Traveling Blues show no.66, October 10, 2012

The podcast is available here:
Traveling Blues show no.66, October 10, 2012


Traveling Blues, show no. 66, October 10, 2012

On tonight's show, we celebrated the birthdays of John Lennon and Nappy Brown (Napoleon Culp).
I also "dug up" some historic recordings by the sadly under-recognized guitarist Hollywood Fats (Michael Mann).
We featured new recordings by Blues diva Shemekia Copeland, harmonica ace Sugar Blue, young Brit Blues lady Joanne Shaw Taylor,
and the deep voiced Hans Theessink with Terry Evans  (not Terry King as I may have said on air) and Ry Cooder.

here's our playlist:

01. Hollywood Fats (Michael Mann) - Hideaway
02. Liz Mandeville - Corner Bar Blues
03. The Beatles/John Lennon - Yer Blues
04. Nappy Brown - Keep On Pleasin' You
05. Nick Gravenites - Buried Alive In The Blues
06. Sugar Blue - One More Mile
07. Hans Theessink/Terry Evans - Blues Stay Away From Me
08. Hans Theessink/Terry Evans - Pouring Water On A Drowning Man
09. Joanne Shaw Taylor -
10. Shemekia Copeland - I Sing The Blues
11. Hollywood Fats (Micheal Mann) - Sidetracked

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Traveling Blues, show no. 65, October 3, 2012

The podcast is available here:

Traveling Blues, show no. 65, October 3, 2012 



On Tonight's Traveling Blues, we celebrated the birthdays of Albert Collins,
Deborah Coleman, Keb 'Mo, Roy Bookbinder, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and Nick Gravenites.


Here's the playlist:
01. Hill Country Revue - Georgia Woman
02. Albert Collins - Mr. Collins! Mr. Collins!
03. Deborah Coleman - I'm A Woman
04. Stevie Ray Vaughan - Love Struck Baby
05. Roy Bookbinder - Let's Get Drunk Again
06. Nick Gravenites - You Can't Hurt Me
07. The Blues Project - Jelly Jelly Blues
08. Keb 'Mo - The Reflection
09. Bo Carter - Please Warm My Weiner
10. Catfish Keith - Reefer Head
11. Geoff Muldaur - Got To FInd Blind Lemon - Part 2



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Traveling Blues show no. 62, Sept 12, 2012

The podcast is available here:

 Traveling Blues show no. 62, Sept 12, 2012

 Tonight on Traveling Blues, we are blessed with many Blues birthdays -
(Riley Blues Boy) BB King, Charles Brown, (R & B singer) Otis Redding, Paul Orta,
Alger Texas Alexander, Barbecue Bob Hicks, Snooky Prior, and Darrell Nulisch.
We featured new albums by Danny Marks (Canada), Alfie Smith (Canada), Chris Watson, and Bob Dylan. 
I also want to wish all of our listeners a healthy, sweet, and happy new year (Jewish new year - 5772)


more info on Danny Marks - www.DannyM.com
more on Alfie Smith - www.AlfieSmith.org
more on Paul Orta - www.great-recordings.com/Paul_Orta.htm
more on Darrell Nulisch -  www.severnrecords.com/site/artistDetail.asp?AID=9


Here's our playlist:

01. BB King - Eyesight To the Blind
02. Charles Brown - Trouble Blues
03. Otis Redding - I've Been Loving You Too Long (To Stop Now)
04. Paul Orta w/Lazy Lester - SHe KNow How
05. Texas Allexander - Don't You Wish Your Baby Was Built Like MIne
06. Texas Alexander - Death Bed Blues
07. Barbeque Bob - Ease It To Me Blues
08. Snooky Prior - Good or Bad TImes
09. Darrell Nulisch - I Can't Be Satisfied
10. Danny Marks - Caretaker
11. Chris Watson - Pleasure and Pain
12. Bob Dylan - Early Roman Kings
13. Alfie Smith - Two-tone Snake

 Traveling Blues show no. 62, Sept 12, 2012

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Traveling Blues show no. 61, September 5, 2012

The podcast is available here:

