Folkways Reflections

I did this early on in the semester in my sketchbook, I hope it shows all of the talent, knowledge, and enthusiasm Tony has every Thursday night!

Songs and Places has come to an end. I have so many emotions as I look all the way back to the beginning of the class, then remember different moments throughout the course, and to the present. I have learned so much about the history of folk songs, what they mean, what I think about them, the artists who sing them, and ideas related to art.

The Lomax's

The Lomax recordings were an essential component in not only documenting but exposing folk songs to the world. The process of locating each artists by journeying to rural towns was entertaining to read about. It shows that hard work pays off. This didn't just benefit the Lomax's, but also some of the artists like Leadbelly who worked his way to become well-known (although still very much under the control of Lomax, working for him). Then of course the world has the opportunity to hear the folksongs recorded as original as it gets.

Learning about the African Americans' history in America through their songs was a unique way to think about it. From the tribal songs to work songs and gospels all the way to blues... The music really tells it all. What is great is that it is a pure telling of history, through the music because it is sung by the people who experienced it. This was a successful way of re-learning the history of slavery because songs bring different emotions to the listener than the written word. One song that is a great example of these is "O Mary Don't You Weep." I had never connected the Hebrews struggles with those of the African Americans.

The songs in this class gave a vast spread of folk music. My favorite song is the first one we sang, Leadbelly's "Rock Island Line" because of it's upbeat tempo and it's about trains (I love trains). This is the song that got me hooked on the class. My dad and I set up a train platform called Plasticville every Christmas. We set up his Lionel trains that he got when he was two years old (about 1950). The trains drive around the electric tracks that encompass the town.

"Down in the Valley," and "Red River Valley" were also more of my favorites. When we first sang them I felt a deep connection to these songs... I am not sure what it as exactly but it made my eyes water a little bit. I remember my project for "Down in the Valley" was one of the most literal paintings. That is something the songs and especially the class has given me is to accept the challenge of not being so literal in artwork that expresses songs. It is in my nature to be! But it is a good exercise to think in a more abstract realm. It was great to see how everyone else in the class thought of the songs too through their art.

Making the artwork every week in response to the songs made me engage with the songs on a more intimate level. Art can be very personal or impersonal, but with these songs, I drew or painted or crafted from a personal level. Maybe this is because not only was it coming from a visual sense but also the hearing sense. 

Appalachia in the 1930s winter.

The research involved in really getting to know what the songs, artists, and places were about also got me very involved. One of the most interesting places this class took me was Appalachia. It has a history that is intriguing from the myths about the Appalachian people to the diversity of immigrants who live there. It is the image that initially came to mind when I thought about folk songs, but now my knowledge has spread to the black south and throughout the United States to California... 

I really enjoyed reading Woody Guthrie's "Soldiers in the Dust." It was well written, just like a novel. I enjoyed the places his songs explored, such as the hopes of prosperity in California and the imagery of the entire American continent in the song "This Land is Your Land." Guthrie was another artist I enjoyed learning about because his story is fascinating. I appreciate that he not only was a talented guitar player, he also knew how to use tools and craft things. Speaking of interesting stories, Mississippi John Hurt's is another golden one. I had always heard the name Mississippi John Hurt but never really knew who or what he sang (same with Bob Dylan) until this class. MJH is unique in the timing of his musical career. 

I also had fun finding out about pieces of American history that I never knew about like medicine shows and Vaudeville! There were so many opportunities to break off and find out more from each week's theme. 

Songs and Places gave me more than I could have asked for. It gave me songs, adventures through time, art, chance to create artwork each week, a chance to have fun and sing, and an awesome professor who is an exceptional guitar player, entertainer, and has a soul full of truth. Tony is one of the professors I will always remember from all of his knowledge he shared in the class through art, history, and music, and especially tips for playing the guitar! The songs I've learned and places I've been have changed me and some will always stay somewhere inside. 

One last touch: my project from a few weeks ago during Leadbelly, here is the finished glazed ceramic form. It brings a completely different feeling to it; it almost brings me a new meaning of the song because of the sleek and shine, which is not what I find from Leadbelly, but maybe it does work... I chose "Bring Me Little Water Sylvie" and now the shine reminds me of water. I am pleased with the two faces this piece took!

"I Feel Like Going Home" Chicago Blues

The song I chose for my final project this week is “I Feel Like Going Home” by Muddy Waters. I love his guitar playing. It is as if he and the guitar are singing their own parts of the song. This song, for me, represents the Chicago Blues entirely with its electric blues sound and the lamenting quality from the blues origins. I made Muddy Waters blue to symbolize his major influence on the Chicago blues scene with his telecaster red guitar as the second color. The darkness is either engulfing him or he is escaping the darkness, which is the blues.

