My first three CD's each cover a wide range of popular music styles of the day, reflecting the songs sung by the soldiers during the Civil War, as well by the civilians who kept the home fires burning.
In Love & War continues that tradition, but all have something to do with some sort of love. There are love songs of various kinds; happy love songs, ill fated love songs, and the popular style of the day, the pathos song (I refer to them as Dead Chick Songs). Then there are patriotic songs (love of country) and a song from the time about a local famous street vendor turned war hero; the most beloved member of the 140th NYV (from my home town, Rochester NY). Add a couple revival hymns, and the result is a 59 minutes collection of sentiment, humor, history, and of course, Love.
A few of the songs:
Nancy Till is a minstrel song I learned on a retuned guitar while my banjo was being made. Just sort of made it up, and found it fit to some words I found in an old Confederate songster without music. I finally found the sheet music, and was surprised to find the melody I 'made up' matched the sheet music fairly closely. I've had a few strange ones like that in the past few years.
My Old Kentucky Home, Good Night was the last song in that Confederate songster I found, the Jack Morgan Songster. The song was originally titled something like Uncle Tom's Home, Good Night. It is based on Uncle Tom's Cabin. Foster re-wrote the song, removing all references to the novel, leaving an almost purely lyric song as opposed to a ballad... this means it is the feeling of the events, not a sequence of events.
I now close every show with this song. I started that before I recorded it, and found a flaw in that... folks came up and asked which CD Old Kentucky Home was on. I answered "the next one." And here it be.
Aura Lea, Sweet Evalina, Tenting on the Old Camp Ground, & All Quiet: I often shy away from well known songs, figuring others have done them better than I could, but I made this CD for me; not to bring back great songs no one knows (See Angel Band and Billy Barlow CD's for those). So go figure, this one is my fastest seller since Night March to Gettysburg. Anyway, Evalina is often done in the later barbershop style, I always do the 1860's style, which is slightly different. Aura Lea is a favorite at my performances.
Poor Rosey is one of the great unknown black songs of the day.
The Razor Strop Man, about a real person from Rochester NY. See my web page for the full story, under Song of the Month:
http://members.aol.com/jerund/jerund.html
The Help:
In addition to the usual thanks to the Sibley Library, Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester, I wish to thank Deborah Griffith Davis, former director of the Harry Scherman Library, Mannes College of Music, for taking time out of a visit to Wales to transcribe a few Welsh songs for me, published before 1863 in the English Language. 'The Ash Grove' and 'All Through the Night' are thanks to her extraordinary efforts.
The instruments:
1897 Washburn, learned period style from an 1864 primer by Sep Winner.
1859 federal style concert minstrel banjo (fretless) made buy George Wunderlich. This is a very different sound and playing style than modern banjos. Learned from period primers by Frank Converse (1865) and John Buckley (1860)
19th century Neapolitan mandolin. Mandolins were rare in the US during the war, but Neapolitans existed. It sounds different than modern flat ones, which became popular much later.
The player:
I have been reenacting since 1994, and searching for original period songs since then. Lets just say I was not content with the state of period music presentations when I started. Spent way too much time in libraries and collected over 400 songs before even thinking of recording a lick. I've got a stack of photocopies a couple or few feet thick. (I ain't pretty, but I've done my homework)
The Philosophy:
The music is not about war. I've read enough about it, and Sherman was right; it is not glory, it is all hell. The music is about people in this extraordinary time. Most of the songs I record and perform have nothing to do with the war. This reflects the actual repertoire of the soldiers of the war. Unlike most "Civil War" acts, I do not differentiate between Southern & Northern songs. These are simply American songs (and Irish, Welsh, & German, among others). My feeling is that when they were done shooting at each other, they were more alike than different.
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