Terrance Simien - The Tribute Sessions (2001)

> The album

A tribute to Louisiana Creole culture

Ethno-historians define "Creole" as a hybrid of Spanish, French, African and native American cultures, not to be mistaken with Cajun, even if both cultures have common aspects, especially in the musical field. If by chance you try to imagine what a "Creole" from Louisiana looks like, Terrance Simien could well be a good example. Go to his official Web site, explore the photo gallery and see him with his eternal cheerful smile and his African traditional hat !

Not only is he a two-time Grammy Award winning musician (2008 & 2014), but he is also an active preserver of Creole culture and zydeco music, having at heart to transmit both to the younger generations : in 2000, he and his wife Cynthia set up the ieducational program "Creole4Kidz and the History of Zydeco" which benefited hundreds of thousands of teens of all continents.

These "Tribute Sessions", issued two decades after Simien's career started in the very early 1980s (a kind of anniversary), belongs to the same kind of approach : as explained in the quick opening narration, it is a homage to the great elders who have had a strong influence on his music, be they zydeco artists or not (Sam Cooke, The Band, Bob Marley).

Terrance Simien was born in 1965 in Mallet, in the Eunice area, 50 km north-west of Lafayette, where his family had settled eight generations earlier, an ancestry he is really proud of. As a boy, he used to hear zydeco at local dances, then learned to play the accordion, formed his first band at age 17 with his brother Greg, who is now a Catholic priest, and began to tour the local clubs and outdoor dances circuit, gaining in popularity and largely contributing to the revival of a genre that was considered as minor by the mainstream and slowly dying.

In 1984, he did a remarked performance at the World's Fair in New Orleans with his band The Mallet Playboys, and two years later, he had the good fortune to retain Paul Simon's attention and record with him. His first album, "Zydeco on the Bayou", came out in 1990, already featuring a deeply moving version of "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" in memory of Clifton Chenier. His career was definitely launched, nationally then internationally, extending to movies scores writing and recording.

Simien, who incidentally likes to play barefoot, is regarded as one of Zydeco’s most soulful vocalists. This is clearly demonstrated by the 13 songs featured on this tribute album. Simien and The Zydeco Experience are driven by a nice gentle but solid zydeco swing and most of all by very nostalgic mellow arrangements (accordion, organ). Sad, sorrowful, desperate, nostalgic, melancholic, heartbreaking, emotional… are some of the words that come to mind to describe Simien's musical and outstanding vocal style.

◄ Canray Fontenot

It starts with a recalling of zydeco rare fiddle player Canray Fontenot through his song "Les Barres De La Prison".
Rockin' Sidney aka Sidney Simien (apparently not a relative, the narration being mute on the subject) is paid his dues with two excellent rhythmic tracks : "If It's Good For The Gander" and the cult "My Toot Toot".
Simien then quote Sam Cooke as one of his main influences as a singer and proves it with a grand version of "Rome Wasn't Built in a Day".

John Delafose (accordion) & the Eunice Playboys ►

From the King of Zydeco, Clifton Chenier, who modernized the genre by using amplified instruments and an extended band, and who taught Simien the important thing was to "do your own thing" as he recalls, Simien chose "I'm Coming Home", a nostalgic and soulful declaration of love of a young man to his mother, featuring a very roots-sounding fiddle part, and "Zydeco Cha Cha", built on an Afro-Cuban rhythm.
With the two rocking pieces, "Joe Pete Got Two Women" (co-signed by John Delafose and Canray Fontenot) and "One Hour Too Late", Simien honors John Delafose and his Eunice Playboys.

◄ The Band (R. Danko at ext. right).

After recalling the surprising way he first met his idol Rick Danko, Simien gives a really outstanding magnificent version of the dramatically sorrowful love ballad "It Makes No Difference" from The Band, that he confesses has always been his favorite group. Written by Robbie Robertson and sung by Rick Danko, it was first released on The Band's 1975 album "Northern Lights-Southern Cross". Simien's cover, magnificently sung, is certainly one of, if not the, highlights of the album.

