Album Notes

Musicians:
Lunenberg Travelers - tracks 2,3,22 & 23
Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee - tracks 5-9, 21-23
Pete Seeger - tracks 11-14, 17-19, 21-23
Arlo Guthrie - tracks 11,12,15,16,20-23

On March 15, 1976, a group of musicians consisting of the LUNENBERG TRAVELERS, SONNY TERRY, BROWNIE MCGHEE, ARLO GUTHRIE, and PETE SEEGER, gathered at Hunter College in New York City to pay tribute to legendary blues and folk artist, HUDDIE LEADBETTER. The results of those historic performances are now being re-issued and made available on Labor Records. “A Tribute to Leadbelly” features the Lunenberg Travelers singing stirring spirituals, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee tearing through the blues, and Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie performing for the audience as Leadbelly might have done had he been there himself. Both educational (excerpts from interviews with Leadbelly himself are included) and entertaining, this salute remains as rich, heartfelt, and rewarding as the man and the music that inspired it.

“This recording of friends gathered together on a night in 1975 to remember the great songwriter and performer is an excellent addition to the Leadbelly legacy.”
--Blues Access

REVIEW by Pete Welding

More than any other single performer, Leadbelly (Huddie Leadbetter) was responsible for introducing radical-intellectuals and, later, the general populace to the glorious heritage of black folk song. A newly paroled murderer who had served two stretches in the brutalizing prison farms of the Deep South, the 49-year old songster arrived in New York City in 1934 as ward of pioneering folk song collectors John and Alan Lomax. Under their sponsorship he began a series of concert and radio appearances that electrified urban audiences with the astringent power of his music and the phenomenal breadth of his repertoire. Leadbelly claimed to know more than 500 songs and supported this claim by committing a huge portion of them to record. Among his nearly 300 recordings were large numbers of archaic work songs, blues and folk songs, as well as his own compositions, such as “Midnight Special,” “Good Night Irene” and “Rock Island Line.”

This two-record memorial features the Lunenberg Travelers, an impressive group led by his nephew who rocks out the anthem “Let Your Little Light Shine Down On Me.” The blues portion of his repertoire is handled with perfect aplomb by Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee. The former strikes a movingly personal note in his song tribute “The Best of Friends,” swooping harmonica lines intertwining with the blind singer’s gritty vocal.

The second disc features Pete Seeger and Arlo Guthrie and contains some of the most enjoyable music on the album. Seeger impresses time and again with the charm, power and sincerity of his singing and playing, his 12-string guitar work being particularly evocative of Leadbelly’s characteristic way with the instrument. And his remarks bespeak a deep, unfeigned regard for a man he knew long and well, a man who exerted a profound, enduring influence on him, as performer and as human being. Guthrie’s offhand performances strike just the right note of blithe insouciance, but with feeling.

PETE WELDING was an American blues historian, archivist and record producer. He worked as an editor and critic for Down Beat magazine and founded Testament Records in 1963 to issue recordings of blues and folk song. He recorded Big Joe Williams, Robert Nighthawk, Mississippi Fred McDowell, J.B. Hutto and many others. He also contributed sleeve notes to a wide variety of albums. He died in 1995 and was posthumously inducted to the Blues Hall of Fame in 1996.