Muddy Waters, as his name tells, was from the Mississippi delta, played there, and was also recorded by Alan Lomax, but it was in Chicago where he began recording music. I thought this was interesting that he was discovered in the city rather than from the recordings the Lomax’s did, like other musicians who became well known from their country roots. His success in the city is probably from the delta blues background he had mixed with the new energy from the urban environment to create songs that made Muddy Waters unique and appealed to the Chicago music world. In my research I found that his style of music is not only urban blues but called electric blues too since each song was not an acoustic version (like so many of our other blues songs). After his death he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of fame… this makes me wonder how close electric blues and rock and roll sound? After listening to Muddy Waters’s songs it seems that the sound specifically is what ties these genres together, not the meanings.

The youtube video of Muddy Waters singing “Hoochie Coochie Man” has a very showman like quality to it and the sound is very full. This is different from the Lomax recording that can have a single person singing with one instrument or no instruments at all. I would call the Chicago blues a plugged in and on-stage version of the rural blues.

Muddy Waters's guitar - a telecaster

Little Walter is also in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame! I see why the blues were turning more rock and roll sounding; it is because of the electrification of instruments. Little Walter was famous for his harmonica playing because he was one of the initial people who began amplifying it by holding it up to the microphone. Muddy Waters and Little Walter had also recorded and played songs together.

“Blues With a Feeling” might be about having the blues mixed with a love-filled passion to get his love back, or find her. He sings about his love living somewhere else… perhaps he is really feeling the way his lover feels when he moved to Chicago? And unknowingly singing about his blues but truly he knows how is absence affects the girl.

Howlin’ Wolf also began in the country blues scene and translocated himself to the city. He even looked up to singers like Charlie Patton and learned the blues from local musicians. Howlin’ Wolf had done performances and signed on with a record company and soon after traveled to Chicago. “Sittin’ On Top of the World” is one of his songs, which now listening to it compared to when we heard it quite a few weeks ago, has to completely different visual in my mind. I used think of “Sittin’ On Top of the World” as a song for the impoverished people living in the rural country suffering the Great Depression. Now it has changed with Howlin’ Wolf’s place in Chicago, although he travelled there later… “Sittin’ On Top of the World” can be seen as a song about overcoming the difficulties that can be found no matter where someone calls home… country or city.

In Howlin’ Wolf’s song, “Little Red Rooster,” is an interesting song especially because of his unique style of playing and singing. I would guess that Howlin’ Wolf’s name was born from his vocals, the power in his voice is rather wolf-like. Since the rooster usually represents males, and he sings about it needing to be found and go home to the barn. I feel that a majority of the Chicago city songs have to do with the place the singers have come from and are currently now. They always seem to wish to go home. For example, Muddy Waters’s “Feel Like Going Home.” The rooster might represent this desire? But the visuals provided in this song with so many warm colors like the red rooster and barn are not as “blue” as the genre they are sung as, providing a stark contrast.

Howlin' Wolf playing the harmonica.

“How Many More Years” in the video where the Rolling Stones introduce Howlin’ Wolf brings back what I touched on earlier where the blues and rock and roll are merged in urban blues. This changes the rural blues to appeal to city folk and popularize the songs further with the sounds from all of the instruments.

In the video where only Howlin’ Wolf is performing the song in the beginning he says, “any time you thinkin’ evil, you’ve got the blues,” which is one of the truest statements I’ve ever heard.

"Cross Road Blues" Delta Blues

“Cross Road Blues” tells of being unable to be noticed or picked up and constantly waiting for someone to stop, which never happens. I would turn this into my own interpretation by saying “Cross Road Blues” is a song about paralysis as a result of indecision. Not knowing which way to go, hesitating, and causing self induced paralysis by not being able to move since the decision cannot be made. I picked this song to focus on for my project. I avoided painting an obvious crossroads and wanted to show the indecision with the figures. I see them as a time sequence of one individual and these are the different stages of trying to decide which way to go. It intensifies as the eye moves right. The background color also gives an idea of factors that may influence the decision making process, such as going towards darker or warmer colors.

In “Cross Road Blues,” Robert Johnson sings “You can run, you can run, tell my friend-boy Willie Brown, Lord, that I'm standin' at the crossroad” and I wondered who Willie Brown is. He was also a Delta Blues singer, who actually played alot of music with Charlie Patton. Why Johnson referenced Willie Brown may be because Johnson was influenced by Willie Brown musically, which could make him a figure who teaches music. There is the legend that the devil teaches fiddlers to play at the crossroads, so perhaps this is the reference? I find that myth to be interesting and not so much negative or scary but more of an interesting “trademark” of the blues/ folk tradition to have these types of superstitions that can be used to make an image more unique.