Rockin' Dopsie ►

Rockin' Dopsie (pronounced "doopsee") typical rocking (of course !) zydeco is present through the "That Was Your Mother" (another mother story !), punctuated by a nice part of vintage New Orleans drumming.
Zydeco and reggae were meant to meet each other, a mix which is common nowadays but wasn't at that time. Simien picked up "Waiting In Vain", a 1977 song from Bob Marley & The Wailers first period, to delivers a nostalgic tropical gumbo.
 

▼ Beau Jocque

The late great Beau Jocque who was eight years older but started his musical career a decade later than Simien, untimely died in 1999 at age 45. The jumpy but again melancholic version of his song "Yesterday" gives justice to his style.
The conclusion of this tribute celebration comes in the form of the very popular Christian "Will The Circle Be Unbroken", a prayer in memory of the musicians who have passed on, rendered here with the same nostalgia that marks the whole album.

Twenty years later, on the last week-end of Feb. 2022, while Terrance Simien & The Zydeco Experience stayed in the Las Vegas area for concerts and "Creole4Kidz" appearances, their cargo trailer loaded with all the band's instruments and equipment was stolen during the night on the hotel parking lot : thousands of dollars gone ! What a nice way to give thanks to such a nice musician ! ■

► The Web site : https://www.terrancesimien.com
► Cynthia Simien, wife and manager of Terrance, accounts for the loss of the band's trailer and extra troubles on a special fundraiser Web page : https://www.gofundme.com/f/tqdqs-we-get-by-with-a-little-help-from-our-friends

Interviews
► In-depth on-line discussion about linguistic oppression in 2020 : https://youtu.be/TTHaAfESKGo
► On the "Levitt In Your Living Room" network in 2021 : https://youtu.be/5kWM3OZN4KA
► On "The Paul Leslie Hour" : https://youtu.be/W3NRe4zDr0s

Videos

► Recent virtual concert at The New Mexico Tech University auditorium during the Covid pandemics (skip the first 25 mn) : https://youtu.be/oiAwj2OIe_8
► "Mardi Gras Mambo" live stream concert from Lafayette in 2021 (including a 28-mn presentation of Creole culture & food, and interviews with members of The Zydeco Experience) : https://youtu.be/UG9sf_ATWzc

► On the Legendary Rhythm & Blues Cruise in 2020 : https://youtu.be/fnNFjHk-9gc + a cooking demo on the same LRBC : https://youtu.be/LCkddYb27W8
► "Amazing Grace" medley at the Long's Park Amphitheater in Lancaster, PA, in 2019 : https://youtu.be/ScrOX9-8ZYM
► At the Fitzgerald's American Music Fest. in Berwyn, IL :
→ in 2016 : https://youtu.be/UUv4le5stMY
→ in 2019 : https://youtu.be/1YKOLSxj8HM

► At the Minnesota State Fair in 2018 : https://youtu.be/4pAfHrgDaew
► In Sellersville, PA, in 2017:
→ https://youtu.be/AUSB-tJ2Jpc
→ https://youtu.be/pC1mVe8zEt0
→ https://youtu.be/qS87LPDXjE0
► At the Redwood Ramble (a family friendly, music infused campout in Northern California) in 2016 : https://youtu.be/f3P1oNVfPSo

► At the 26th Annual Simi Valley (CA) Cajun & Blues Music Fest. in 2015, with Terrance Simien (vocals and accordion), Danny Williams (keyboard & vocals), Eric Johanson (lead guitar), Oreum Joubert (drums), Josh Lazo (saxophone & washboard), Stan Chambers (bass guitar & vocals) : https://youtu.be/W7kHChS0FA8
► On the 2015 Russia Tour :
→ Part 1 : https://youtu.be/PsC4AiEf1pk
→ Part 2 : https://youtu.be/MMGbjq-xODI
→ Part 3 : https://youtu.be/x3gvllKs1sQ
→ Part 4 : https://youtu.be/KZ1NKXbiALc
→ Раrt 5 : https://youtu.be/IrTRk5xxc3M

► In Kyiv (Ukraine) in 2015 (11-part playlist) : https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFA7FznavK1Y0FEV-kQJZ36g2ioKveBSY
► At the Green Harbor Blues Festival in Marshfield, MA, in 2015 : https://youtu.be/tmPltaMEnVw
► At the Crawfish Festival in Sussex County, NJ, in 2014 : https://youtu.be/t_JmIHsMOsU
► At the 17th Annual Rhythm & Roots Festival in Charlestown, RI, in 2014 : https://youtu.be/mV70SdHsRKA

