Song Links (CD)

A celebration of English traditional songs and their American variants

Some Fabulous Yonder cover, by Jeff Davis.
 

Track Listing:
Jeff Davis performs on two cuts of CD 2: #7, Pretty Silvia, and #18, Rose of Allendale. (May 2005)

PURCHASE CD

A beautifully presented 2CD set, full of wonderful songs and sleeve notes. The 80-page hardback CD-size book marries together English traditional songs with their American variations - top singers from both sides of the pond perform. Following the success of the first Song Links album (which looked at Anglo-Australian songs) this release continues the theme by taking English traditional songs and looking at their American variants. 

As in the previous album, these CDs feature the cream of singers specializing in this type of material from both sides of the Atlantic. The English singers include The Copper Family (who can trace their family's singing tradition back over two hundred years), leading lights of the Folk Revival such as John Kirkpatrick and the project's instigator, Martyn Wyndham-Read, and young singers already building a reputation for themselves, such as Benji Kirkpatrick and Jim Causley.

The American singers include the legendary Jean Ritchie. Cassie Franklin and Tim Eriksen contributed traditional material to the soundtrack of the film Cold Mountain. Jody Stecher has been at the forefront of the American folk scene with many fine albums to his name, and the mother and son contribution by Sara Grey and Kieron Means demonstrates the continuum of this material.

Shirley Collins, who accompanied Alan Lomax on one of his US song collecting trips in the 1950s, has written the book section. Again it is packaged in a handsome, hardback book form. Loads of information, full lyrics included and super performances.

"Sets new standards" (Living Tradition)

 

Jeff Davis, folk songs and traditional American music

About Jeff Davis

Jeff Davis is one of the nation’s foremost performers, interpreters and collectors of traditional American folk music.

"A fine interpreter of traditional song" Sing Out!
"An excellent banjo frailer and fiddler" The Living Tradition
A "charismatic master" whose "knowledge of this repertoire is second to none." NetRhythms
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