After reading back over the reading my understanding has changed in a way that I think I have learned more about the history of black people through their music, rather than a history book. History class in middle school and high school give some depth to the history of the African Americans becoming enslaved and continuing from there… but after listening each week to the different layers that Jones also mentions in the reading, like songs from Africa to work songs to gospels to blues, then I heard how the suppression of the black people is developed over time into new forms of song. The songs give a much more accurate and raw perspective and account of their history.

William Ferris puts it nicely that the blues consist of “a kinship of love for music and good times shared together” (22) in Blue from the Delta. Then it is also true that the blues are expressions of the singer’s lives, which could contain loneliness, and weariness. Much of these were culminated from difficulties African Americans had to endure. Ferris discusses how place is a defining factor of for the form a blues song takes (28). This is because of the unique characteristics of each town or city the singers lived and the encounters they had. A place being isolated has an effect on the song, or its proximity to, for example, the delta or another body of water. It was interesting that female blues singers were more prevalent in the urban realm while the men were known for the “rural” areas during the early recording stages. Ferris also brought up how the “blues singer became a spokesperson for the black community,” which he later explains that it is so deep in those roots that it is assumed to naturally sing blues from a black person’s standpoint (26).

I selected a handful of songs to go into detail on this week (there are so many!):

At first I thought Robert Johnson’s “Sweet Home Chicago” was about Chicago. After listening closer it made me do a double take with my ears and I had to read the lyrics and try to understand the chorus… because he sings “Back to the land of California, to my sweet home Chicago,” and both places are far apart in the United States. Initially I guessed that this could be him trying to decide if he wanted to either go back to California, or Chicago, then he chooses his “sweet home” Chicago. But later in the second to last stanza, he sings “I’m goin’ to California, From there to Des Moines Iowa,” so maybe he grouped California and Chicago together. I did some research on this and found that (according to the Chicago Tribune) that Johnson never went to Chicago, which answers one question I had, which was what does Chicago have to do with the delta? It seems to be a mystery...

“Corrina, Corrina” as first recorded by Bo Carter, reminds me a little bit of “Into the Pines” from the line asking where she was last night. “I met Corrina across the sea…” this line also makes me think of the Odyssey and Corrina would take the form of Calypso because it seems like the singer is enthralled with her and loves her too much for his own good.

On mudcat there was some discussion that “Careless Love” was WC handy’s “folk” version of “Loveless Love,” told by him in an interview with Lomax…Bessie Smith also sings a version of this, I found that she is one of the successful female blues singers. Apart from the song’s history, I wonder what the meaning of a careless love is… in one way it is an oxymoron, in another way it could be taken as a care-free love that is relaxing and comfortable. But the song sounds like it is calling love itself a careless being that neglects to take care of the person in love. I see where this would be found in the delta blues world (or any world) where love can tear people away from their families and cause people to chase after it, not knowing where it will lead them.

I listened to Charlie Patton’s “‘34 Blues” but it was hard to enjoy because his style of singing was hard for me to understand. But this also gave me understanding as to why his audience was smaller, especially compared to MHJ and Woody Guthrie. It is because Patton is more like Leadbelly in the way that they had some difficulties finding large audiences who could relate (or understand) their songs. After some research I also found that Patton appealed more to “folk” and was not as commercialized because his tone was unique. As for the song, “‘34 Blues” addresses some scenes of the Great Depression era where he sings “I was as broke as I could be...”

Then “I’m So Glad” by Skip James gives so many different paths as well because he is glad, doesn’t know what to do, but also tired of several negative emotions that are caused by someone else. Maybe is glad because the “moaning” and “weeping” is over and now he is no longer giving his energy to negative things but now he has so much more time to be glad that he does not know what to do with himself… which can be a good thing! Then I watched the YouTube video where he sings “Devil Got My Woman,” the other four men hanging around enjoying the music really captures a quality blues scene…

"Do Re Mi" Woody Guthrie

In the first video where Woodie Guthrie is singing live, the videographer frames him sitting playing his guitar with an old pedal machine in front of him and a record player in the foreground. I decided to explore this tool. It is a stationary pedal powered machine that can be applied to lathes, tool sharpeners, and a variety of other tools. This is probably so prominent in the footage because of its importance in working, which is a major theme in Guthrie’s songs. It is also a symbol for the message Guthrie presents to people in his songs in general where working becomes a his idea of movement for social change. 