► In Dnipropetrovsk (Ukraine) at The Gorky Park Summer Theater in 2012 :
→ Part 1 : https://youtu.be/IYIX9ZZWPn0
→ Part 2 : https://youtu.be/55YE2YzN9kk
→ Part 3 : https://youtu.be/KkPO3kZNx6w

► At the Sioux Falls JazzFest in South Dakota in 2011 : https://youtu.be/mzudESQ5HfA

 

____________________________________

Patrick Verbeke - Echos d'Acadie (2004)

> The album

 From the coasts of Acadia to the bayous of Acadiana

Acadia must not be mistaken with Quebec although they have in common  their French origin and language. A colony of New France, this largely maritime territory on the south-east side of the Saint-Laurent river, included parts of New Brunswick, the Gaspe peninsula, Nova Scotia, Isle Royale (Cape Breton Island), Isle Saint-Jean (now Prince Edward Island) (all being united in what are now the Maritime provinces of Canada), and the north part of Maine in the US.

Acadia in 1755. ►

The musical folklore of Acadia finds its origin in that of the old French western provinces along the Atlantic ocean and Manche channel, before encountering other influences like English and Celtic music (Welsh, Scottish and Irish), but also blues, especially for the Acadians of Louisiana (Cajuns) after the Great Upheaval of the 1750s-60s.

This album-tribute to Acadia's folk and history was a nice idea. First, because apart from a few musicians from Louisiana like Zachary Richard or French Canadians like Félix Leclerc or Robert Charlebois, not many artists have sung about its culture and musical folklore. Secondly because it comes from a French "cousin" from across the Atlantic (where Acadians have their original cultural and linguistic roots) who purposely sing in French. An authentic Gaulish like me couldn't but appreciate this homage to "francophonie". ;-)

Many people know zydeco and Cajun music, but fewer are familiar with the Acadian history and culture. So Patrick Verbeke, an active member of the French blues scene, has contributed to fill this unfortunate gap in a great musical and quite poetic album after several visits to Acadian regions in Canada and Louisiana. Moreover he was from Normandy, a French province that exported many settlers to New France as soon as 1604.
Technically, this album is even with the best productions from across the Atlantic. The number of musicians who took part to the recordings is amazing, and the sound is great. The album is woven with unusually rich guitar threads : acoustic or electric, plain or vibrato, slide, pedal steel, dobro…, and great keyboard work too. Special mention to the impressive multi-instrumentist Denys Lable, excellent on anything with strings.

Musically, if blues constitutes the foundation of Verbeke's work, the Acadian specific color is rather found in his lyrics, summoning images from either sides of Acadia : Eastern Canada and Louisiana.
The nice rocking "Coeurs Solidaires" builds a bridge between Old and New France . The excellent country blues "Bluesy City" evokes the geographical distance from the country of the blues, Mississippi (although it's not really an Acadian area), calling memories of Robert and Tommy Johnson, Charley Patton and Blind Lemon Jefferson. The nostalgic soul ballad "Joe Leblanc" tells of a lonesome Louisiana fiddler, and "Orage" (Thunderstorm), a heavy blues noticeable for its great slide guitar work, is premonitory of 2005 major hurricane Katrina that devastated coastal Louisiana.

Back to the birth of Acadia in 1604 with the ballad "L'Ordre Du Bon Temps" devoted to the first settlement by French explorers-adventurers. The funky "Evangelina", probably the high light of the album, recalls a famous (fictional) figure of the Cajun history (again, read below), while "Acadiana" is a declaration of love to a cultural identity split between Canada and Louisiana. Finally, this poetic and idealistic musical voyage would be biased without a tribute to the natives inhabitants of Acadia, the Mic-Mac Amerindians : that's the excellent "Henry Membertou (Blues des Indiens Mic Mac)".
A really nice album from Patrick Verbeke, who was one of the most prominent and gifted musician of the French blues scene, but unfortunately died last August 2021... ■

Evangeline, the cultural icon of the Cajuns

The Great Upheaval of Acadians occurred between 1755 and 1764, during the war between the French and the British, known as the French and Indian War. The British who finally got hold of the Eastern coastal provinces of New France (Canada) known as Acadia, decided to deport the Acadians, those rebel French-speaking and catholic population who fought to keep their cultural identity. They were sent south to the British colonies which would later become the embryo of the United States after the Independence War, to Great-Britain, to France or the French West Indies.
Many of these deportees decided to return to the New World and embarked for the then Spanish colony of Louisiana where they settled in an isolated region of swamps and bayous. Their descendants are known as Cajuns, a distorted pronunciation of the French word  "acadien" : acadian > cadian > cajun.

