Founded in 1984, the North Carolina-based Music Maker Relief Foundation – led by Tim and Denise Duffy – is utterly pragmatic in its goals: preserving traditional southern music by presenting it on disc and on stage and also by helping needy players through finding them gigs, providing them with decent instruments and even repairing their homes. Among its 150-plus CDs thus far, the primary focus is on performers age 55 or older with incomes below $18,000 per year.
The 44-track We Are the Music Makers!: Preserving the Soul of America’s Music commemorates the non-profit’s 20th anniversary with acts ranging from the obscure to a few big names like Carolina Chocolate Drops (whose recording career began on the label) and Taj Mahal (who plays backup banjo, guitar and ham bone on a few cuts). Musical styles run the gamut from Etta Baker’s graceful Piedmont blues picking to Pura Fe’s Native American chants from her Tuscarora tribe. Classically trained Leyla McCalla, former cellist in the Chocolate Drops, draws on her Haitian heritage in “Manman Mwen.” Among the religious tracks, country singer Carl Rutherford hauls out “Old Rugged Cross.” As for childhood memories, Big Boy Henry’s “Old Bill” tells of his pet rooster, which his mother killed to feed a lecherous minister his father thoroughly distrusted. Jerry “Boogie” McCain’s “My New Next Door Neighbor” ends with screams and gun shot sounds. On “Peter Rumpkin,” Willa Mae Buckner (a snake charmer, say the notes) falls back on a gimmick many of us can recall from childhood: raising expectations that a verse’s rhyme will end with a dirty word but then closing it with something innocent.
The news is fodder for the blues. (Remember Blind Willie Johnson’s “God Moved on the Water” in the wake of the Titanic’s sinking and, from World War II, the harmonizing Golden Gate Quartet’s “Stalin Wasn’t Stallin’.”) Whooping, Bible-referencing guitarist Drink Small’s “President Clinton’s Blues” points out, “The man did the same thing that Adam did to Eve. … The Bible says, ‘He who has not sinned cast the first stone.’ … She didn’t rape him. And he sure ‘nough didn’t rape her.” Anti-gay sentiment appears in the song. Political correctness is oft an unknown concern in the blues, Ironing Board Sam’s disco-like offering has one basic, repeated line: “I can’t think of nothing but your butt.” High-pitched Algia Mae Hnton advises “Cook Corn Bread for Your Husband, Biscuits for Your Outside Man.” Prison being a well-known topic in the blues, a title such as Adolphus Bell’s “Child Support Blues” speaks for itself. Is Bell ad libbing? And a bluesman’s listening habits aren’t limited to the blues, either. Eddie Tigner, who toured with the Ink Spots for 35 years, scats and improvises his way through “Route 66.”
A genre that traveled from Africa to America, the praise song can have various motives – showing appreciation or currying favor, for example. Just think back to Leadbelly’s “Governor Pat Neff” for the Library of Congress and Folkways not to mention, from Memphis’s Sun Studios, the Prisonaires’ “What about Frank Clement (a Mighty Man)” for governors of Texas and Tennessee, respectively. Side 1 of this Music Maker package ends with a quiet but quite specific praise song, Captain Luke & Cool John Ferguson’s leisurely “Tim Duffy Is a Good Ol’ Guy”: “As good a guy as he could be / He got me a gig across the sea. / When he tell you something, he really mean it. / He got me a gig in Argentina.” In the world of downhome music, the Duffys are bringing home the bacon. ~ Bruce Sylvester
Album:
We Are The Music Makers! (Disc 1)
Bitrate: MP3@320K/s
Time: 68:12
Size: 156.2 MB
Styles: Blues/Soul/R&B/Jazz
Year: 2014
Art: Front
[0:57] 1. Captain Luke - Freight Train Boogie
[1:18] 2. Guitar Gabriel - A Living Past
[2:37] 3. Etta Baker - Railroad Bill
[4:23] 4. John Lee Zeigler - Going Away
[4:08] 5. Cootie Stark - High Yellow
[2:15] 6. John Dee Holeman - Chapel Hill Boogie
[5:28] 7. Neal Pattman - Shortnin' Bread
[2:52] 8. Carl Rutherford - Old Rugged Cross
[3:24] 9. Cool John Ferguson - No Hidin' Place
[3:28] 10. Essie Mae Brooks - Feel Like My Time Ain't Long
[4:06] 11. Elder James Goins - Old Time Religion
[3:09] 12. Elder Anderson Johnson - My Lord And I
[1:55] 13. Mr. Q - Cocktail Boogie
[1:47] 14. Albert Smith - Big Bell Mamma
[2:10] 15. Precious Bryant - If You Don't Love Me, Would You Fool Me Good
[4:35] 16. Big Boy Henry - Old Bill
[4:45] 17. Drink Small - President Clinton Blues
[2:40] 18. J.W. Warren - Looking For My Woman
[5:44] 19. Dr. Burt - What Can An Old Man Do (But Sing The Blues)
[3:02] 20. George Higgs - Greasy Greens
[0:28] 21. Whistlin' Britches - Clickin'
[2:52] 22. Captain Luke - Tim Duffy Is A Good Ol' Guy
We Are The Music Makers! (Disc 1) mc
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Album:
We Are The Music Makers! (Disc 2)
Bitrate: MP3@320K/s
Time: 71:36
Size: 163.9 MB
Styles: Blues/Soul/R&B/Jazz
Year: 2014
Art: Front
[2:34] 1. Samuel Turner Stevens - Railroadin' & Gamblin
[1:16] 2. Pura Fe - Pigeon Dance
[2:25] 3. Clyde Langford - High Steppin' Mamma
[3:37] 4. James Davis - Fred, You Ought To Be Dead
[4:47] 5. Beverly Guitar Watkins - Back In Business
[3:22] 6. The Carolina Chocolate Drops - Sourwood Mountain
[2:44] 7. Nyles Jones - Ain't Gonna Let No Women
[3:32] 8. Macavine Hayes - Snatch That Thing
[1:21] 9. Algia Mae Hinton - Cook Cornbread For Your Husband
[1:15] 10. Willa Mae Buckner - Peter Rumpkin
[3:38] 11. Adolphus Bell - Child Support Blues
[3:55] 12. Ironing Board Sam - Nothing But Your Butt
[4:36] 13. Benton Flippen - Benton's Dream
[4:43] 14. Eddie Tigner - Route 66
[3:19] 15. Jerry 'Boogie' McCain - My New Next Door Neighbor
[1:57] 16. Carl Hodges - Flossie
[5:37] 17. Boo Hanks - Home On The Range
[4:05] 18. Boo Hanks - Keep On Truckin'
[3:26] 19. Captain Luke - Old Black Buck
[3:14] 20. Leyla McCalla - Manman Mwen
[3:05] 21. Cora Fluker - Amazing Grace
[2:58] 22. Cary Morin - Sing It Louder
We Are The Music Makers! (Disc 2) mc
We Are The Music Makers! (Disc 2) zippy