My project is an inked drawing of one of these pedal powered machines. I also think it is important that it is not powered by an engine, but by human power, which makes the work produced even more humanly. The song is “Do Re Mi” because the song sums up America in the sense that it is thought of as a gloryland full of riches, and places like California are idealized as places where people can become prosperous. But work and how much people can make always stands in the way. “Do Re Mi” is a song Guthrie described as being a song where people are “lonesome for a job, they’re lonesome for some spending money…” (Brooks, 245). This tool symbolizes that choice to work but also the fact that no matter hardworking someone is, it may not be enough if they “ain’t got the do re mi.”

This weekend the mountain bike race was hosted by Chico State in Oroville. After the race, my parents and I went to a hand tool museum, Bolt's Tool Museum in town. They had some boxes with tools your could buy as a donation to the museum, and I found a few treasures, including this hand powered drill. It can still work, and me and my dad are going to put a replacement wooden handle on the crank arm side. Eventually, I want to use this to make something! I thought it would go well in the blog since it relates so well to the working theme.

The “This Machine Kills Fascists” video that plays “Do Re Mi” in the background uses images that address what Guthrie is singing about… how there is a price to pay to achieve what is desired. In this case it is the “paradise” of California, but it costs money. “This Machine Kills Fascists...” on his guitar relates to the video since it depicts film from wartime dealing with fascism. I see it also as addressing the cost of war on America, which suggests that if what is desired is a solution (after war) then that is going to have a price to pay, just like riding a train requires money (seen in the image of two men walking with the “next time try the train - relax!” billboard). The phrase on Guthrie’s guitar, “This Machine Kills Fascists” tells of the guitar’s purpose to not only create music but also was a way to make a few bucks; Guthrie believed fascism to take money from those in need and it would end up with one elite class.

This makes perfect sense for Woody Guthrie to have this way of thinking from a quote he says in the introduction to Bound For Glory; “I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work.” This tells so much of his character in that he shows care for others while applying it to himself. He seemed to have valued the effort work takes and what should be earned from work. This was also brought up several times in the first chapter of his autobiography “Soldiers in the Dust.” One of the first arguments (of many to come) was about whether Guthrie knows what it means to work and later several people on the freight argued about this among each other. Work took on a meaning of value where the men could feel higher than another based on this.

An even more dramatic image than Guthrie's account of the packed freight train

Woody Guthrie has a diverse collection of songs that reveal his encounters with the world but also give much more to the people who listen. I found it interesting, and a nice change, that Spud Terkel pointed out how his songs have “universal appeal” (Terkel, x), which differs from the other folk artists we have learned about because Guthrie is not appealing only to “folk” during his time but an international audience, as Terkel mentions Guthrie’s India trip.

Red River Valley. The version we have from the first download has a sadder tone and when I close my eyes and listen, I feel the sadness of the girl leaving the valley. In this version I feel a different sense where the memories that the singer values of the girl in the valley are more present and not watered down by the solemn truth of her leaving. In other words the first version is a funeral but this version is a celebration of life. Both lose the person but remembers in different tones.

A family walking to California to escape the Dust Bowl

Woody Guthrie’s version of “This Land is Your Land” is my favorite out of the three. It is great when he sings it because it parallels his awareness of people and the environment around him. In the chapter “Soldiers in the Dust” in his autobiography, he describes laying on the train and looking up at the sky and then rain clouds above him. Then he even writes in detail about the train bouncing and how it strained his neck and the different things he tried to do to get comfy… this kind of awareness is what brings me to like Guthrie’s character so much. He was sensitive to his surrounds, which is what made him able to produce songs so many people could relate to. For “This Land is Your Land” he combines his observations of the beauty of the land with the importance to allow all to enjoy it through sharing. Dylan’s version feels more impersonal for me. When I first sang this song in elementary school I felt connected and that I thought I knew exactly what I was singing about, which was how lush America was. Now that I reconsider, this may have also been Guthrie addressing the Dust Bowl and how people migrating to places like California needed the land to be shared with them too.

My elementary school image of "This Land is Your Land"
 (and still is my image)

This is how Woody Guthrie became the spokesperson for the common man, by understanding the curve balls life throws… his childhood was full of them with the devastating losses of his family members. He was in the brutal situations other men went through, like the freight train rides that so many Americans took. He knew what it meant to work to live. And he was well traveled across the land. All of these elements that Guthrie brings together in each of his songs creates the ability for him to relate to nearly all “common men” and women… it’s because he has been in their shoes.  

"Bring Me Little Water Sylvie" Leadbelly

Crinkle pot

“Bring Me Little Water, Sylvie” is the song I chose for this week. It is a great song to tell of Leadbelly’s history and roots. On MudCat someone shared that the song comes from Leadbelly’s own chants while doing work in the field, and when he would get thirsty, he would yell to his uncle’s wife, Sylvie, to bring him some water. Not only does the song address his own experiences, it shows how so many of Leadbelly’s songs were written; in the Szwed chapter “The Saga of Leadbelly,” he explained that Leadbelly would create his own songs from other songs he heard and make a new tune, or go off a melody and make his own lyrics.

