Hub City Dutchmen- Polkas & Waltzes We Send From The Hub City Dutchmen

It is getting close to that time of year, Oktoberfest.  Every year I have done this blog, we have commemorated this period in some fashion.  Last year, it was a massive posting of German music which consisted of mostly military marches.  This turned out to be miserable listening for me and really appealed to no one except that small minority really into marching bands.  So this year, I decided to go a a different direction.  Well, any direction than last year.  So here we are presenting albums which are or either German or fashioned around polkas and waltzes. If you can read the title of this album, you can see this clearly falls into the latter.  I paid $5 for this.

This would be the second album I have posted from Richard Polasek and the Hub City Dutchmen.  Hailing from the then Polka Capital of Texas, Yoakum, these guys were popular in Central Texas.  I am not sure when this record came out. Some time in the 60’s, possibly the 70’s.  Pretty decent stuff.  As the title would suggest it contains both polkas and waltzes as well as a few songs with vocals.Check out the earlier post on this band for any backstory although I believe it alluded me at that time as well.

For a sample, let’s kick off the season with “Under The Elm” .  Also, I am presenting “In Heaven There Is No Beer” which is a finely disguised advertisement for Texas’ own Shiner Bock.

Satisfactory.  If you are looking for music to use for your Oktoberfest celebrations, search Oktoberfest on this blog and you should get quite a selection.  Surprised I have not made a separate category for it by now.

Maria Teresa Chacin con Juan Vincente Torrealba- La Paraulata

Here is a Venezuelan record I got for $4 with discount.  I was familiar with the work of Juan Vincent Torrealba, having featured his work on this blog before.  The pretty female singer did not hurt either.  For those taking notes, this is the first record this month recorded with my new record player.  Well, the sample song is, anyway.  While I was recording songs for this record, my old record player which has been shifting slightly in speed, finally crapped out.  More than likely the belt, but for the purposes I use it for, it is cheaper to buy a new one, which I did. Cheap no frill ION.  Hooks right up to the lap top.  Good to go.

Born in Caracas in 1945, Maria Teresa Chacin is a pretty accomplished Venezulean singer , having put out over 50 records or so. Composer and harpist Torrealba was born in the same city in 1917.  He is equally if not more so accomplished as a musician.  He also turned 101 last February.

This album came out in 1970 I think.  From Palacio records, it features 10 latin/folk tunes with harp, either driving or supporting the songs.  6 of the tunes are written by Torrealba.  Good album.  Besides the excellent harp, Chacin’s vocals are great.  I liked a bit more than half of this album for samples. The title, by the way, is the name of a bird, what English speaking folk know as the speckled thrush.

But for our purposes, I pretty much settled on “Mar Y Llano” soon as after I heard it so here it is.  Google translates the title as “Sea and Plain”.

Satisfactory.

The Weavers- Folk songs Around The World

Here is one I got for $4.  From the Weavers, which at the time of this record included Lee Hays, Fred Hellerman, Ronnie Gilbert, and Pete Seeger (pretty much the classic lineup).  All are currently deceased. I got it for the songs.

Released by Decca in 1959, this record contained a little less than half of what I would call International content.  The bulk of the songs are American, including “The Frozen Logger”, “Darling Corey”, Leadbelly’s “Sylvie”, “Follow The Drinking Gourd”, and Woody Guthrie’s classic “Hard Ain’t it Hard”.  Among the round the world songs, highlights include England’s “Greensleeves”, and a medley of tunes from around the world.

It is that medley that I propose for today’s sample. It inlcudes “Artza Alinu”, “Floppy Eared Mule”, “Mazurka”, and “Hey Liley Liley Lo”.

Satisfactory.

Marek Weber and his Orchestra- Balalaika! Thirty One Russian Gypsy Airs

Two things I like with this record:  Russian music and $1.

While the subject of this record is Russian music, the principle behind it was Marek Weber, the German band leader (1888-1964).  He began leading bands in his twenties and became quite popular, recording albums and working on film scores.  Although he detested jazz, he accepted its rising polarity by fostering jazz musicians and jazz numbers.  Although, it is said when his band would play jazz numbers, he would leave his conductor’s stand to get a drink at the bar.  Weber was Jewish so he was unfortunately caught up in the Reichsmusikkammer, Goebbels’ effort to promote “good” German music while suppressing non-Aryan composers.  Weber left for London and then the US.  After WWII, Weber mostly retired until his death at age 75.

