Album Notes

"Great songs!"- Pete Seeger
"Rich performs them with style. He's got a sturdy voice, a nifty guitar style, and a storyteller's flair that makes you hang on his every word."- Steve Israel, Times Herald Record
"Not just a musical joy, but an historical adventue"- Steve Prisco, Taconic Press

"Hudson Valley Traditions" is a collection of three centuries of regional folk songs from and about the historic Hudson Valley/ Catskill Mountains area of New York State. There are songs from the Revolutionary War ("Ballad of Major Andre"), to the Catskill lumbercamps ("Cuttin' Down the Pines"),to the farms ("Gettin' in the Cows" & "Apple Picker's Reel"), to more recently written songs about life in the valley and on the river ("Sailig Down This Golden River" by Pete Seeger, "The River That Flows Both Ways" by Rick Nestler).

Rich is more than adequately qualified to present these songs. With over twenty-five years' experience researching, collecting, and performing folk songs of the region, he has preseted concerts at such locations as the legendary Caffe' Lena, Saratoga National Historic Battlefield, the New York State Museum, Clearwater's Great Hudson River Revival Festival, and the Hudson River Museum, to name just a few. He has played with Pete Seeger, Jay Ungar & Molly Mason, Happy Traum, John Herald, Eric Weissberg, and Joe Hickerson.

In addition to Rich's singing, guitar and harmonica playing, he is ably assisted on this recording by multi-instrumentalist Tom White (banjo, fiddle, mandolin, concertina, & hammered dulcimer),as well as Geri White (harmony vocals), and Bruce Morrison (harmony vocals & mandolin).