My project also has a similar unique birth (like his songs) this week. It is also very personal… this is my second semester taking ceramics at the Berkeley Art studio and I’ve thrown, sculpted and handbuilt over twenty pieces this year. This form was intended for this song to become a perfect cylinder and then a bucket. But, ironically if I think about the song, I used too much water when I brought up the walls! The song calls for more water but I used too much and it created this interesting wave-like form. It was a good thing that it happened. This is one of the most fun pieces I’ve created and it was by accident with a disappointing beginning but exciting end. I’m glad I didn’t decide to just dry out the clay and re-wedge it and start over! The twists and folds now share a rough journey as did Leadbelly and relates to the song because I am not sure if water was ever brought to the singer… of course how could it if it was carried in this?

In the segment from the Gordon Parks’ 1976 film, “Leadbelly,” he depicts Leadbelly as a singer who is a justified murderer, who, other than killing someone to protect his lover, is a good man doing his time and still holds much talent. He shows this by bringing in Lomax to collect his songs, which gives a chance to hear and see Leadbelly’s side of the story as to why he is in jail. He is portrayed as someone who does not deserve to be incarcerated. Some of the battles this story may face in the public eye is that Leadbelly had “powers denied to men of color” (Szwed, 52) seen in his multiple early releases. But also in the Szwed book on John Lomax he told of how he wasn’t freed because of his songs but under one of Louisiana’s laws. This film makes the crimes of murder that Leadbelly committed be tossed under the rug by giving him enthusiastic and passionate characteristics, along with his musical talent, which seem to erase the reasons he is in jail.

The Leadbelly Newsreel film shows Leadbelly asking Lomax to send his song to the governor to plead for his release, which would be the next piece of the story after the Gordon Parks segment ends. Leadbelly goes to Lomax after his release to work for him later on in Kentucky where he sings “Goodnight Irene” to his love and his songs go into the Library of Congress Music Division. Since newsreels were shown in theatres at before movies, the audiences were those who were wealthy enough to go to the movies. The film is from 1935, so still during the Great Depression. I also feel that this film was gauged more to white audiences because the script writers depicted Lomax as the hero in Leadbelly’s story, unlike Gordon Parks’ version giving more pull to Leadbelly and Lomax is another piece that falls into his great story. Szwed tells us that Leadbelly did not get paid by the Lomaxes for starring in the film and I also learned that it was John Lomax’s idea to have Leadbelly wear the jail stripes (he usually wore overalls) to use as a visual identifier and I see it as a form of branding for Leadbelly’s image (63).

“Goodnight Irene” ... The notion to jump into the river and drown comes from the reasons to move from country to town and vice versa. The country can be lonesome, isolated, or not have enough to do, driving people out to the town or city where there are more people and activities. But the city is loud, has too many people, and never stops. Leadbelly doesn’t say this but he gives enough in his lyrics to tell us all of this. Not being able to have the one you love is a more obvious reason he presents too. I think these dramatic or violent ways to die come from his history - he murdered two people so this probably produced his rougher choice of lyrics.

Leadbelly was not the typical folk singer I would envision. His multiple phases of worker, musician, and some recurring, like prisoner make him unique with his history. John Szwed tells of Leadbelly’s past where he did farm work, sang at parties, and went to jail several times. He mentions that after John Lomax helped him get out of jail, his “enthusiasm cooled” after learning that Leadbelly was jailed for murder (Szwed, 41). This is the same reaction I am having because he is a great singer with a distinct voice and some of my favorite songs that we have done, but this man that I am listening to and sing along with has killed someone… or does this add to his story and make him more unique in the folk song realm? In some ways he is a murderer and criminal, but then there are the accounts of the governor letting him off early because he enjoyed Leadbelly’s songs, so even the governor was able to see past his crimes.

I would not be surprised if it is common for people to see Leadbelly as a strong and passionate musician and easily let go of his brutal past. That is how I feel too - the way I can compare is that he is like a character in a movie who the cops are trying to catch but the audience really wants him or her to get away, because they are more than the crime they are committing. I appreciate what the Lomaxes’ were doing by using Leadbelly to introduce black tradition to the white Americans, who Szwed described as rather naive as they could not relate or believe Leadbelly’s songs (if they could understand him). This was important in teaching America about the history they were a part of even though they hadn’t known yet.

