Banjo

Interview with the Tillers

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On today’s show I speak with The Tillers, an excellent 3 piece string band on tour from Cincinnati, Ohio.  The Tillers were in New York over the weekend where they played at my “Down Home Live” show that I host every month at Banjo Jim’s on the Lower East Side.  We met on Saturday afternoon at the Music Inn, the great old instrument and record shop on W. 4th St. and recorded this interview there in the basement.

The Tillers are Michael Oberst, Sean Geil & Jason Soudrette.  Mike and Jason started out playing punk music, but in the past couple of years have begun playing old-time music – and have been particularly inpsired by Woody Guthrie.  They do a number of songs that Woody Guthrie & Cisco Houston did together, and do them very well!  I recorded their set at my “Down Home Live” show on Saturday night and play cuts from that, as well as from the Tillers’ studio album on today’s show.  The Tillers also play some of their favorite records, both current favorites and old standbyes.

The Tillers’ CD, “Ludlow Street Rag” on the Chestnut Tree Records label is availale at: http://www.chestnuttreerecords.com .

The Tiller’s myspace page


Eli with the Tillers outside of the Music Inn on W. 4th St. in Greenwhich Village where this interview was conducted.

Frank Hovington: Lonesome Road Blues LP

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Frank Hovingtong Lonesome Road Blues LP Flyright 522 by you.

Here’s an excellent LP by blues guitarist / banjoist / singer Frank Hovington (1919-1982).  Hovington was from Pennsylvania but lived in Delaware.  These recordings were made by Dick Spottswood & Bruce Bastin back in the summer of 1975 at Frank’s home, using a tape recorder on loan from the Library of Congress. It was released by the British Label Flyright Records in 1976.  I’ve really enjoyed listening to this one lately, Hovington is an excellent singer and has a great style, or range of styles on guitar and banjo.  This album was apparently reissued on CD by Rounder Records at some point, but as far as I know is now out of print.  Hovington was originally “discovered” by John Fahey while John was driving around looking for old records.  Mack McCormick brought him to the 1971 Smithsonian Folk Festival, but other than that Frank Hovington did not like to tour or try to play lots of gigs at that point in his life.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD ALBUM CUT UP INTO TRACKS

F R A N K   H O V I N G T O N; from back cover of Flyright FLYLP 522; photographer: Bengt Olsson

See below for track list:

The Library of Congress Banjo Collection

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The Library of Congress Banjo Collection

I recently received a request to post this fine album of banjo music drawn from the trove of material at the Library of Congress.  This album of field recordings representing different pre-bluegrass banjo styles was put together by Bob Carlin and released on LP in 1988 by Rounder records.  Amazingly it has not been reissued on CD.

There is some seriously amazing and important music on here.

I didn’t upload this album, the fine people over at
www.timesaintliketheyusedtobe.blogspot.com did and that’s where I first got the record.  Thanks!  Be sure to check out their website for a scan of the back of the record so you can read the excellent notes by Alan Jabbour and Bob Carlin. There’s lots of great records available on “Time’s Ain’t Like They Used to Be”.  Well worth checking regularly.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD the record.

and be sure to check out my sort of complete list of free internet folk music resources

The Ekonting: African Roots of the Banjo – A Direct Connection Between African & African-American Music

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On today’s show Eli attempts to demonstrate the real links between African & African-American music.

The show features a direct comparison of African ekonting music to African-American banjo music followed by an interview with Daniel Jatta, music researcher of the Jola tribe from Senegambia. In the interview Daniel plays Jola songs on the ekonting, and gives a description of his research into the instrument and its clear connection to the African-American banjo. He also discusses the cultural center he has founded in Gambia to preserve and promote Jola culture and other traditional cultures of the region. This group in Africa has retained a musical culture closest to that which arrived with slaves brought to America from that region hundreds of years ago.

Included above is also a complete 46 min tape of field recordings of ekonting music sent in by Daniel Jatta.

(Photo by Ulf Jägfors)
(L) Anonymous folk painting. South Carolina, c. 1790. One of the oldest depictions of an early gourd banjo in America. (R) Master ekonting player Jules Ekona Jatta with drums and percussion, Mandinary, Gambia 2003.

Daniel Jatta and the Jola akonting:

Daniel is doing real amazing work. For years American researchers have tried to trace “the roots of the blues” back to Africa, with little real success. African America music is just not that much like any African music that they could discover. Daniel’s research into the music of his tribe, the Jola, really presents the most direct link between African and African-American music that is known. The instrument that he learned from his father, the ekonting, is obviously banjo like in its construcion and its playing technique is identical to that used by elder African-American banjo players here in the USA.

Interview with Mike Seeger

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Mike Seeger. Photo by Ron Pen

This week I’ll be drawing from my “archives” for an interview with Mike Seeger, multi-instrumentalist, field-recordist, record producer and 1/3 of the New Lost City Ramblers. This interview is from a tape of one of my old radio shows from college. It was conducted in May 0f 2003 at WOBC, the radio station of Oberlin College in Ohio. This was my first real radio interview! I had booked Mike to come and play at the Oberlin Folk Festival and while in town he appeared on the weekly radio show I hosted with my friend Jacob Groopman. We talk about his parents Ruth Crawford and Charles Seeger, Elizabeth Cotton, Dock Boggs, Josh Thomas, Henry Thomas, Alan Lomax, the current state of folk music and more, and Mike plays some gourd banjo and jaw harp live on the air.

Included above are the interview with Mike, and a recording of his appearance at the Oberlin College Folk Festival, May 2003.