Odetta Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

National Recording Registry 2021

Flaco Jiménez

You may have heard about 25 recordings making it into the National Recording Registry. Some got more press than others.

Edison’s “St. Louis tinfoil” recording (1878). I can’t find it yet, but it should be available starting August 28, 2021, when the Missouri History Museum starts its St. Louis Sound exhibition.
Nikolina – Hjalmar Peterson (1917) (single). This appears to be a 1929 version.
Smyrneikos Balos – Marika Papagika (1928) (single). “An authentic Greek recording.”
When the Saints Go Marching In – Louis Armstrong and his Orchestra (1938) (single). He performed this song a lot, but this is among the finest versions.
Christmas Eve Broadcast – Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill (December 24, 1941), right after the US entered WWII.
The Guiding Light – Nov. 22, 1945. I can’t find it, but now I know why it’s on the list. It aired “the first Thanksgiving after the conclusion of World War II… The Rev. Dr. Frank Tuttle gives a moving sermon to a packed church.”

The 1950s and 1960s

Odetta Sings Ballads and Blues – Odetta (1957) (album). My father LOVED her voice.
Lord, Keep Me Day by Day – Albertina Walker and the Caravans (1959) (single)
Roger Maris hits his 61st home run (October 1, 1961). I don’t know if it’s the one with Phil Rizzuto’s voice, or, more likely that of Red Barber.
Aida – Leontyne Price, et.al. (1962) (album)
Once A Day – Connie Smith (1964) (single) – EIGHT weeks at #1 on the country charts in 1964, though only #101 on the pop charts
Born Under a Bad Sign – Albert King (1967) (album). I may still own this on vinyl.

Onto the ’70s and ’80s

Free to Be… You and Me – Marlo Thomas and Friends (1972) (album). I watched the TV special for sure. I might have even bought the album.
The Harder They Come – Jimmy Cliff (1972) (album). There are YouTube versions with more than 12 songs, but the version I own has the dozen.
Lady Marmalade – Labelle (1974) (single). Patti LaBelle didn’t know what this song was about? She didn’t understand French, evidently.
Late for the Sky – Jackson Browne (1974) (album)
Bright Size Life — Pat Metheny (1976) (album). Didn’t find it.
The Rainbow Connection – Kermit the Frog (1979) (single)

Celebration — Kool and the Gang (1980) (single). On the 22 March 2021 JEOPARDY, R and B and SOUL HITS $800. 40 years later and partygoers still like to get on the dance floor and “celebrate good times” to a hit by this group. Triple Stumper, but I knew it instantly. I have the album on vinyl.
Richard Strauss: Four Last Songs – Jessye Norman (1983) (album)
Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation 1814 – Janet Jackson (1989) (album). I LOVE this album. She performed much of it when I saw her at SPAC in 2018.

THE Find

Partners – Flaco Jiménez (1992) (album). I was not familiar with this artist, but he performs with Stephen Stills, Linda Ronstadt, John Hiatt, and Los Lobos on songs they wrote or co-wrote, plus Dwight Yoakam, Oscar Tellez, and Ry Cooder
Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What A Wonderful World – Israel Kamakawiwo’ole (1993) (single). I may have gotten a little teary-eyed when this played on the TV show E.R. just before Dr. Greene’s departure. Maybe not. Possibly.
Illmatic – Nas (1994) (album)
This American Life: The Giant Pool of Money (May 9, 2008). “A special program about the housing crisis produced in a special collaboration with NPR News. We explain it all to you. What does the housing crisis have to do with the turmoil on Wall Street? Why did banks make half-million dollar loans to people without jobs or income? And why is everyone talking so much about the 1930s?”

Music. Birthday. Roger. Chaos. 67.

Annie Haslam, Judy Collins, Odetta

Roger.babe We have the convergence of Saturday, when I generally write about music, and March 7, which is my birthday. Save for the obvious, there is isn’t much I play every year.

Now there WAS a song I played on March 8, a lot. Have a Good Time from my favorite Paul Simon album.

Yesterday it was my birthday
I hung one more year on the line
I should be depressed
My life’s a mess
But I’m having a good time

I’ve been trying to remember what music I have received on my birthday. A couple years back, I received an album of Odetta singing Bob Dylan. A couple of those tracks appear here.

There was an album I got on my 16th birthday called Who Knows Where the Time Goes by Judy Collins. I wrote about it back in 2008, but somehow all the YouTube links got mucked up. So here it is again.

I was thinking about a particular song from the album, The Story of Isaac, written by Leonard Cohen. It’s because my Bible guys have been rereading the book of Genesis. Specifically Genesis 22, when Abraham is tested by God.

In 1977, I was in Charlotte, NC, crashing on my parents’ sofa. What I wanted for my birthday was the album Scheherazade & Other Stories by Renaissance. I played it. Don’t think my family appreciated as much as I did. So it goes.

Anyway, 67 suggests sixes and sevens. Chaos. Or at least that’s how I’ll remember how old I am.

Yes, I DID have a happy birthday, thank you

I find that the most efficient venue to write is a public setting, near the guy making wheezing noises, and the guy with the peculiar laugh.

