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AMERICAN ROUTES ON INSTAGRAM
SONGS OF RIVERS AND MOUNTAINS: JOAN SHELLEY & JEFF LITTLE
This week we visit with two Southern crafters of music and song. Kentucky native and guitarist Joan Shelley takes her ethereal songwriting and voicing of life’s emotional flow from observations on the banks of the Ohio River near Louisville. Then, the virtuosic Blue Ridge pianist Jeff Little shares his stories of growing up playing alongside the legendary flat-pick guitarist Doc Watson at the family’s music store in Boone, North Carolina. It led to a singular career of playing high speed fiddle tunes on the piano. Also music of love, loss, and fast trains from Bill Frisell, Johnny Cash, James Brown, Tom Waits and Elizabeth Cotton.
HOUR ONE
- Brighter Than the Blues Joan Shelley
Over and Even , No Quarter - This Place Joni Mitchell
Shine , Joni Mitchell - Lonesome Bill Frisell
Harmony , Blue Note - Pretty Fair Miss in a Garden Doug and Jack Wallin
Doug & Jack Wallin: Family Songs and Stories from the North Carolina Mountains , Smithsonian Folkways - Pretty Little Miss Joan Shelley and Doug Paisley
Rivers and Vessels , No Quarter Records - Instrumental: Keep On the Sunnyside Bill Frisell
Beautiful Dreamers , Savoy - Kentucky Everly Brothers
Songs Our Daddy Taught Us , Barnaby Records - Blue Kentucky Girl Loretta Lynn
Blue Kentucky Girl , MCA Nashville - Banks of the Ohio Johnny Cash
Unearthed , American Recordings - SEGMENT: Joan Shelley
Listen - Instrumental: Timoney's Nathan Salsburg
Third Nathan Salsburg , No Quarter - Beat the Retreat June Tabor
Beat the Retreat: Songs of Richard Thompson , Capitol - Urge for Going Tom Rush
The Circle Game , Elektra - Closing Bed: Dandelion River Run Richard and Mimi Fariña
The Complete Vanguard Recordings , Vanguard
HOUR two
- Billy in the Low Ground Jeff Little
Just a Little Music, self-released - Freight Train Boogie Doc Watson
The Elementary Doctor Watson! , Tomato - Casey Jones Grateful Dead
Workingman's Dead, Warner - Night Train James Brown
The 50th Anniversary Collection , UTV - 2:19 Tom Waits
Orphans: Brawlers, Bawlers & Bastards , Anti - Memphis Mail Scott Dunbar
Voices of Mississippi: Artists and Musicians Documented by William Ferris , Dust to Digital - Instrumental: Big Sky Jeff Little
Just a Little Music , self-released - SEGMENT: Jeff Little
Listen - Going Back to the Blue Ridge Mountains The Delmore Brothers
The Delmore Brothers, Vol. 2 , Classic - (Oh Susanna) Dust off that Old Pianna Fats Waller
The Essential Fats Waller , Sony - Chicken Shack Boogie Amos Milburn
Down the Road Apiece-The Best of Amos Milburn , Capitol - Instrumental: Tipitina and Me Allen Toussaint
Our New Orleans , Nonesuch - Take Five Dave Brubeck
Time Out , Columbia - Brighter than the Blues Joan Shelley
Over and Even , No Quarter - I'm Going Away Elizabeth Cotton
Shake Sugaree , Smithsonian Folkways - Careless Love Snooks Eaglin
Classic African American Songsters , Smithsonian Folkways - Closing bed: Careless Love Etta Baker
Railroad Bill , Cello