Evangeline is the central character of the famous epic poem of 19th century writer Henry W. Longfellow set during the Great Upheaval, "Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie" published in 1847. It tells the tragic romantic story of a young Acadian woman, Evangeline Bellefontaine, desperately searching for her beloved Gabriel Lajeunesse, after they were separated during the deportation. Both characters were inspired to Longfellow by a supposedly true story he heard of, that of Emmeline Labiche and Louis Arceneaux.

▲The statue of Evangeline and the famous oaktree in St Martinville. ▼

For Acadians, both in Canada and Louisiana, Evangeline became the iconic symbol of their tribulations and of their cultural identity.  In St Martinville, a little town on the bayou Teche in the heart of the Cajun country (Acadiana), can be found a statue of the famous young woman and the old "Evangeline Oak" under which she used to seat and cry in despair in the Longfellow poem. Like other famous literary fictional character, she became and is revered as a real historical figure in the popular Acadian/Cajun culture.
Further up north in Louisiana, can also be found the Evangeline Parish, and west of Lafayette, in the Acadia Parish, the village of Evangeline. ■

Movie

► "Autour du Blues", a documentary movie featuring Patrick Verbeke among the cream of French bluesmen : https://youtu.be/WzDdRHnQkkg

Live videos

► Patrick Verbeke YT channel and his Blues PV Shows : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQ0IXZKdxyZ4gzTdcqHIGxA/videos

► Short interview during his second visit in Montreal : https://youtu.be/BHKDL7h7C3k

► Verbeke father (Patrick) & son (Steve) :

→ "See that my grave is kept clean" in 2009 : https://youtu.be/p3mzvTOdSVs

→ at the Volcanic Blues Festival, Le Mont Dore, in 2010 : https://youtu.be/hHAqb5Bi2lQ

→ and both with Bernard Allison : https://youtu.be/hYiDxoObV8E

► With Pascal "Bako" Michaelian in 2020 : https://youtu.be/E6a9erApqWg & https://youtu.be/pY0AcxjF7sw

► With the Witch Doctors at the Portobello Rock Club in 2019 : https://youtu.be/uUySXtaNQGs

► With Ahmed Mouici, David Locatelli & Pascal "Bako" Michaelian in 2019 : https://youtu.be/gtaPLvyJqYA

► At the "Melting Potes" (Les Lilas) in 2019 :

→ with Pascal "Bako" Michaelian (harmonica) : https://youtu.be/Ao7FnndW3E4

→ with Philippe Poitevin (harmonica), Jeannot Cirillo (drums) & Emmanuel Chabbey (bass) : https://youtu.be/-led4DX5zXo

► With Vincent "Butch" Bucher, Pascal Lasnier & Christophe Gaillot in 2019 : https://youtu.be/yZ58DG77whc

► "St James Infirmary" in 2001 : https://youtu.be/TlArQsB-nDc

► Jam with Roland Tchakounté, Xavier Pillac, Maria Popkiewicz, Lance Harrison, Simon "Shuffle" Boyer… at the Blues sur Seine Fest. in 2000 : https://youtu.be/uBlxwq5GCM8

► With Stan Noubard Pacha (guitar), Cédric Lesouquet (bass), Fabrice Millérioux (drums) & Ghyslin Di Sacco (piano) in Caen (Steve Verbeke's home town) in 1999 : https://youtu.be/msxYicP8mIo

► At the Issoudun Guitar Festival :

→ in 1997 : https://youtu.be/u8WEmT20l38

→ in 2005 : https://youtu.be/BOQiMlbU2Tw

► With Benoit Blue Boy in 1986 : https://youtu.be/W3eRLn9gAQU

► With Paul Personne & Benoit Blue Boy at L'Utopia (Paris) in 1980 : https://youtu.be/b3QDP9A29Gs