Each month, when there’s a birthday in our office at work, someone, usually the boss, will ask, “What did you do on your birthday?” I thought I’d write it down while I can still remember.

My bride and I got up and had breakfast at a sandwich shop nearby. We might have opted for a more leisurely locale except that: 1) she had to report for jury duty and 2) I had a massage scheduled, and they’ve moved to a place I wasn’t exactly sure of. But find it I did, and it was especially needed.

I walked home, read some newspapers, watched a little TV, notably CBS Sunday Morning, which I never watch actually on the Sabbath, when The Wife came home around noon. Apparently, the court impaneled enough people before they even got into the courtroom.

I went to the library for an hour to blog. For some reason, I find that the most efficient venue to write, in a public setting, near the guy making wheezing noises, and the guy with the peculiar laugh.

The three of us went out to dinner at a family-style restaurant recommended by a bus driver I know. It had been opened since 1996, and I must have passed it dozens of times, but I had never even heard of it. It was good food, though, interestingly, the chicken parm was better as leftovers.

When we got home, PRESENTS! This included Odetta singing Dylan from the 1960s, though the CD version was released around the turn of the millennium. I also received March Book 2, the last of the trilogy penned by Georgia Congressman John Lewis that I received. I got Book 3 as a review copy and Book 1 for Christmas.

Oh, Jaquandor wrote a blog post in my honor!

The following Saturday, I held my annual hearts card game. It’s useful to do this in part because it forces us to clean the house more thoroughly. We talked a lot, ate a lot, and even played cards; I even won one, and by “shooting the moon”, taking all the points, on the last hand.

To paraphrase some song, a splendid time was guaranteed for all.

Throwback Music Saturday: Run On

‘Run On’ is a traditional folk song which has been recorded by numerous artists.

At some point in the 1990s, I bought a box set called Roots ‘N Blues: The Retrospective 1925-1950, “a four-CD box set released on Columbia Records in 1992. The set features five hours worth of early blues, folk/country, and gospel recordings from a variety of American artists. Many of these recordings had never previously been issued in any medium.”

Eventually, I got Moby’s 1999 album Play and stopped short when I heard the song Run On. BOY, that sounded familiar. As it turns out Moby sampled Bill Landford And The Landfordaires’ 1949 version of Run On For A Long Time, which appears on disc 4 of Roots ‘N Blues.

From Wikipedia: “‘God’s Gonna Cut You Down’, also known as ‘Run On’ and ‘Run On for a Long Time’, is a traditional folk song which has been recorded by numerous artists… modified to fit the boundaries of diverse genres like country, folk, gospel and techno.”

Subsequently, I got versions of the song by Johnny Cash, on a 2006 posthumous album, and Tom Jones, from his 2010 album. But I had never owned the great 1956 version by Odetta, though my father had possessed several of her albums.

Listen:

Run On For A Long Time – Bill Landford And The Landfordaires here or here or here

God’s Gonna Cut You Down – Odetta here or here (a slightly different version)

Run On – Moby here or here (official)

God’s Gonna Cut You Down – Johnny Cash here or here (official)

Run On – Tom Jones here

Harry Belafonte is 85

Harry Belafonte was an artist who used his celebrity for good.

Harry Belafonte, who turns 85 today, is a hero to me. Based on his record collection, my late father was likewise taken; moreover, I think Belafonte was a model for my father’s life.

If you’re not familiar with him, here’s an apt description from the Charlie Rose website:
Harold Belafonte, Jr. is an African-American musician, actor and radical social activist of Jamaican ancestry. One of the most successful Jamaican musicians in history, he was dubbed the “King of Calypso” for popularizing the Caribbean musical style in the 1950s. Belafonte is perhaps best known for singing the “Banana Boat Song”, with its signature lyric “Day-O”. Throughout his career, he has been an advocate for civil rights and humanitarian causes. In recent years he has been a vocal critic of the policies of the Bush Administration.

My father used to sing in the Binghamton, NY area when I was growing up. He was a “singer of folk songs,” which he found to be an important distinction from being a “folk singer,” a term he found too confining. And like Belafonte, he sang in a variety of styles.

My father’s musical repertoire, I understood far later, came from a variety of sources: Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Odetta, Leadbelly, Jimmie Rogers and very definitely, Belafonte. In fact, here’s one song called There’s A Hole in My Bucket by Belafonte and Odetta, which my father used to sing, until my sister Leslie and I joined his act and stole it from him.

Harry Belafonte was an artist who used his celebrity for good. He was not one to shut up and sing, or act, as though he had forfeited his rights as a citizen, something we in my household admired greatly. He was quite active, for instance, working with Martin Luther King, Jr. Read The amazing American journey of Harry Belafonte -Day-O! How the singer-activist blended Caribbean shtick and fierce political passion. Also, watch this segment of CBS News Sunday Morning.

And if sleeps through an occasional interview, he’s entitled!
***
Davy Jones of the Monkees died this week. I was not a big Monkees fan, but I distinctly remember wanting a Monkees Greatest Hits album and getting it one Christmas. Mark Evanier tells a lovely story about Davy Jones from just a few weeks ago; seemed like a great guy. Here’s the Monkees doing It’s Nice To Be With You.