Traveling Blues show no. 61, September 5, 2012


Tonight we celebrated the Blues birthdays of Buddy Bolden, Freddy King,
Memphis Slim, Guitar Shorty, Deanna Bogart, Little Milton, Meade Lux Lewis, and Sunnyland Slim, and oh yeah, Guy Dagan!!!
We featured new recordings by local artist David Peretz, and by Bert Deivert.

here's our playlist:

01. Spider John Koerner - Rent Party Rag
02. Dave Van Ronk - Buddy Bolden's Blues
03. Freddy King - You've Got To Love Her With A Feeling
04. Freddy King - Hideaway
05. Memphis Slim - Buddy Comes To Town
06. Percy Mayfield - My Mind Is Trying To Leave Me Too
07. Guitar Shorty - Story Of My Life
08. Deanna Bogart - OK, I'll Play the Blues
09. Little Milton Campbell - If Walls Could Talk
10. Meade Lux Lewis - Closing Time
11. David Peretz - Song For The Middle Of Life
12. Bert Deivert - Keep On Truckin'


Traveling Blues show no. 61, September 5, 2012



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Traveling Blues show no. 60, August 29, 2012

The podcast is available here:

Traveling Blues show no. 60, August 29, 2012


Tonight's show celebrated the birthdays of Dinah Washington, Spider John Koerner,
L.C. Ulmer, Jack Teagarden,  Luther "Snakeboy" Johnson, Robert Crumb, and Gayle Dean Wardlow.
We featured new recordings by Dennis Jones, the touring Ruf records project Girls With Guitars,
Roger "Hurricane" Wilson with Willie Big Eyes Smith, and our own expat representative in Chicago - Guy King.

here's our playlist:

01. Guy King - I Am Who I Am, and It Is What It Is
02. Guy King - Last Fair Deal Gone Down
03. Willie "Big Eyes" Smith and Roger "Hurricane" Wilson - Eyesight To The Blind
04. Ruth Brown - I Would If I Could
05. Dinah Washington - Begging Mama Blues      
06. Koerner, Ray, and Glover - Good Time Charlie
07. Koerner, Ray, and Glover - Ramblin' Blues
08. L.C. Ulmer - Hip Shake
09. Muddy Waters - Walking Through the Park
10. Jack Teagarden - I've Got A Right To Sing the Blues
11. Dennis Jones - My Kind of Blues
guest station ID - Mitch Woods
12. Dawn Tyler Watson - Wild Wild Woman
13. Samantha Fish/Girls With Guitars - Leaving Kind
14. Reverend KM WIlliams - I'm Comin' Home

Traveling Blues show no. 60, August 29, 2012


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Traveling Blues show no. 56 July 18, 2012

The podcast is available here:

Traveling Blues show no. 56 July 18, 2012 

Tonight we had our friend Delmark Goldfarb in the studio,
and he brought with him 11 year old Elijah Eskins to accompany him on electric guitar.
We featured an album by veteran Blues singer and guitarist Bill Sims Jr.,
and celebrated the birthday of Washboard Sam (born Robert Brown)
Our Dirty Blues of the week  - Merline Johnson and Don't You Make Me High (Don't You Feel My Leg).


Here's our playlist:

01. Bill Sims Jr. - I Want To See You Again
02. Robert Belfour - Down the Road of Love
03. Merline Johnson - Don't You Make Me High (Don't You Feel My Leg)
04,. Bill Sims Jr. - Blues For Breakfast
05. Washboard Sam - Out With the Wrong Woman
06. Delmark Goldfarb - Got Something Good With Her
07. Delmark Goldfarb and Elijah Eskins (live in studio) - Early In The Morning
08, Delmark Goldfarb and Elijah Eskins (live in studio) - Big Boss Man
09. Delmark Goldfarb and Elijah Eskins (live in studio) - The Likes of Us
10. R.L. Burnside - My Woman Done Left Me
11. R.L. Burnside - You Don't Love Me
12. North Mississippi Allstars - Po' Black Mattie
13. Delmark Goldfarb and Elijah Eskins (live in studio) - Going To New York
14. Robert Belfour - Catfish Blues

Traveling Blues - show no. 55  July 11, 2012

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North Mississippi Allstars live in Tel Aviv, Tuesday, July 10, 2012

 Luther Dickinson with Israel Blues Society

 co-founder Ilan Jonas

More than 400 music fans from many different disciplines and from all over the country came out Tuesday night July 10, 2012 to the Barby club in downtown Tel Aviv.
A fair contingent of Israel Blues Society members, some dedicated "Deadheads" (Grateful Dead fans),
fans of jambands like the Allman Brothers and Gov't Mule, and just folks who enjoy good music, and heard about the show from friends and on Facebook.
The Barby club is an old warehouse type structure with very high ceilings and metal rafters to support the old roof, huge chandeliers that look over 100 years old hang here and there from the rafters.


