I feel compelled to add this, based on my experience with Doc's music.
He is an incredible flat-picker, but he strikes me more as compellingly
humane. In concert, he is heart-warming and the stories are an integral
part of that.
Doc's two albums with Bill Monroe on Smithsonian Folkways are incredible
bluegrass.
Also on SF is that Doc Watson Family album which is a master of the many
shades of old time music. And beautiful, esp. his mother's old-time ballad
singing.
matt
At 11:36 AM 4/5/00 EDT, DRoyko@aol.com wrote:
>In a message dated 00-04-05 10:28:28 EDT, DRL@valley-media.com writes:
>>In my opinion, Doc Watson is one of the best flat-pickers ever. I love some
>>of his song. However, on all the albums of his that I've heard, there are
>>sooooo many stories (which I don't find terribly funny) that I find myself
>>fast-forwarding through half the album.
>
>Try "Riding the Midnight Train," on Sugar Hill. Doc's one and only actual
>bluegrass album, with Bela Fleck, Sam Bush, Mark O'Connor, and others, and
>not one single story;-) One of Doc's best albums, and the final album Merle
>made before he died.
>
>Dave Royko
>
>-
>
>
- ---
Matt Laferty
Department of English, General Literature, & Rhetoric
Binghamton University
PO Box 6000
Binghamton, NY 13902
607.777.2754
bg60009@binghamton.edu
- -
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 5 Apr 2000 12:05:35 EDT
From: DRoyko@aol.com
Subject: Re: Doc Watson
In a message dated 00-04-05 11:54:21 EDT, you write:
>Doc's two albums with Bill Monroe on Smithsonian Folkways are incredible
>bluegrass.
Actually, I think you might mean the two Monroe albums on Smithsonian
Folkways, one of which is a CD of Monroe/Watson duets. And I agree, both are
excellent discs.
Dave Royko
- -
------------------------------
Date: 5 Apr 2000 09:31:01 -0700
From: Dan Given <dlgiven@altavista.com>
Subject: Re: Sun Ra
> Date: Wed, 05 Apr 2000 07:27:19 -0700
> From: Daryl Loomis <DRL@valley-media.com>
> Subject: Re: Sun Ra
>
> I feel like "Heliocentric Worlds" is my favorite, with the "Concert for the Comet Kohotek" coming in a close second. However, there is a new (or reissued? I'm not sure) CD called "The Sun Ra Arkestra meets Salah Ragab in Egypt" on Leo Lab's Golden Years Label. It's live from 74-75 and very good. It seems pretty accessible to an uninitiated person, and probably most accessible to a world music fan.
>
> Daryl Loomis
Golden Years also has just reissues Live at Praxis 1984 (2 discs) which, in my opinion, is far better than the one mentioned above. The two hour concert comes off very much like a jam session, with some older Ra compositions, some standards (such as Tea for Two, a really fun version of Mack the Knife with Ra doing a great Louis Armstrong vocal) and some free improvs by the whole band. Probably a good intro to the latter part of his career.
As for earlier, more out there material, I think that Black Myth/Out in Space is probably pretty easy to find these days (I may be wrong though). It is another 2 disc set -- two concerts I think, formerly editted onto a double LP, and now complete. It is from 1970, and has some pretty 'out there' moments with Ra on synth. Worth picking up.
Also, has Live at Montreux ever been issued on CD? If so, another good place to start.