+ interview of the trio : https://youtu.be/fvh9D30YikU

With Paul Personne (center) and Benoit Blue Boy (right). ▲

______________________________________

Texas Johnny Brown - Nothin' But the Truth (1997)

> The album

Texas Brown, Texas groove

Tough based in Houston and considered as a Texas blues musician, as his nickname claims, John Reilly or Riley (like B.B. King !) Brown was born in 1928 in Mississippi. He moved to his father in Louisiana in 1937. At that time, according to Brown, his father, who was a blind street singer and acoustic guitarist, had a guide dog that played guitar too ! His father was holding the guitar on his knee and make the chords while the dog pawed the strings. Johnny was accompanying them on tambourine and vocals, and later on guitar... Father, son and dog rambled from town to town, playing street corners and small clubs for tips. Finally in 1946 Brown moved to Houston where he really began his professional career.

Amos Milburn ►

In particular, he played and toured with Amos Milburn and his Aladdin Chicken Shackers band, with Junior Parker, Ruth Brown (another Brown !), and Bobby "Blue" Bland for whom he wrote the hit "Two Steps From The Blues" (featured in a new version on this album), and as a session musician for Houston's Duke/Peacock record label working with people like Wayne Bennett, Joe Hinton, Buddy Ace or Clarence Hollimon...
In 1970 Johnny packed up his guitar to take care of his family, working "normal" jobs, and playing only occasionally. In 1991, once his kids grown, he finally fell back to the call of his guitar. For a couple of years he played with old friends like the excellent Joe "Guitar" Hughes, like Grady Gaines, Trudy Lynn, Teddy "Cry Cry" Reynolds...

In 1993 Johnny set up his own group, The Quality Blues Band, and by 1995 they started to record some of the tracks featured on this first album. These recording sessions, interrupted by tours (including in Europe) and festival performances, extended for over two years cursed by two successive defections : his old friend keyboardist Teddy Reynolds left due to health problems, then Charles Rhinehart, who had taken his place, died unexpectedly, finally replaced by Alvin King.
Finally the album was ready to be released and it was, in 1998 by Choctaw Creek Records. Brown was then 70,  but the result is full of the energy of a younger man. A great album proving that talent is like good wine, it's getting better and better with age.

Yet, when the first track, "Cheatin' and Stealin'", started, I got skeptical. A name immediately crossed my mind : Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown ! Same name, same kind of jumping swing, same kind of horn riffs, same kind of guitar sound ! I really love "Gatemouth" and I thought "that Brown's gonna have a hard time doing as well !" Fortunately the next track, "There Goes the Blues" and its followers, broomed off my reservation : I discovered a man with his own musical identity, and a rich one too. Fortunately because a "Gatemouth" copycat would have caused an annoying deja-vu feeling. There's only one "Gatemouth" !

Anyway, it must be difficult for a musician who's been a sideman for so long to come out with something original and not a collection of imitations of one's former leaders. The nice surprise is that Brown's first album shows his multi-faceted creative and imaginative musical talent as a song writer, composer, arranger, singer and, of course, excellent guitar player. He doesn't imitate, he creates ! As a band leader he has a gift to make the best of his sidemen, especially his successive keyboardists, despite the misfortunes that perturbed the sessions.
Brown, who cited jazz guitarist Charlie Christian as an influence, plays a quite liquid guitar style, and sings with a warm soul voice that must have seduced a whole lot of women ! The album features :

- brassy numbers like the jumpy above-mentioned "Cheatin' and Stealin'" and the horn-driven "Your House, Your Home",
- great moving blues like the wonderful "There Goes The Blues", like "Strange Situation", and the final rolling "Nothin' but the Truth, so Help Me John",
- the excellent swinging rhythm and blues "No Part-Time Lover" backed by killing horn and rhythm guitar riffs, one of the high-light of the album in my opinion,
- romantic soul slows like "Tender age, Gentle Woman", "Stand the Pain" (even featuring a flute-like part), "Two Steps From the Blues" (specially re-cut for the album), "Blue and Lonesome", the magnificent melodic ballad "Once Was" and the no less magnificent guitar-led instrumental version of Aretha Franklin’s "Ain't no Way".

