Music lessons don't have to end with high school band. There's a whole world of playing opportunities out there for Northwest Indiana folks, read on to find out more!
There were a ton of great musicians born in January! This month we covered Iris Dement, Joan Baez and Dolly Parton, but we left out Janis Joplin, Earl Scruggs, David Bowie, Elvis Presley, Allan Toussaint, Etta James, Jim Croce, Steve Earl, Warren Zevon, Stephen Stills, Country Joe McDonald and Huddie Ledbetter. (We'll get you guys next year.)
Last night we celebrated Lucinda Williams' 65th birthday by playing her breakout hit, Car Wheels on a Gravel Road.
Next Friday (February 2nd) is a rehearsal for Paul Henry's open mic, so pick your favorite 4 songs and we'll polish them to a high gloss for the 8th. 🙂
Last week, we warmed up with a classic from the Civil Rights Movement.
This Little Light of Mine is a gospel
song that came to be an anthem of the civil rights movement in the 1950's and
60's. It was originally written by Harry Dixon Loes around 1920 as a children’s
song. This Little Light of Mine" made it into the American folk music
tradition when it was found and documented by John Lomax in 1939. At Goree
State Farm in Huntsville, Texas, Lomax recorded Doris McMurray singing the
spiritual.
During the Civil Rights Movement, Zilphia Horton of
the Highlander Folk School adapted the song and taught it to Pete Seeger. The
song is famously tied to Civil Rights leader, Fannie Lou Hamer. On August 31st,
1962, while being detained by police on her way back from attempting to
register to vote with other members of her community, Hamer began singing this
song with other volunteers from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
(SNCC).
Here is Odetta singing a beautiful version of the song.
Next, we celebrated Dolly Parton's birthday. She turned 72 on Friday!
The origins of Jolene
"One night, I was on stage, and there was this beautiful little girl — she was probably 8 years old at the time," Parton says. "And she had this beautiful red hair, this beautiful skin, these beautiful green eyes, and she was looking up at me, holding, you know, for an autograph. I said, 'Well, you're the prettiest little thing I ever saw. So what is your name?' And she said, 'Jolene.' And I said, 'Jolene. Jolene. Jolene. Jolene.' I said, 'That is pretty. That sounds like a song. I'm going to write a song about that.'"
Parton says that she got the story for her song from another redhead in her life at the time — a bank teller who was giving Parton's new husband a little more interest than he had coming.
"She got this terrible crush on my husband," Parton says. "And he just loved going to the bank because she paid him so much attention. It was kinda like a running joke between us — when I was saying, 'Hell, you're spending a lot of time at the bank. I don't believe we've got that kind of money.' So it's really an innocent song all around, but sounds like a dreadful one."
Dolly Parton has been married to Carl Dean, a retired Nashville businessman, since 1966. "Every time I look at him sleeping over there in his La-Z-Boy, snoring, that hair turning grey at the temples," she said, "I wonder if Jolene is still around. I'll call her up and say, 'you come and get him now!'" We ended on a high note with 9 to 5, Dolly Parton's anthem to working people everywhere. It was the #1 hit on the country, pop, and adult contemporary charts in Jan-Feb 1981, so it's fair to say Dolly struck a nerve!
The tide's gonna turn and it's all gonna roll your way.
And finally, it's not a song we covered last Friday, but the video is deeply silly and makes me laugh-- it's Dolly Parton's Why'd You Come in Here Looking Like That. Enjoy!
To honor the fact that much of Northwest Indiana is fighting one flu bug after another, I thought it would be an excellent time to learn Jimmie Rodgers' The T.B. Blues. Jimmie had personal knowledge of the subject, as he ended up dying of tuberculosis two years after the single was released. He was just 35 years old when he passed away, but his music legacy (and his trademark yodel) live on in country music. You can even visit The Jimmie Rodgers Museum if you happen to be passing through Meridian Mississippi!
Here is a version of The T.B. Blues sung by Pete Seeger that I just love, from his American Favorite Ballads 5-CD set issued by Smithsonian Folkways. It's where I first heard the song.
Last night we started work on Bob Dylan's Forever Young. Dylan recorded two versions-- one slow, one fast-- and we're going to tackle the fast version (video at the link).
Here is a beautiful cover by Joan Baez doing the slow version.
Baez celebrates her 77th birthday this week, and this song seems appropriate when considering her life and musical career. I also recommend her memoir And a Voice to Sing With. She published this is 1987 and really needs a sequel.