This record takes standard Russian tunes and groups them together in blocks. Pretty good stuff.  There is a gypsy air to this record as it has a lot of violins.  I was sort of expecting the balalaika since it is in the title, but there is none I can discern on this record.  Still , it is pretty decent. This came out in 1958 on Harmony Records (so he could not have been THAT retired…).

For a sample, I wanted to highlight the inclusion of two pieces f work from the Russian opera I saw a couple years back, Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin.  The first piece groups together the folk songs “Kasbek” and “Birch Tree In The Meadow with the Polonaise from Onegin.  Second, we have a combination of “Balalaika:, “Haida Troika”, “Russian Kozak”, the Onegin Waltz, and the old Russian stalwart, “The Volga Boatmen” which serves as a bookend as it was also used to open this record.  Why the Onegin kick?  No reason.

Good record.  Satisfactory.

We Five- Make Someone Happy

Here is something I bought for a dollar.  Quite a few dollar records this week.  Awe, the good old days,  Well, I bought this for the song I am going to post. This record was owned by someone I believe named Hardy.

We Five were a folk-pop group from the mid 60’s, formed in San Francisco by Michael Stewart, brother of John of the Kingston Trio.  Along with Beverly Bivens, the group had a #1 hit with their version of Ian & Sylvia’s “On My Mind”.  They split after their second album with some reformation and additional releases over the years .  Stewart would pass in 2002.  Bivens, on the other hand, would resurface in 2009 to perform again.  This is a rather condensed version of events that may be factually challenged but that is what time allows for these days.

This was that second album.  Released in 1967, Blevins left the group soon after its recording.  The back cover references this breakup by stating that this is the last album from the group (they would reform two years later). Pretty descent collection of songs which were popular at the time including “Let’s Get Together”, “Somewhere”, “Our Day Will Come”, and the title track. I don’t know.  This album is missing a bit of bite to it but again, this music was quite popular at the time.

For the sample, I went with the reason I bought this album, “High Flying Bird”, the sad blues standard.  Really does not show the dynamics of the group but rather the strength of Bivens.  Pretty good version although the best version still in my mind is Judy Henske’s.

 

For the price I paid, I am happy.  If it were, lets say, in the $3 or higher range, this would not be the case but let’s go ahead and call this satisfactory.

The Mitchell Trio- The Slightly Irreverent Mitchell Trio

Here’s somebody who has been on the blog a few times.  $2.50 was the price.  Had a lot of songs I liked on it.

This was around their 8th album or so.  Released by Mercury in 1964, it went to #128 on the charts. Lot of good songs on here by famous authors.  From Kurt Weill, we have a version of his “Alabama Song” (which was probably why I bought the album).  There are songs y the trio’s folk contemporaries Tom Paxton and Phil Ochs.  The lyricist of The Wizard of Oz and Finian’s Rainbow, E.Y.  Harburg contributed some lines to a song with the music from “A-Weep-A-Way/ (“Lion Sleeps Tonight” melody).  Finally, there is a pretty good version of “When I Was A Young Man”, which is an early form of both “The Streets of Laredo” and “St James Infirmary”.  In fact I was listening to this song today and wondered which album it came off of.

Kind of bummed now that it is this one for I have already picked the song that I intend to use as a sample.  On prior Mitchell Trio albums, the band quite liberally took traditional tunes and added new words, giving themselves writing credits. Well, this album at least gives arranging/adaption credits.  By reading the title, I thought this song was Russian but that would make me completely wrong.  From Ireland, here is “The Pride of Petrovar” (Petrovar is an anglicized version of the Gaelic Pedar-a-Vore”, some place that either may or may not exist any more. Hard to tell from this part of the world.   The song is adapted from another Irish tune which I posted here, “Elieen Oge” which is again anglicized into Elieen Ore.

Link to said post with Eileen Oge

 

Satisfactory

Buffy Sainte-Marie- It’s My Way!