All of these, written by Brown except "Ain't no Way", are standing on a groovy bass-drums rhythm section, and are masterly arranged, with excellent groovy rhythm guitar and gliding solos by Brown, great keyboard work (piano and especially magnificent organ lines) and effective R'n'B horns backing. As a first album, it was a master-strike, rightly honored by a nomination as Comeback Album of the Year at the 1999 W.C. Handy Blues Award.

Brown put out a second and last album in 2001 : the equally tasty and swinging "Blues Defender". He died from a double cancer twelve years later at the age of 85. Why do bluesmen have to get old and sick ?! 😢 ■

Videos
Unfortunately many of the videos found on YT are rather poor quality, image and/or sound, and do not make justice to TJB's talent…

► Promo clip with the Quality Blues Band (William Hollis on keyboards,  Larry Evans on bass and Kerry "KC" Cartwright on drums) around 2009 : https://youtu.be/jmb_9auTylI
► Celebrating his 85th birthday at The Big Easy Club in Houston in February 2013, just a few months before his death : https://youtu.be/TArsobPz3DE
► At the "Blues on the Hill" Fest in 2012 (?) :
→ Pt 1 : https://youtu.be/OL_zENl_HyM
→ Pt 2 : https://youtu.be/8wrSfJpUNfI
► At The Big Easy in Houston in 2012 : https://youtu.be/MNCzEyDPLvg
► A "guitar montage" of TJB from 2011 : https://youtu.be/PidR4_01vZQ

► At the Houston Blues Society show at Discovery Green, Houston, in 2011 : https://youtu.be/zIBdSMaVFJI
► At The Big Easy in 2010 :
→  with William Hollis on keyboards : https://youtu.be/hc8kaU-fQeI
→  with Bobby Mack (Jimmy Pate on drums, Larry Evans on bass) :
- https://youtu.be/pzYS45crctI
- https://youtu.be/i9E6X3uurbY
► Jam at The Big Easy with young Eric Hoovestol : https://youtu.be/O91HyiAA2JE

► At the Blues on the Hill festival in Harlingen, TX, in 2010 : https://youtu.be/0XBVvzCJVKA
► At "Blues To Bop" in Lugano (Italy) in 2009 (with William Hollis on keyboards, Larry Evans on bass and Kerry "KC" Cartwright on drums) : https://youtu.be/aD3zJdV3e2M
► At The Big Easy (unknown date) : https://youtu.be/YKfKhnB8F90
► At a Dallas Blues Society show in 1992 : https://youtu.be/FibWGtJtQPg

__________________________________________________________________

Doc & Richard Watson - Third Generation Blues (1999)

> The album

 Guitars from the High Country

The Watson clan is from Deep Gap, a small town up in the Appalachian Blue Ridge Mountains (called the High Country), in the northwest corner of North Carolina. The High Country overlooks the Piedmont foothills region famous for its finger-picking guitar style, a detail which has to be considered when acoustic folk music is concerned.
Arthel Lane Watson aka "Doc", born in 1923, played both flat-picking and finger-picking styles, but is best known for his outstanding flat-pick technique. He also built a vast repertoire of mountain ballads learned via the oral tradition of his Deep Gap home area. He died in May 2012. His grandson Richard followed him three years later, in June 2015.

Doc was already 76 when this album was recorded, while Richard was around 33. The latter had all genetic cards in hands (rather in DNA) to become a talented guitar picker : in his veins flowed not only the blood of his grandfather but also of his father Merle Watson, who was also a gifted and famous guitar player but untimely died in 1985 at only 36.

The album's title might mislead a bit orthodox blues purists : these third generation blues are closer to folk, and by certain aspects to Piedmont style. Nevertheless, it features a good number of classics of the country, folk and blues traditional repertoire, from the opening track, Big Joe Williams' "Turn The Lamps Down Low" (titled "Honey Please Don't Go" on the other release, but it's the same song anyway) to Gershwin's "Summertime" (in a nice version) and the popular "If I Were A Carpenter" to the over-covered "House Of The Rising Sun" and "St. James Infirmary" (with an unusual new intro though), and to "Milk Cow Blues" featuring Doc's harmonica.

◄ The grandson was the eyes of his blind grandfather.

