I played Texocentric songs on last Sunday’s edition of Folkways for Texas Independence Day and I noticed that on the Cartwright Brothers’ 1929 “Texas Ranger” they pronounce “Rio Grande” as “RYE-oh Grand.”  I’d first noticed the Texas river pronounced that way on Stan Freberg’s 1955 “Yellow Rose of Texas,” which parodies Mitch Miller’s singalong hit version of the song and which also uses that pronunciation. (So does a version by Johnny Desmond released hot on Miller’s heels in the summer of ’55 – another big hit.) I figured Freberg’s usage was an oversight that was especially regrettable since he mimics a Texan and I’ve only ever heard it as “REE-oh Grand” here in the Lone Star State.

The Cartwright Brothers threw me, though, because they were from the town of Munday in the Texas panhandle and their record came out so much earlier than the other ones.  Additional poking around has informed me that the town of Rio Grande in Ohio happens to be pronounced “RYE-oh” and that the majority of the employees of the Denver Rio Grande Western Railroad, which ran in Utah, Colorado and New Mexico, also pronounced it that way. Maybe the railroad connection is the most relevant one here, with Munday close enough to the Intermountain area to adopt that quirk.  (Gene Autry’s 1933 version of “The Yellow Rose of Texas” has him singing “REE-oh Grand.” He’s originally from Tioga, pronounced “Tie-OH-ga” in Northeast Texas.) Keeping my ears open…

Mitch Miller – “Yellow Rose of Texas” (1955) (“Rio Grande” at 1:12)

Cartwright Brothers – “Texas Ranger” (1929) (“Rio Grande” at :43)

One of my favorite “borrowed tunes” is Shocking Blue’s “Venus” (1969), which was lifted from the Big 3’s 1963 version of “Oh Susannah,” which they called “The Banjo Song.” I like how Neil Young’s new version of “Oh Susannah” is directly inspired by “The Banjo Song.” I like the fact that many people who listen to it will think that Neil’s lifting from Shocking Blue. I also like how Neil once had a group called the Shocking Pinks and he will now be accused of lifting from Shocking Blue, who were actually lifting from the Big 3. I also like how I lifted my “Borrowed Tunes” heading from a Neil Young song he lifted from the Rolling Stones.

The Big 3 – “The Banjo Song” (1963)

Shocking Blue – “Venus” (1969)

Neil Young and Crazy Horse – “Oh Susannah” (2012)

The Kingston Trio’s “Tom Dooley” hit #1 over the Thanksgiving weekend in 1958.  I had a mini-Dooley fest on Folkways today, where I played the hit version, the Smothers Brothers version, Grayson and Whittier’s original 1929 version (Grayson was actually related to the Grayson in the song), and “Tom Dula” by the late Bill Morrissey with Greg Brown from 1993. I did not, however, play this 1974 Incredible Bongo Band version of the song, called “Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley, Your Tie’s Stuck in Your Zipper.”

The Incredible Bongo Band – “Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley, Your Tie’s Stuck in Your Zipper” (1974)

And here’s a playlist of some of my favorite pastoral tracks from the Vertigo label that I aired on my KOOP Radio International Folk Bazaar show this week. Above: Magna Carta.

Playlist:
Dr. Strangely Strange – “When Adam Delved”
Magna Carta – “The Bridge at Knaresborough Town”
Juicy Lucy – “That Woman’s Got Something”
Thomas F. Browne – “Poor Man’s Smile”
Fairfield Parlour – “Monkey”
Tudor Lodge – “It All Comes Back to Me”
Rod Stewart – “Only a Hobo”
Magna Carta – “Sponge”
Jade Warrior – “Yellow Eyes”
Black Sabbath – “Fluff”
Ian Matthews – “Little Known”
Jimmy Campbell – “In My Room”
Hokus Poke – “Big World Small Girl“

I got talking with Kendell Kardt about his pre-Rig days in New York City and he again made my head spin somewhat when he talked about a folk group he played in called “Forever Children” that included his friend Paul Giovanni (other members included Ronnie Gilbert, Joyce Aaron, and Mike Poznick). This is the same Paul he writes about in his private, online memoir – a guy he gave guitar lessons to and who performed, along with the aforementioned Ms. Aaron (Kendell’s girlfriend at the time), in an experimental troupe called the Open Theatre. Paul and his partner, the British playwright Peter Shaffer, eventually (and benevolently) flew Kendell out to London during an Open Theatre stint out there circa 1970 so he could reunite with Ms. Aaron.

That’s pretty much the end of Kendell’s own story with Paul, but the memory drive in my head kept clicking over the familiar-sounding name, and I remembered it was the same name listed as composer on the opening credits of the the 1973 Wicker Man cult film (performed by a group called “Magnet”). So I dug up an album cover by the group Side Show, that I since found out Giovanni had also belonged to, and Kendell said, “yes, this is Paul, second from the left.” I then told Kendell about The Wicker Man and have now replaced the long standing encyclopedia listing in my head that read “Paul Giovanni: Forgotten British folkie who composed a one-off soundtrack to a singular movie” to “Paul Giovanni: New York actor, composer, and old friend of Kendell’s who also happened to write the music for a singular movie.” Giovanni passed away in 1990, but although this New York Times obituary makes no mention of it, that enchanting soundtrack alone will keep his memory alive and well.

