for more from Disky."

A lot of music for the price, but not much else

Glenn | Stockton, CA USA | 07/24/2001

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Like the first reviewer, I too was struck by the lack of African American representation in a collection titled "American Roots." I can't really imagine how this might have happened, except perhaps because the collection comes from a Dutch record company, though even that explanation seems rather untenable. The lack of any documentation in the box set only exacerbates this oddity.You sure get a lot of songs here, and the range of material is useful for a collector of old timey music - I particularly appreciated the inclusion of "I'm A Man of Constant Sorrow" and the Pete Seeger repertoire. Again, though, there's zero documentation on the history of these selections, and specific information like recording dates and record labels is really missed.For the completists in the audience, you'll want this collection. For interested amateurs, you'll probably be better off with either the Harry Smith's AAFM or the many series put together (and well documented) by Yazoo. In fact, there are probably links above this review to at least one Yazoo series.Bottom line: lots of songs but little explanatory information."