Mississippi John Hurt left his home in the fashion of going from a small town to the big city for his musical career (very basic description) and he had done years of hard farm work in the music-less gap years before he “came back” and was popular in the music world. Leadbelly had a similar disconnection from home as MJH but Szwed described it more as a longing to be with his friends from home, them being people of color. He had been on the road working for the Lomaxes for so long and performing for white audiences that he began to get restless. This is reflected in Leadbelly’s songs because as I discussed before, the white people could not relate or image the life described in some of Leadbelly’s songs, which carry the same toil and burden as his life’s history.

Building railroads

The lyrics for "Take This Hammer" are interesting because each verse unfolds different feelings of the singer. At first I thought it was a song about revenge when he sings "take this hammer, carry it to the captain" I thought it was intended to harm the captain because of later verses saying that he wasn't just running, but flying, which could imply escaping. Then, "if he asks you, was I laughing" is where I began to think of revenge or him mocking the captain out of spite of escaping. However, this idea changed in the next verse "tell him I was crying" because this brings a new light that takes away cruel intentions by making it more emotional and personal  that the man wants to be free. This is also heard in him having no desire for "cornbread and molasses" but just have his pride. This took me back to the first verse "take this hammer to the captain" and gave it a new meaning to show that he is giving up the hammer, or work, and leaving for the good of himself. Also, flying instead of running no longer meant the speed that he is escaping, but flying became a term for freedom.

“Rock Island Line” was a wood chopping song that belonged to a prison gang (Szwed, 58) The first verse of tells us that the world continues to sin, which is very true. What I got from the “ABC double XYZ, cat’s in the cupboard but he don’t see me” is that the singer is trying to hide from another and that person does not see the singer... or maybe it is just a something Leadbelly wanted to sing. The song is fun and high energy. It was the first song we learned for this class and got me hooked. I especially liked the way we learned it (the basics) without song books but just by repetition and tripping over ourselves when singing the fast part “if you wanna ride it got to ride it like you find it get your ticket at the station on the Rock Island Line.”

"Fishin' Blues"

The song I chose for my project this week is “Fishin’ Blues” because the playful line, “I bet your life your lovin’ wife will catch more fish than you” caught my attention. At first I thought this gave more power to women in the song to even suggest that his wife would out fish him. However, I researched this song more and the anthology from Harry Smith suggests that fishing is more of a sexual metaphor… so maybe the fish that “bite if you got good bait” means a measure of the ability to attract people with their “bait” (whatever form that should take). Therefore the singer, who is a male, might be fishing around for other lovers but his wife is already ahead of him. Either way, my project shows three fish in the gestural form with colors of salmon, which are all of the options for the woman (in a reflection at the top of the page) to potentially catch - given that she has good bait.

Both Henry Thomas and Taj Mahal’s versions of “Fishin’ Blues” have great strengths in their sound. I do appreciate the reed pipes in Henry Thomas’ version alot - they bring so much character to the song. While I enjoy Taj Mahal’s version, one thought I had was, which of these singers do I REALLY believe had gone fishing close to the time they recorded… my best bet is on Henry Thomas… Henry Thomas was a songster who played ragtime music, which originated in St. Louis African American communities and gets its name from the ragged sound of the music. He was born in 1874 and most of his recordings were during the 1920s.

The Mississippi Sheiks’ original version of “Sitting On Top of the World” speaks so much about the setting of the song because of the time it was recorded, about 1930. To compare this with a later version I find several differences in how I listen to and visualize the place for the song. The 1930s Mississippi Sheiks version was recorded during America’s Great Depression, so it is interesting that the song sings of sitting on top of the world during a time where Americans did not feel that way at all. But in this place of the great Depression, the song brings some words of uplift to say what is gone or lost does not mean you cannot move on. In the video of Sam Chatmon playing, I know that the song is from him (and the other members of the Mississippi Sheiks) because he sings it like he belongs to the place where it was intended for because he lived during through that time.

Great Depression, Mississippi 1930s

Listening to Bob Dylan’s remastered version, which was released in 2013, it is a completely different song. Now I hear it as a song with more emphasis on the relationship of the singer with the girl who is gone and how he doesn’t worry, so it makes it more specific and gives less emphasis to a place. Dylan also sings the final stanza as “why should I beg you, you said goodbye” while the Mississippi Sheiks sing, “why should you beg me, and say goodbye...” very different tones. Dylan makes it more about the self, Mississippi Sheiks give that attention to the other person.

“Cocaine Habit Blues” really gives that jug band sound with the base/drum sounding instrument in the background that I found is actually a jug. Reverend Gary Davis is successful in giving the same jug band feeling with his guitar playing. The songs speak for themselves in the meaning - addiction and pleasure from the drugs - but in a way it masks those darker sides even though admitting the detriment… But “Stealin’ Stealin’” also admits to some downfall of personal character but actually seems to WANT to change, while Cocaine Habit Blues” is just pointing out a habit and probably won’t change it.