The folks start filtering in and getting settled in seats around tables, or standing in the space in front of the stage. Many of us are old friends and acquaintances who see each other at concerts and festivals, and this is one of the biggest events we have shared all year.

Alvin Youngblood Hart comes on stage to open the show solo, playing Charlie Patton, Son House, and Skip James classics as well as a couple of his own songs with impeccable technique on the guitar and a very soulful voice. To tell the truth, many of us came to hear Alvin just as much as the features act. The crowd is warmed up nicely now, and ready for the main show, the air is already highly charged with lovely energy, and about 10 minutes after Alvin finishes his set, brothers Luther and Cody Dickinson come on stage.

 Luther Dickinson with 2 dedicated Blues fans

Cody immediately opens with a New Orleans style quick parade marching beat, as Luther straps on his guitar and begins picking out a song slowly and softly.
The brothers, also known as the North Mississippi Allstars, and also as the North Mississippi Allstars Duo LuCo, It is quite hard to believe how full the sound is coming out of just a guitar and drum set, but these two manage to make it sound like at least a full 4 piece band was on stage.

After an hour with a string of their best songs, going from playing hard and full out and back down to a whisper and gentle fingerpicking, the audience is rocking and swaying, and hanging on their every move, and that's when Alvin comes back on stage, and picks up the bass guitar. Luther sits at the drum kit, as Cody pulls out a metal laundry washboard that is hooked up to a microphone and electronic effects pedals, and literally stuns the audience by making some wild and amazing sound patterns with the amplified washboard. Alvin now takes up a guitar and Luther the bass, as Alvin sings a couple of his own songs, and then switches back to the bass, as Luther pulls out an amplified 2 string cigar box guitar and plays it with a bottleneck slide. Next, Luther picks up a 2 stringed amplified coffee tin guitar and plays it slide style as well as singing through the other end of the tin can like a megaphone...

After all this wildness, they all went off stage for a few minutes as the crowd all stood on their feet and waited for an encore, and encore they got - at least another 20 minutes of the amazing high energy North Mississippi Allstars show. As one person leaving the club said: "That's just what I needed, that music filled me up for a long time!"

Traveling Blues - show no. 55 July 11, 2012

The podcast is available here:

Traveling Blues - show no. 55  July 11, 2012

On tonight's show, we were still enjoying the high from the North Mississippi Allstars performance last night in Tel Aviv.
Blues birthdays of the week wre Casey Bill Weldon and Blind Boy Fuller. We featured a new release by singer guitarist Suzanne Thomas and the Blues Church.

There are two members of the Blues community that need our help - Graham Wood Drout of the Florida Blues band Iko-Iko, who is recovering from medical treatment for complications from severe diabetes,
and Curtis Salgado, who is undergoing surgery to remove a cancerous piece of his lung.

You can donate to Graham's Wood Drout medical fund at this website:
http://www.iko-iko.com/Iko-Iko/HELP_GRAHAM.html

You can chip in to Curtis Salgado's medical fund by clicking "chip in " on his website:
http://www.curtissalgado.com/

Here's our playlist:
01. North Mississippi Allstars - Shake  
02. North Mississippi Allstars - Going Home
03. Robert Belfour - Po' Black Mattie
04. Johnny Moore and the Three Blazers - How Blue Can You Get?
05. Iko- Iko - I've Got the Gris Gris
06. Curtis Salgado - Inside My Heart
07. Suzanne Thomas - Cheatin' On Me
08. Casey Bill Weldon - Somebody Changed the Lock on My Door
09. Blind Boy Fuller - Baby I Don't Have to Worry
10. Blind Boy Fuller - Walking My Blues Away
11. Robert Belfour - Hill Stomp
12. North Mississippi Allstars - The Horseshoe

Traveling Blues - show no. 55  July 11, 2012

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Traveling Blues show no. 54, July 4, 2012

The podcast is available here:

Traveling Blues show no. 54, July 4, 2012

Tonight's show featured an interview with Luther Dickinson of the North Mississippi Allstars, and Blues birthdays for Mississippi John Hurt, Willie Dixon, Willie Pinetop Perkins, and James Cotton.


Here's the playlist:

01. Mississippi John Hurt - The Moanin' Blues 
02. Mississippi John Hurt - Satisfied 
03. Big Three Trio (Willie Dixon) - I Ain't Gonna Be Your Monkey Man 
04. Big Three Trio (Willie Dixon) - Violent Love 
05. The North Mississippi Allstars - Ain't None of Mine 
06. Pinetop Perkins - Baby What You Want Me To Do 
07. Luther Dickinson - interview 
08. North Mississippi Allstars - Lord Have Mercy 
09. James Cotton - Cut You Loose 
10. Daniel Dworsky - Don't Cry to Me 

Listen to Traveling Blues live Wednesdays at 8 PM (GMT+2) IDC Radio 106.2FM,
or http://1062fm.co.il/en/,

Listen to archived podcasts at www.icast.co.il/TravelingBlues

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Poor man, but a good man, Skip James

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***James Coburn * James Brown *****
***Etta James * Steve James *********
***Jesse James * Jameson*************
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*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
*** Skip James Skip James Skip James ***
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***Jimmy James & the Blues Flames***
*** James Bond * Bob James***
***Elmore James * King James***
***Frank James * James bay***
***Susan James * Ellen James***
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James

****Skip town for 33 years***

James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
James James James James James
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The Blues as Zen

This is an article that I wrote for a local magazine back in 1998,
I made some minor updates and corrections, and here it is:


The Blues As Zen

By Eli Marcus

What is the essence of Blues? I see the Blues as a kind of Zen. Like Zen the Blues at face value looks simple, easy. Actually the Blues is simple in its essence, however, as with Zen, a deep understanding of the Blues requires the student/disciple to travel along a path of gradual enlightenment. Brownie McGhee said: "Blues is life", i.e. the Blues is a way of life. It can also be understood that the Blues, like life, has complexity on the one hand, with levels and layers, changing and evolving in time but at the core - its essence is constant.

Willie Dixon said: "I am the Blues", expressing a level of Zen awareness about his life as a Bluesman. The origins of the Blues are quite diverse: not necessarily just musical, they are to a great extent a social/cultural expression of the enslaved and oppressed Black populations of America. Musically we find African melodies and particularly rhythms, intermixed with European musical forms, both folk and classical.

One of the inborn paradoxes of the Blues is that pain and frustration are expressed side by side with joy and spiritual elation, sometimes in the same song. This is a sort of Zen duality. The Afro Americans ("Blacks") arrived in America a few hundred years ago as slaves who were kidnapped out of Africa. With them came the famous "Talking Drums", which was both a form of percussion and an actual method of communication (like the telegraph).

White plantation owners soon understood that the drum-communication was a direct threat to their subjugating authority and a widespread ban of drums and drumming was enforced by the 1830’s. The result was apparently a strengthening of the singing rhythms as well as an emphasis on guitar (European origin) and banjo (African origin) as rhythmical instruments, a trend that has remained in the Blues to this day.

In the same token that rhythm was internalized or went "underground’, so did the Black slave's spirituality. The Black man brought with him from Africa a myriad of religious practices and beliefs which were quite foreign and strange to the Christian/European sensibilities of the White man. This included kinds of tribal witchcraft, Hoodoo and Voodoo.

The clash with Christianity, followed by a ban of Hoodoo and other ritual practices, caused the Blacks to hide these beliefs deep down inside themselves (much like the Maronites in Portugal - Jews who were forced to conceal their religious practices from public view and "officially" converted to Christianity). Again a duality arose with the Black man publicly embracing Christianity (producing Gospel music by the early 1900’s).

Many Blacks continued in secret the practices of Hoodoo and other pagan traditions, some of which are even witnessed in the Blues today. Muddy Waters was well known for the song "Hootchie Cootchie Man" (written by Willie Dixon) and also for "Got My Mojo Working", with lines such as:

"I got a black cat bone, ‘got a Mojo too,
I got a John the Conqueror root, I’m gonna mess with you...."
or -
"I’m goin’ down in Louisiana ‘gonna get me a Mojo Hand,
gonna’ have all you ladies right here under my command".

