Barbara Dane - Anthology Of American Folk Songs (1959)

Stop what you're doing right now and treat yourself to this album by folksinger Barbara Dane, "Anthology of American Folk Songs: Tradition Years".

A Detroit native, Barbara Dane (b. 1927) got her start playing protest songs during the early days of the civil-rights movement. Her musical career truly took off, though, once she moved to San Francisco in 1949 and began doing renditions of jazz and blues classics at clubs. She eventually attracted the likes of Time magazine, and was the first white female to be featured in Ebony. Louis Armstrong once invited her to play alongside him on national television, and famously said to Time in 1958: "Did you get that chick? She's a gasser!"

Dane's political commitment was a lifelong one; she lent her talents to peace demonstrations against the Vietnam War and toured Freedom Schools in the South. She was also the first performer to tour Cuba in the wake of the Cuban Revolution. Other noteworthy accomplishments include her founding of a San Franciscan club, Sugar Hill: Home of the Blues, and Paredon Records, the latter of which highlighted music and performers borne of left-wing, feminist, and otherwise important social movements of the 1970s.

On this album Barbara Dane presented 15 traditional songs, accompanied by her guitar and by Tom Paley of the New Lost City Ramblers on guitar and banjo. Dane sings in a low, rich voice on this stark but effective collection, and it's easy to hear how she might have been an influence on, or at least an ancestor of, 1960s bluesy white folk and folk-rock singers such as Judy Henske and Tracy Nelson. Although some of the songs had been and would go around the block many times - "Nine Hundred Miles," "Girl of Constant Sorrow," "Gypsy Davy," and "Greensleeves," for instance - Dane's interpretations are committed and somberly moving. It's a good folk album for the era, well above the average in terms of guts and feeling.   

Tracklist:
- When I Was A Young Girl
- Little Maggie
- Nine Hundred Miles
- Turkey Reveille
- Who's Gonna' Shoe Your Pretty Little Foot
- Ramblin'
- Girl Of Constant Sorrow

- Gypsy Davy
- Single Girl
- I Know Where I'm Going
- The Danville Girl
- Stung Right
- Greensleeves
- La Lee Too Dum
- Don't Sing Love Songs

Barbara Dane - Anthology Of American Folk Songs (1959)
(256 kbps, cover art included)