Every Little Thing Is Going to Be Alright

I first heard this on the British mystery show 'Beyond Paradise', although I was already familiar with Kate Rusby and had a couple of her CDs. This popped up after I posted another video on Facebook. This seemed to be good for me lately.

Thanks to Bill

who first introduced me to 'I Am Stretched on Your Grave', who suggested this version, which may be the original I heard (I don't remember it being a duet, though), is beautiful, AND includes the stanza about the priests and the friars that I learned that was missing in the one below, along with the exact wording I learned. I highly recommend it. Bob commented on the Kate Rusby version, which I love, as well--it's on my phone. I don't care that much for Sinéad O'Connor's--too pop-like; I prefer the folk style better, which is why I like this version better. This is by the Voice Squad:



Here's another song that Bill introduced me to all those years ago (not the same version, but close). It's a song credited to David Dodds, sung by Nigel Parry, called 'The Magpie':

Such a beautiful song and legacy

Guy Carawan Dies at 87; Taught a Generation to Overcome, in Song

On an April night in 1960, Guy Carawan stood before a group of black students in Raleigh, N.C., and sang a little-known folk song. With that single stroke, he created an anthem that would echo into history, sung at the Selma-to-Montgomery marches of 1965, in apartheid-era South Africa, in international demonstrations in support of the Tiananmen Square protesters, at the dismantled Berlin Wall and beyond.

The song was “We Shall Overcome.”

Mr. Carawan, a white folk singer and folklorist who died on Saturday at 87, did not write “We Shall Overcome,” nor did he claim to. The song, variously a religious piece, a labor anthem and a hymn of protest, had woven in and out of American oral tradition for centuries, embodying the country’s twinned history of faith and struggle. Over time, it was further polished by professional songwriters.

But in teaching it to hundreds of delegates at the inaugural meeting of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee — held in Raleigh on April 15, 1960 — Mr. Carawan fathered the musical manifesto that, more than any other, became “the ‘Marseillaise’ of the integration movement,” as The New York Times described it in 1963.

Here he is, singing the song:

The son of Southern parents, Guy Hughes Carawan Jr. was born on July 28, 1927, in Santa Monica, Calif. His mother was a poet, his father an asbestos contractor who later died of asbestosis. After Navy service stateside at the end of World War II, the younger Mr. Carawan earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Occidental College in Los Angeles, followed by a master’s in sociology from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Around this time, Mr. Carawan, who sang and played the guitar, banjo and hammered dulcimer, became deeply interested in the use of folk music to foster social progress. But Wayland Hand, a distinguished folklorist with whom he studied at U.C.L.A., warned him against mixing folk music with activism — they had been combined to devastating effect, Professor Hand pointed out, in Nazi Germany.

Mr. Carawan disregarded the warning. Moving to New York, he became active in the folk revival percolating in Greenwich Village. In 1953, he and two friends, Frank Hamilton (later a member of the Weavers, the musical group closely associated with Mr. Seeger) and Jack Elliott (soon to be known as the folk singer Ramblin’ Jack Elliott), took to the road, collecting folk songs and singing for their supper throughout the South.

I do love this song

'The Ballad of Accounting', which was written by Ewan MacColl. Here is his version, along with Peggy Seeger:



...and then this is the Scottish group The Battlefield Band, whose music I really like, with their version:



(although my favourite Battlefield Band song, one of their own, is 'The Dear Green Place', as story of Glasgow):



I know, I've posted these before. But they're still great. :)

Two versions of a couple of folksongs I like quite a bit

I first heard 'The Trees They Do Grow High' on a vinyl LP we had, Joan Baez' Ballad Book. But I love Pentangle's version, too, along with virtually everything they've done. I was lucky to see Baez in concert a few years ago, one in the Lexington Opera House as part of the Troubadour Concert Series.

Another song traditional song I like a lot, although it's darker, is 'I Am Stretched on Your Grave'. Here are two versions. I prefer the Dead Can Dance version to O'Connor's.

Whew!

I sat down at the computer and started finally compiling a list of all the books I have on the Kindle, or at least each file (several have books within a collection). It's taken a couple of hours to get the formatting and sorting right, but I'm finally finished. If you'd like to see, feel free to follow this link:

Eilir, the Rabid Librarian: My Kindle Books

The entire time I've been listening to the cable Celtic music channel, and I'm apparently pretty decent at recognising singers. For example, the Chieftains came on with 'The Lowlands of Holland', and even though Natalie Merchant was not listed on that, it was her singing, I realised, and I confirmed on the web. I also recognised a band I really like, Battlefield Band, playing their version of 'Ballad of Accounting' from their album Dookin'. I really like it:



It was written by Ewan MacColl in 1964, according to the website Ballad of Accounting. The lyrics may be found at the following page http://www.balladofaccounting.org/ballad.html. This is the version by Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger, which is excellent: