I went looking for some Civil War music on YouTube, and was tickled to discover this video: An 8-minute excerpt from Johnny Cash’s 1960s variety show, in which he sings and spoken-words his way through a medley of Civil War songs and speeches. Sadly, he doesn’t introduce the last song with “Hullo! I’m Johnny Reb!” Missed opportunity, really…
“Free Jazz” is a phrase that doesn’t much stir my enthusiasm, and I admit I’m not quite sure what to make of this, but it’s an interesting news item to note, and besides – I’m sure there are readers for whom “Free Jazz” inspires the same kind of heart-throbs that “fluffy kittens” or “Tecumseh Sherman” do for me. (I’m a girl of varied tastes, what can I say? If they ever uncover a tintype of Sherman holding fluffy kittens I might shatter every window in Toronto with my high pitched squealing.)
The six new compositions in this concert give voice to the thoughts and feelings of the mothers, brothers, civilian spies, and runaway slaves all living in the war but rarely seeing the battle field. The tone of these compositions reflects the anxieties and fears of a population living in an unforeseeable future.
Jazz pianist Dave Burrell, with violin accompaniment, presents a Civil War-themed programme commissioned by the Rosenbach Museum & Library. The link below has the entire hour-plus performance embedded if, well, y’know… “Fluffy kittens”.
http://www.rosenbach.org/learn/artists/projects/civilians-during-wartime
The past days’ accounts of Confederate exiles sailing to safe harbours put me in a sailing mood, so here’s an unusual blog post for today.
I stumbled across this CD a few years ago while on a quest for Civil War music, and it’s one of my favourite period performances. The band describes themselves as,
An actual string band of the Civil War Era singing a wide variety of traditional American songs in authentic, “living history” style.
“Living” is the key word, there – these guys sound like they’ve been issued double grog rations and the promise of some weekend shore leave in a bordello-lousy port. While Bobby Horton’s catalogue of songs is impressive, his singing leaves a lot to be desired. Such is not the case here. The shanties are rollicking and well-performed.
I didn’t recognise any of the titles except for Shenandoah and Drunken Sailor, but the Navy songs never got the kind of publicity that the Army’s marching songs did, so that’s understandable. The Mermaid is now a personal favourite, and I dare anyone to refrain from singing along to Jolly Grog.
The best part about writing this post is that I’ve just noticed the band has a whole series of other Civil War CDs. If I ever figure out how to make money off this site, I know how I’m blowing my first paycheque.