Hit List

 

Claire Holley

Claire Holley is an observer, a romantic reporter from the backyards and front porches of the heartland, out "looking for signs" and stealing snapshots of people who sing "the sweetest out of tune you’ll ever hear." This Mississippi native’s brilliant new country-folk CD takes the listener on a trip past "Heyward Avenue" where "most people are sleeping or drinking something warm in their homes" to "Abilene" where there "ain’t nothing but the cattle on the plains." She drives past a "Pennsylvania Town" to a place where "some of the rivers overflow and flood the land and some are dried up like thirsty old men" and on to "Mississippi" where she stops to fingerpick a music-box–like instrumental. Holley frames her observations in bright, major-key chord progressions (spiced with a few choice modulations) and peripatetic bass lines. She’s accompanied by a sympathetic band of bass, drums, and electric guitar, but her sparkling acoustic guitar is always front and center, a plangent partner to her voice’s sweet twang. An evocative, literate, and luminous recording. (Yep Roc)

—Scott Nygaard

 

John Parrott and Don Stiernberg, The Swing Sessions

Pair former Jethro Burns protégé Don Stiernberg with swing guitar virtuoso John Parrott and you’ve got the makings of a stellar swing session. Stiernberg coaxes the sweetest melodies imaginable from his mandolin, fluttering effortlessly over the strings with a right-hand tremolo unheard since the late Dave Apollon. Parrott brings the music to life on his vintage Gibson L-5 archtop, chording deep rhythmic grooves that smoothly place passing chords and leading tones within the melodic structure. Recorded live in the studio, this CD perfectly captures that all-too-elusive sense of elegance and grace that defines the greatest swing music. The sterling rendition of Ray Noble’s classic tune "Cherokee" is a textbook example of acoustic jazz rhythm guitar at its very finest. (Cronyn)

—David McCarty

 

 

Phil Heywood, Circle Tour. Phil Heywood, 1986's National Fingerpicking Champion, may be the Midwest’s best-kept secret. He rarely tours, but area guitarists hold him in high esteem for his strong musicality and easygoing personality. Circle Tour’s set of mostly original tunes demonstrates Heywood’s grounding in traditional American folk music. His powerful guitar sound features crystal-clear melody and harmony lines above subtly driving bass lines. Heywood’s grooving arrangements of "Old Man River" and Leadbelly’s "Ha Ha This a Way" and the moody "Crested Hens," by Brittany hurdy-gurdy player Gilles Chabenat, round out this impressive collection. (Atomic Theory)
Check out Phil Heywood's new Web site: www.philheywood.com

—Gary Joyner

 

Greasy Beans, Real Live Music

The Greasy Beans are bucking acoustic music’s trend toward ever-greater refinement. Instead, they mix old-time and bluegrass elements to create an album of unabashedly rugged music. Real Live Music sounds like it could have been made 50 years ago--the liner notes boast that it was recorded live with no overdubs, resulting in the devil-may-care feel of a boisterous party jam. Sounds of legends Tommy Jarrell and Bill Monroe echo in the fiddle and mandolin work of Cailen Campbell and Charley Brophey, and guitarist Josh Haddix adds some lively flatpicking. (Double Ought)

—Sue Thompson

 

El McMeen and Friends, The Lea Rig

El McMeen’s seventh recording, The Lea Rig, finds the "king of C G D G A D tuning" adding others to his musical vision. Until now McMeen has let his lyrical solo guitar sensibilities carry each recording, but on The Lea Rig he’s joined by Bob Pegritz on pennywhistle, Kate MacLeod on fiddle, Steve Black on harmonica, and Larry Pattis on second guitar. The material includes several Turlough O’Carolan compositions ("Carolan’s Concerto," "Bridget Cruise, Third Air," and "Carolan’s Receipt/Morgan Magan") as well as the Celtic standard "Mo Giolla Mear." McMeen’s interest in popular music is reflected in the inclusion of Bruce Springsteen’s "Sad Eyes," George Harrison’s "Here Comes the Sun," and the Motown classic "Stop in the Name of Love." It’s good to see an artist as mature and assured as El McMeen leave his safe harbor and explore new elements. (Piney Ridge)