Here we go with another month of 2018 and therefore, Donkey-Show.  Already past the half-way point for the year.  Where did the time go? I can’t remember for sure if I bought this during the Memorial Day sale at Half Price which is sad because that was less than two months ago.  Let’s go ahead and say yes and call this a $2.40 record.  Well , even if this was $3, it would have been a good buy.  I am posting this today as a belated Canada Day celebration.

This is the critically acclaimed debut album from Canadian folk singer Buffy Sainte-Marie, born 1941 in Qu’Appelle Valley, Saskatchewan.  Released by Vanguard in 1964, the album put her on firmly on the map of important folk artists of her day.  Perhaps that is a slightly inaccurate statement as she had been playing in folk houses in Toronto and New York for a spell before this came put but that is just the general cliche statement that gets these posts written these days .  Anyway, you get the general idea.

I thought there was at least one Phil Ochs song on here but I was proven wrong.  There are two traditional tunes and an adaptation.  The other ten were written by Sainte-Marie.  On a few tracks (well two tracks to be specific)  there are accompanying musicians but for the most part, it is just her and her guitar.   Overall, it is a pretty strong statement and a powerful debut.

Furthermore, this album features some of her best known songs such as “Now That The Buffalo’s Gone”, “The Universal Solider”, the often covered “Cod’ine”, and the title track.

Although these are all great songs, for a sample, I went with the folk song “Cripple Creek”.  When I first heard it, I liked it because I had just purchased a jaw harp and I thought that was the instrument featured on this album (I must have bought this on Memorial Day then).  I found out however, that this was not a jaw harp but a mouthbow, which according to Wikapedia, was a staple on her first three albums.  It is also the bowed/stick thingy shown on the front cover.  Well, I am not going to argue over semantics as the two do produce a similar sound.  Also, when I post well known albums, I like to sample the more obscure tracks so here we are with “Cripple Creek”.  If you want to see this in action, check out the 7 minute mark on the video below.

Top Rated Record.  Sure, this post glosses over the many fine accomplishments of this artist as well as the personal backstory.  And yeah, I did post a lot of videos.  This is kind of how this month is going to play out so I would suggest you use Google to fill in any blanks in this narrative.

Bobbie & Smoky Coats-Folk Song We Love

This album was $3.  Look at it.  Between the goofy font and the equally goofy guy with the beret, there is no way I was going to pass this up. I mean, it just really looked bad.  Also, it had a couple of songs I really like on it.

I was really expecting this to be really bad attempt at beat folk from the 60’s based on the cover.  However, in actuality, it is more like folk songs grounded in country,  I could not find much about the subjects other than what is on the back cover, written by Grand Ole Opry star Billy Walker. In 1948. Walker played in a trio with Smokey and his brother Dusty Coats (so I am assuming they are from Texas).  At the time, Smokey was known for his multi-instrument skills.  In 1952, Smoky got married to Bobby and the pair worked with swing fiddler, Wade Ray.  When the Ray band disbanded, the Coats became a duo.  They played the Golden Nugget in Las Vegas.  This is all I know and it all came from the liner notes.

This record was released in 1963 on Sims Records. 12 songs on this album, featuring Smokey on guitar, Bobbie on piano, and the duo on vocals, along with a few musicians on bass, banjo, and drums backing the couple.  Most of the vocals are handled by Smokey but Bobbie’s vocals appear here and there.  Again I was taken  aback as I set my sights pretty low on this. The arrangements are good as is the musicianship and vocals.  For a sample, I could have used 75% of this album so how to narrow it down?  Well, I really liked the song “God’s River”.  Furthermore, I thought their version of “Rovin Gambler” was really good.  Finally, I wanted to throw Bobbie some vocal light so I considered “Sweet Betsy from Pike”.  Which one of these beauties would I go with?  Well I decided to take the easy way out and go with all three.

9 times out of 10, you can judge a book by its cover. Well, here is an exception.  Quite a good little record.  Satisfactory.  If you know anything about the Coats, please leave me a comment so I can fill in the many blanks this post left.  I would love to replace the stock photos on this post.

