The Seeger Sessions
The Seeger Sessions
My first love for music sprang from the Folk Era of the early 60’s. My folk hero was Pete Seeger. He had a simple style, playing only a banjo, he sang from the heart and told real stories in the music about real people and real times. Well, some was not totally real but whimsical, and that was just fun. And maybe the truth was stretched a bit as stories became legends, but most of it was down to earth and comfortable. I actually got interested enough in the music to get a guitar and learn how to play it so I could sing these songs accompanying myself as well as in groups, then called hootenannies.
By the way, some people have the mistaken notion that the Peace Movement, and Civil Rights protests started with the Hippie Era. This is not true. The Peace Movement and Civil Rights protests were part of the Folk Era many years previous, and the Hippies just adopted it along with some healthy doses of psychedelics. Remember that Bob Dylan (Masters of War), for example, was a folk artist before he moved to mainstream. Even more mainstream folk artists, such as Peter, Paul and Mary had much to say on social issues. Early on, I was also impressed that a lot of folk music had something to say other than the likes of pop music and ‘My girlfriend left me and I am all alone’.
At any rate, Bruce Springsteen has done a remarkable thing. He broke from his traditional genre of rock and did a whole album of folk songs commonly sung by Pete Seeger. It is called We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions. I first saw the promotion on this and thought Wow! You have got to be kidding. I listened to a promotion track, John Henry, and was instantly sold. I immediately bought the album as a pre-release.
The album was made as a 3-day hootenanny in a New Jersey farmhouse with 13 musicians playing various acoustical instruments. Bruce stylized the music to a sort of New Orleans Jazz/Cajun/Zydeco type folk music but surprising put a lot of heart and soul into the music. You can tell Bruce is really feeling his roots as he produces his unique earthy vocals and directs the band. If you don’t like any of the genres of music aforementioned then you might want to stay away from the album.
The production is packages as a DualDisc, which was a new concept to me. One side of the disc is a CD and the other side is a DVD. The DVD side has about 30 minutes of video session tapings and commentary by Bruce. It also has all the audio tracks in DVD sound (superior quality) as well as a couple of bonus tracks. And I was surprised this was all for $12.98 at Amazon.
If you have any appreciation at all for folk and would like to see The Boss in an inspired performance I highly recommend this DualDisc
My first love for music sprang from the Folk Era of the early 60’s. My folk hero was Pete Seeger. He had a simple style, playing only a banjo, he sang from the heart and told real stories in the music about real people and real times. Well, some was not totally real but whimsical, and that was just fun. And maybe the truth was stretched a bit as stories became legends, but most of it was down to earth and comfortable. I actually got interested enough in the music to get a guitar and learn how to play it so I could sing these songs accompanying myself as well as in groups, then called hootenannies.
By the way, some people have the mistaken notion that the Peace Movement, and Civil Rights protests started with the Hippie Era. This is not true. The Peace Movement and Civil Rights protests were part of the Folk Era many years previous, and the Hippies just adopted it along with some healthy doses of psychedelics. Remember that Bob Dylan (Masters of War), for example, was a folk artist before he moved to mainstream. Even more mainstream folk artists, such as Peter, Paul and Mary had much to say on social issues. Early on, I was also impressed that a lot of folk music had something to say other than the likes of pop music and ‘My girlfriend left me and I am all alone’.
At any rate, Bruce Springsteen has done a remarkable thing. He broke from his traditional genre of rock and did a whole album of folk songs commonly sung by Pete Seeger. It is called We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions. I first saw the promotion on this and thought Wow! You have got to be kidding. I listened to a promotion track, John Henry, and was instantly sold. I immediately bought the album as a pre-release.
The album was made as a 3-day hootenanny in a New Jersey farmhouse with 13 musicians playing various acoustical instruments. Bruce stylized the music to a sort of New Orleans Jazz/Cajun/Zydeco type folk music but surprising put a lot of heart and soul into the music. You can tell Bruce is really feeling his roots as he produces his unique earthy vocals and directs the band. If you don’t like any of the genres of music aforementioned then you might want to stay away from the album.
The production is packages as a DualDisc, which was a new concept to me. One side of the disc is a CD and the other side is a DVD. The DVD side has about 30 minutes of video session tapings and commentary by Bruce. It also has all the audio tracks in DVD sound (superior quality) as well as a couple of bonus tracks. And I was surprised this was all for $12.98 at Amazon.
If you have any appreciation at all for folk and would like to see The Boss in an inspired performance I highly recommend this DualDisc
posted by Eclectricz at
10:34 AM
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