—Art Edelstein

 

James Birkett and Rod Sinclair, The Jazz Guitar Duo

British guitarists James Birkett and Rod Sinclair have done a magnificent job of reviving the acoustic jazz guitar duet style that flourished between the invention of the modern archtop guitar in the mid-1920s and its electrification in the mid-’30s. Although they eschew archtop instruments in favor of flattop Lowdens, they perfectly capture the spirit of these compositions by Eddie Lang, Carl Kress, Dick McDonough, and Englishman Albert Harris. Birkett and Sinclair have also expanded on the tradition of these great guitarists by composing their own delightful suite that incorporates ragtime, blues, swing, and Latin music—a primer on the history of jazz guitar in the 20th century. (Jazzperformance.com)

—Michael Simmons

 

Fred Eaglesmith and the Flying Squirrels, Ralph’s Last Show

With the grit of Steve Earle and the irreverence of John Prine, Fred Eaglesmith takes alt-country down a very gravelly and scenic back road. Whether rhapsodizing about trains and fast cars or wondering "When exactly did we become white trash?" he nails the story or image again and again. As captured on this live, double-CD set, his band plays along with just the right kind of reckless abandon. For those who have caught the Flying Squirrels in person, the only disappointment is that Washboard Hank’s wearable percussion kit, which is unforgettable on stage, doesn’t make much of an impact on disc. (Signature Sounds)

—Jeffrey Pepper Rodgers

Manuel Barrueco, Nylon and Steel

Classical guitarist Manuel Barrueco recruited jazz and rock virtuosos Al Di Meola, Steve Morse, and Andy Summers (as both players and composers) to join him on his new recording Nylon and Steel. It’s not for classical purists, but hearing these guys in unfamiliar territory is fun and will please many guitarists. Highlights include Morse shredding effortlessly over Villa Lobos’ Etude No. 1 while Barrueco furiously arpeggiates underneath, Di Meola and Barrueco dueling on three Di Meola pieces, Summers’ steel-string playing on a Celso Machado duet, and two solos by Barrueco. (Angel)

—Mark Small

Books

Jim Ferguson, All Solos and Grooves for Jazz Guitar

In the third in his distinguished series of jazz guitar instruction books, Jim Ferguson helps the aspiring jazz guitarist develop fretboard fluency and a better understanding of the dynamics of jazz phrasing. Using a series of hip licks based on two-, four-, three-, and six-note patterns and juicy jazz vamps that move effortlessly through sambas, bossa novas, and other popular jazz grooves, Ferguson teaches the scales needed to explore various jazz styles and helps unlock the mysteries of the fingerboard. (Mel Bay)

—David McCarty

 

 

Elijah Wald, Josh White: Society Blues. Elijah Wald’s knowing and skillful biography of Josh White chronicles the life, times, and artistry of a dynamic singer, guitarist, and entertainer whose performing and recording activities spanned five decades and encompassed the fields of blues, gospel, folk, and popular music. Relatively little has been written about White, but Society Blues balances the record in an engaging style well suited to White’s dizzying chronology—from his birth in 1914 in Greenville, South Carolina, and his family’s tragic brush with a racist power system there to his childhood years as "lead boy" for blind bluesmen and guitar evangelists to his emergence as a teenage gospel and blues guitar wunderkind and his subsequent lionization as an important folk voice by New York’s art and politics elite. Also reported on are his fall from grace after testifying before the House Un-American Activities Committee and his subsequent return to the international folk and blues scene. Wald combines careful research with the reminiscences of a variety of relatives, friends, and performers to create a multifaceted portrait of an artist who, in many ways, personified the contemporary folk music he helped create. (University of Massachusetts Press)

—Steve James

 

Visit the reviews archives to read dozens of reviews of great acoustic-guitar oriented CDs.

Sources

 

Atomic Theory, www.tt.net/atomic.

Cronyn Records, www.cronynrecords.com.

Double Ought, www.greasybeans.com.

Piney Ridge, www.elmcmeen.com.

Yep Roc, www.yeproc.com.

 

 

Excerpted from Acoustic Guitar magazine, September 2001, No. 106.

 

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