The jug is the center of this picture of Mississippi Jug Band

For “Candy Man,” I paid particularly close attention to the distinct guitar styles of each artist: Rev. Gary Davis and Mississippi John Hurt (1928 version). MHJ uses more melodies to guide his song. Rev. Reverend Gary Davis was blind and played ragtime blues and was part of the Piedmont Blues scene - he also was born in the Piedmont region of South Carolina. Rev. Gary Davis also uses a melody but it just sounds so different from MHJ, I can’t quite put my finger on it. This shows their unique ways of playing the song. I was looking at this song on mudcat and then found the debate on what is a “salty dog.” Of course some took to the sexual meaning, some that it is a sailor, but the one I believe might be true is that it is a person who is tough and good at their work.

Jesse Fuller’s one-man band “San Francisco Bay Blues” is impressive! I found a video of him playing and singing it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBME_J0pf3o He sings about losing his girl and toys with the idea of catching a “freight train” because he’s “feeling blue...” maybe that is why Elizabeth Cotten sings “Freight Train.”

The Elizabeth Cotten reading was interesting since it was her who was speaking. Much of her story reminds me of Mississippi John Hurt’s as they both have very humble beginnings, worked hard through life, and became more popular later in their lifetimes after some period of taking a break from playing. But the most important similarity that I found in the two is that they have acquired such unique guitar styles by playing it a way that suites them, or as Elizabeth Cotten says, “you get it to sound like you want it to sound.” This is a vital element in folk music because trying to play songs perfectly, or sing a line the same way every time does not fit the culture right. In Gerrard’s introduction she says, ”Cotten rarely played “her tunes the same way twice” (Gerrard, 42), which I found to be a trend in most folk music that gives the songs the ability to become unique in their tones and moods.

1910s, a street car in Chapel Hill, NC, where Cotten was born

Now that I listen closer to “Freight Train,” I try to visualize Cotten’s “upside down” guitar playing and that does offer a special style for her music. The reading also gives some insight into Cotten’s world and where that song comes from because she does mention where her father worked in mine that was near a railroad track. Maybe he is the character in the song who wishes to ride the train and escape the arduous labor? “Please don’t tell what train I’m on so they won’t know where I’m gone”

A songster travels and sings and plays, with a variety of songs they have mastered.

Vaudeville was a post Civil War entertainment cultural phenomenon with multiple performances from different arts, such as music, dance, comedy, etc.

Minstrel shows were also a form of entertainment around the time of the Civil War where performers would be white but wear black masks and later black people were the performers.

Medicine shows had entertainers who would sell miracle elixirs that could "cure" any aliment. There were also magic shows, freak shows, story telling and all kinds of fun.

I had to add a photo of a small medicine show

"Lay Me A Pallet On Your Floor" & "Avalon Blues"

I believe this is MJH in Avalon, Mississippi

Eric von Schmidt’s Baby Let Me Follow You Down gives very different information on the folk revival movement than does Norm Cohen. Cohen reaches very far and wide, touching on what seems to be every piece and person of the folk song revival. Schmidt focuses initially on a specific place and its history on how it came to be, Tulla’s Coffee Grinder (Club 47). By picking out this specific place and providing the words of people like Paula and Joyce who opened this business, it gives a unique perspective on the singers they who encountered the place, which brings with it the information on the folk revival as it played out. “The Baez family came in one night… [Joan] started one of these ‘whoo-haa’ things… that was the first time I heard her,” is a memory of one night at Tulla’s (Schmidt, 18). Schmidt offers these more personal points of view that give the history a completely different spin compared to the way Cohen does it. This is not to say Cohen’s version of discussing the folk revival is better or worse, I do find it very pleasant to read his factual information on how a great deal of folk music was initiated through print and recordings and festivals and books, but both provide their own unique information.

Joan Baez singing at Club 47

I did notice that “The History of Folk Song Revival” and Baby Let Me Follow You Down both reveal that folk music is considered “left” or democratic. Cohen describes Wilson Guthrie’s father playing in bands and refers to him as an “outspoken Democrat who had played guitar,” which I thought was interesting since I usually think of the eastern states, like Oklahoma where his son was born, to be conservative. Then Schmidt also connects folk music to politics by claiming it to be “politically left” for occasions like Pete Seeger going to Boston to sing at “The Folk Arts Workshop” where music and politics would have equal drive for alot of people. I do not enjoy discussing politics myself, but I thought I would make that connection.

The article by Jas Olbrecht mentioned what Cohen discussed on record companies producing race records, which is what Columbia records called Mississippi John Hurt’s songs that he recorded there. “Make Me A Pallet on Your Floor” and “Lewis Collins” were some of the first songs that Hurt recorded with Rockwell in the 1920s. I had no prior knowledge of Hurt before this class, and I was surprised to learn not only that he had a job as a sharecropper and farmed throughout his life, but mainly that the peak of his career came much later in life and that it was a result also of being rediscovered. This is interesting because he was rediscovered and THEN was very famous and successful; not that he was very famous, then rediscovered, then successful again but that his popularity was created, not reborn.

Another cover for MJH, it relates well to his story and farm work in the earlier years

Then in “With Mississippi John Hurt” by Max Ochs, recorded by Elizabeth Dubovsky, there are parts that tie in John Hurt’s story that I read in the Olbrecht article. It talks about how Max knew Mississippi John Hurt Disappeared “long ago” but then how after listening to his records, he decided to look for Hurt in Avalon, which he did find him. Here is when I found out that Max is the man who Hurt thought was the FBI taking him up North to record his songs (as told in the Olbrecht article). Both describe the instructions on finding Hurt as the third mailbox up the road (Olbrecht), or “forwardly just down the way three houses from the corner” (Ochs). Both readings also gave to notice to how he would make the guitar play the sound “the way he wanted it to” (Ochs), showcasing his musical talent.

To contrast the two telling of Hurt’s story, Max Ochs’ account told that early on, Hurt was not allowed to touch the guitar or read the musical notes of Bach, but ended up finding a way to. Olbrecht did not mention this aspect of Hurt’s story but paid more attention to his life working on the farm and railroad. The biggest distinction was the personal account in “With Mississippi John Hurt” of John and Max’s relationship in the studio, and what gave me goosebumps when I read it was MJH telling Max “that’s how sure I am that I feel God being right here with us now in this place” after he jabbed him in the ribs. This gave a very personal and closer insight to John Hurt, which reveals so much about his character and soul.

In my project this week I depicted a man with his back towards us. In front of him stands a small building from a small town… guess which one - Avalon, Mississippi. Beyond it, looming in the background is New York City. I worked from two songs this week: “Lay Me Down A Pallet on Your Floor” and “Avalon Blues” by Mississippi John Hurt. A line that continued to stand out to me in “Lay Me Down A Pallet on Your Floor” is “well, I’m sleepin,’ my back and shoulders tire,” which after reading about John Hurt’s story in the 1920s, it occurred to me that that reference might be related to the labor that he knows so well from working in the farm. In the jas article, it tells that Hurt would make extra money by selling 8ft cross ties to railroads that would carry over his shoulder - this could be the connection to his own life. The up country has cold sleet and snow and there’s “no telling how much further I’ll go” - he asking for a pallet to be made suggests a time to rest, possibly to rest before continuing on to these places like the country. He says that his back and shoulders are tired, which tell us that he might have travelled a long ways already and still has a long way to go, this is where “Avalon Blues” ties in.

He sings, “Avalon, my hometown, always on my mind” and “New York's a good town but it's not for mine.” This tells of the inner tumult that the singer but be going through, which I also believe is another tie into Hurt’s story where he begins to record more songs and must spend more time in cities where the record companies are. My charcoal drawing this week shows the line where work can begin to alter one’s comfort with different places and the decisions and fear included. Moving to places where success in business can mean leaving loved ones and loved places. Is it worth it? In my experience, coming to Berkeley has been rough at some points because I have a very close relationship with my parents and hometown, but it has helped me learn alot about myself, grow stronger and most importantly, learn to appreciate what I have left.

Lake Arrowhead, my Avalon

To address the other songs of this week, “Beulah Land” has a central message of going to a place that outshines the sun… does this mean it may be heaven? It is also way beyond the sky, which suggests a heavenly or out of this world place. If has got a mother, father, and sister in “Beulah Land,” they have probably left this earth and now rest in Beulah Land. I researched Beulah Land and found that it is from a hymn where the Hebrews were able to call Jerusalem “Beulah,” which means married, instead of Desolate. I wonder if Beulah Land is where the main character in “Lay Me A Pallet on the Floor” wishes he could rest…

These two songs also connect to “Lewis Collins” being layed away by the angels under the clay. He was shot by Bob after he left his home. His mother and people who knew his mourned his death but I wonder why he and Bob were in a shootout. On MudCat I read that this was song is actually about a real event that Mississippi John hurt experienced - someone, maybe a friend, was murdered. This song for me is about the rippling effects, like murder or suicide that impact the lives of so many others, in Lewis Collins’ case, his mother, town, and especially Mississippi John Hurt.