Apart from these standards, the other songs fully deserve their presence, and maybe even more : Woody Guthrie's ballad "Gypsy Davey", the tender "Uncloudy Day", the story-telling folk "South Coast", Jimmie Rodgers' "Train Whistle Blues" (Doc once confessed that Rodgers was his first idol), the sad but beautifully melodic "Moody River", the catchy "Columbus Stockade Blues" and "Walk On Boy", and finally the nostalgic gospel "Precious Lord Take My Hand".

These fourteen songs are all delivered in a neat, highly skillful guitar picking virtuosity and gently swinging tempo, with Doc's immediately identifiable voice, that of a man who has decades of practice, performances and recordings behind him. It is difficult to distinguish Doc's guitar from his grandson Richard's, except that the "third generation" is apparently in charge of most of the solo lines, and nicely too.
Just underlined by the bass of T. Michael Coleman, the sound of their acoustic guitars is deep and warm, perfectly balanced and recorded, a treat for the ear.

Both play a special Gallagher guitar model designed for and baptized "Doc Watson", a type of guitar whose Martin-like sound is generally favored by folk, bluegrass and country players, contrary to Gibson-like models generally more appreciated by blues musicians. But this in no way means that the Watsons' blues songs are at a lower level of performance. Both artists master their music with eyes closed (which actually was the case for Doc who was blind !) and were able to play any genre. This pleasing grandfather-grandson collaboration is the best proof of this. ■


◄Two Gallagher guitar models.

Documents
► Deciphering Doc Watson, A look at his life and influences : https://youtu.be/P1LRSrihy00
► Audio interview of Doc Watson in 2002 : https://youtu.be/WEQwTCp9ZX4

Doc Watson at 18. ►

Doc Watson
► At the Wayne Henderson Festival in Grayson County, Virginia, in 2004 : https://youtu.be/neud2Ai5t_A & https://youtu.be/1U_aLhIgzH8
► At Papa Joe's "Banjo-B-Que" Music Festival in 2011 : https://youtu.be/R8VXgxKWPmg

► With fiddler Bill Monroe at the Delaware Valley Bluegrass Festival in 1990 : https://youtu.be/eg9nh3K1_HA
► Live with the younger generation in 1978 : https://youtu.be/-4SAkCv6ri4
► Live with son Merle in 1983 : https://youtu.be/5xaHl5ryeJ0

◄ Merle and Doc

Doc Watson with grandson Richard

► At the Neighborhood Theater in Charlotte, NC, in 1999 (2h16) : https://youtu.be/vkZdLfiUsEs
► "Walk On Boy" : https://youtu.be/5tnYNtLSSkE
► "Train Whistle Blues" : https://youtu.be/ZZpqGjo9V8s
► "Trouble in Mind" : https://youtu.be/JZPat3DpTa4
► "Deep River Blues" (with Charles Welch) in 2009 : https://youtu.be/kB3mxonkgS0

► "Precious Lord Take My Hand" at the MerleFest 2008 : https://youtu.be/ITJ54wcbgxE
► "Milk Cow Blues" at the MerleFest. : https://youtu.be/TXYycvVKJlA
► "Nine Pound Hammer" at the Sugar Grove Music Fest., NC, in 2011 : https://youtu.be/pAiBfXYMnJo
► "Working Man Blues"
→ at the Neighborhood Theatre in Charlotte, NC, in 2010 : https://youtu.be/xChQ_hN6lNk
→ at the Sugar Grove Music Fest. in 2009 : https://youtu.be/j17F0XcVoVM

► "The Cat Came Back"  at the Delaware Valley Bluegrass Festival 2005 : https://youtu.be/2TjUZ1MbUQ4
► "I'm Gonna Buy Me A Pistol" at the Sugar Grove Music Fest. in in 2009 : https://youtu.be/F2RKHsUx6M8
► "Summertime"
→ at BB King's, NYC, in 2007 : https://youtu.be/n29S4fq5Nfg
→ at the Romp Bluegrass Festival 2010 in Owensboro, KY : https://youtu.be/M9-dSjgXy9A

 

► At the Springfest in 2002 : https://youtu.be/GvFbtAYyiT0

► An Evening with Doc & Richard Watson around 1997 : https://youtu.be/6mh_PuYjBjc

_____________________