(Another friend of Kendell’s, by the way, recently sent along this piece from the Guardian about a Rocky Horror-style Wicker Man singalong that just took place in London…)

Magnet – “Corn Rigs” (1972)

Dave Bixby’s moody and fascinating Jesus folk album, Ode to Quetzalcoatl, which I wrote about here, is now available on CD via the Guerssen label in Spain. The record continues to generate a good bit of online chatter, and I’ve since gathered a few more tidbits about it along with the cult group that spawned it thanks to the reissue itself, an email conversation with a former movement member named Dave Henrickson (who commented on that earlier post), and a reading of Al Perrin’s Many False Prophets Shall Rise:

— The cult Bixby belonged to originated in Grand Rapids, Michigan and was simply called “The Movement” or “The Group,” led by an extraordinarily charismatic and manipulative guy named Don DeGraaf. Any Don or Donald DeGraafs you dig up on Google are probably not him. Henrickson had heard that the real one died in a helicopter accident.

— The movement arose out of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ, a Mormon offshoot, and Bixby’s title reference has to do with Mormon beliefs that Quetzalcoatl is a manifestation, through legend, of Jesus Christ’s Book of Mormon visit to the Americas.

— Bixby is still making music, and currently stages war reenactments in Arizona. This makes sense after reading Perrin’s book, which depicts Bixby not as the docile and depressed introvert we hear in Ode to Quetzalcoatl, but a lively, war game dynamo dressed in Army fatigues who served as one of the group’s higher-ups. The group’s most ardent members, it turns out, engaged in militaristic “campouts” as part of the brainwashing process.

— The group, which believed DeGraaf to be an onmiscient, modern incarnation of the Biblical prophet Elijah, initially raised money by selling combs for a dollar a pop for the sake of their “youth group fighting drugs.”

— Probably because group maintenance became too much of a chore for DeGraaf, the group devolved, circa the mid-seventies, into an Amway-selling army that traded in Jesus for est (Erhard Seminars Training). This likely jibed more cozily with DeGraaf’s private-airplane lifestyle, and it’s also the point where Bixby, to his credit, finally bailed.

— As Dave Henrickson said in his comment from the previous post, the album was definitely out by May 1970, when he remembers trying to sell copies at a Grand Valley State University flea market. He also remembers hearing Bixby sing those songs at meetings as far back as early summer ’69. His memory is that while none sold at the fleamarket, he was able to sell one to his uncle, an elder in the RLDS church.

— I like Al Perrin’s assessment regarding the positive appeal Bixby and his music had on the group: he sounded “like Burl Ives.”

So you have this charming Jesus thrift store find floating around forever, then you come to find out the duo that recorded it is actually Kevin Bacon’s brother Michael and Larry Gold, a man responsible for some of the entire Philly soul genre’s crucial string arrangements.

Good News – “I’m a-Losin’ My Mind” (1969)

This guitar/vocal gem comes from a tape of 3-4 songs Kendell made at Juicy John Pink’s, a club in DeKalb, Illinois which had an adjoining studio. Featuring guitar refrains taken from the old hymn “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” and lyrical references to “Oh Susannah,” this ode to the downtrodden’s got a vintage and stately aura.

Kendell Kardt – “Death of a Hobo”

posted by Stanislav

I translated Tomaz Pengov’s lyrics for “Danaja” from Slovenian into Serbo-Croatian and English.

Danaja

Mirno je na tornju
pod krillima veceri cekanja
u svom jadu Danaja cuje
kada je vjetar prorocki poziva
u snu.

Ptice su tihe
i konji bjeze dolinom
vec ove noci ce biti kise pod svodom
strelica napinje luk
i harfe se cuje zvuk.

S jutrom braca
razgrcu slijepe i uspavane
nevidljivom toplinom sa strane
i malom kapljom na dlanu
koja hlapi.

* * *

It’s peaceful at the tower
on the evening wings waiting
in her misery Danaja can hear
the prophetic call of the wind
in her dream.

Birds are silent
and horses are fleeing the valley
there will be rain under the arch tonight
arrow strains the bow
and you can hear the harps.

With morning the brothers
uncover the blind and the sleepy
with the invisible heat on the side
and a small drop on a palm
evaporates.

Tomaz Pengov – “Danaja”

Goin’ Down the Road was an influential Canadian film about two Nova Scotia young bucks who drive a cool 1960 Chevy Impala to Toronto in hopes of snazzing up their floundering lives. It’s pretty much a bummer, like most movies at that time were. But it was a worthwhile bummer. Particularly worthwhile was the soundtrack by a young Bruce Cockburn, the venerable Canadian singer-songwriter who was only one album into his career back then. No soundtrack LP ever appeared because Bruce, apparently, insisted on not releasing something commercially that didn’t reflect his direct experience. Too bad. Anyway, I loved the theme song so much when I first saw this (still do) that I propped up a tape recorder by the TV, merging the opening first few verses with the closing verse that plays at the end.

Bruce Cockburn – “Goin’ Down the Road”