 

Oscar Brand- Bawdy Hootenanny

I supposed I should just go out right now and apologize to the good people of Manitoba for today’s post as I bought this record ($6? Yikes) for the song I am going to post. I have bought and actually listened to another album in this series so I kind of had an idea what I was getting into with this.

This is a part of a series of at least “Bawdy” collections of tunes along certain folk genres from one Oscar Brand, who I am not surprised to now learn, was born in in Winnipeg in 1920.  Over his illustrious career, Brand wrote over 300 songs, (including “Something to Sing About”), released over 100 albums (mostly not bawdy), and performed along with such folk luminaries as Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie, and Pete Seeger. His tenure hosting the  Folksong Festival for WNYC put him in the Guinness Record books as longest running radio show with a single host. His CTV/CBC show in the 60’s, helped introduce Canada to up and comers such as Joni Mitchell and Gordon Lightfoot.  When he pass in 2016 from pneumonia, he was 96.

So here is this , a piece in a series of bawdy records from the Audio Fidelity label.  At the time of this release, the series included 9 of these type albums.  This album in particular was originality released in 1955, but I am guessing this a re-release from the 60’s. Not a whole lot of diversity on this.  I mean you have one song about turds, two about drinking, and the rest about prostitution for the most part.  But still some interesting areas on here.  Brand is backed up on this record, incidentally by Dave Sear, who taught Paul Newman banjo for Cool Hand Luke.

 

Well, despite finding a few songs catchy, I hold my head in shame when I post this next song.  Here is the “Winnipeg Whore”, yet another tale in the long narrative of sailors/ travelers getting their belongings stolen by less than reputable prostitutes.

As far as the record goes, meh. The joke gets on on this about half way thru the first side.  I also thought a few of the songs, most notably “Plymouth Town” which was a disguised version of “The Maid of Amsterdam” could have been a bit better.

Don Stewart/ Cliffie Stone- Square Dance USA

Back to back $1 albums.  How awesome were those days?  I have bought a couple square dance albums over the last three years.  Not sure why this one is the one I started with on the blog.

6th grade Jr High School gym was by intro and exit from square dancing.  Yes for four weeks or so, the boys and girls gym classes got together to learn this lost art form for an 50 mins a day under the watchful eyes of Coach Kees (as well as the girl’s Coach who I think would later become Mrs Kees).  I got lucky, I recall.  I had a pretty cute looking partner.  That is all I can remember about it though, with perhaps some memory of promenading.

While researching this story, I found this Youtube video on the rise of Chinese Square Dancing but in reality, it is more line dancing than square dancing.  Still, I found it too interesting not to mention.

Well, with the music of Cliffie Stone and the calling of Don Stewart, we revisit this lost art form with 10 songs.  Most of these songs are standards (“Gentle On My Mind”, “Tiny Bubbles”, “That Old Black Magic”etc). The calls are printed on the back if you want to get ahead of the game. I believe this came out in 1968.  I know they made at least a second volume after this one.

The calls are almost hypnotic in quality much like an auctioneer.  Some of the calls are written by others such as Joel Pepper and Al Massaro ( I have a vision of two guys at a desk in an office churning out these things).  Others are written by Stewart himself.  Stewart from what I can tell, was from the Los Angeles area and did many calls in the 60’s and 70’s.  He has also been dead for some time now according to one site.

Some info on Stewart

 

Cliffie Stone (1917-1998) handled the music.  As a singer, musician, publisher, producer, and tv/radio personality.  Stone was one of the people behind the popularization of the California country scene of the last century.  He also has his place in the County Music Hall of Fame.

For a sample, I went with the traditional “Patter (Hey Li Lee Li Lee)” with call written by Stewart as I felt this was the best track on the album and really showcased Stewart’s talent.  I felt “Something Stupid” was a but cheesy at times but could not exactly explain why so I am posting that as well.  The call on that one was written by Ernie Kinney, who was also something of renown in square dancing circles.  He passed at age 92 in 2016. Before his death, he was known as the world’s oldest caller.

Some info on Kinney from the same site

Decent little album. Satisfactory.  After I finished writing this, I realized that this has been to back to back dance albums that were both $1. Not sure what this says about the state of recorded antiquated dance music.