These ancient pagan religious references in the Blues may be the reason that "righteous" Blacks who were loyal to the church called the Blues "the Devil’s Music" and frowned on it or banned it outright in their homes and the community at large.
Gospel music, though really another musical form of the Blues, was strictly Christian and "White" in textual content, while the Blues have all the rest of the social and cultural content of the Black experience.

Much in the same way that Zen and Blues can be a process of enlightenment, the Black man has undergone a process of socialization and evolution in America. In the music itself we see lots of clowning and "hokum" in the Blues of the 1920’s and 30’s. The Black man in Vaudeville and early movies has no dignity, no self respect. His only expression of being a real person is his sexuality- the one thing the White man didn’t manage to repress. The White man was afraid of the Black man’s overt sexuality, leading to all the nasty stereotypes that exist about Black’s and their sexuality.

The expressions of sexuality that seemed natural and healthy in Black society, were too blatant for the uptight and even puritan White society in America of the 40’s and 50’s, and this was a major factor in keeping R & B and Blues from breaking the color barrier in the 50’s. The "softened" versions of the Black music that were hits for Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, and other White performers were often simply "covers" of the Black originals that couldn’t break through, and were often stolen outright from the Black artists.

The late 50’s and early 60’s saw a maturation of the Black music scene, Chuck Berry became a star that appealed to Whites as well as Blacks, but just as the White audiences began discovering the wonderful Black heritage, the Black community began to turn away from the Blues as being archaic, and something they wanted to put behind them. For a while there was even a kind of shame involved in the old black culture and music, and only in the mid 1980’s did young Black artists find a renewed pride in the traditional Blues (witness Corey Harris, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Keb ‘Mo, Guy Davis, and Eric Bibb).

The great attention Blues has received in recent years in the media, including the United States government declaring 2003 as “The Year of the Blues”, is a "ship finally coming in" for artists such as John Lee Hooker, Buddy Guy, and the recently departed Luther Allison- artists who have patiently practiced their Blues craft for 30-40 years before achieving real fame and fortune. A pop-rock artist may rise to fame in 5 years and then vanish overnight, but the Blues, like Zen, is a patient and enduring art.

Living with the Blues and learning as we go, brings us full circle, like Zen, to the starting point of simplicity, an expression of everyday life-
"THE BLUES IS LIFE"
Brownie McGhee

© 1998-2008 Eli Marcus

Root Doctor - "Change Our Ways"

I just received the new CD from Root Doctor Band a couple of days ago, so this morning I gave it a "test drive" so to speak on my way to work.

It was a fairly normal day today, with moderate traffic as I got onto the highway. But of course, the laws of "Carma" - the cosmological laws of driving and traffic, have a way of balancing out your experience sometimes. What you gain in a break in traffic at one part of your journey, you certainly will lose as you encounter a minor jam somewhere further on up the road.

Root Doctor are an interesting band of mostly young Blues musicians fronted by a more veteran vocalist named Freddie Cunningham. Cunningham has one of those soulful voices that have a rich rounded tone and deep vibrato or sustain in his technique. He wouldn't stand out that much among old style R&B/ Soul singers, but in the Blues idiom it adds a breath of fresh air and a different take on the Blues.

Root Doctor are a tight band with a good dose of Soul and Funk in their playing, but they can certainly prove their mainstream Blues roots as well. Their previous album from last year (Been A Long Time Coming - Big O Records 2406)impressed me as a fresh new band on the scene, and this new CD just keeps up that good feeling with a selection of original tunes, and some interesting covers.

One such cover, "Soul Shine" by Warren Haynes, is a very pleasant surprise since I am a very big fan of Warren and his band Gov't Mule, and Root Doctor do a fine cover of this inspirational song.

Well, I finally made it through that last surprise traffic jam just 800 meters from the office, and managed to slip into the parking lot without event as I flipped to the first track on the CD - "Blues Will Take Care of You", written by their keyboard man Jim Alfredson, a very nice Blues song to carry with me through my day...

Ted Cooper is in the house!

Canadian/Israeli Blues artist Ted Cooper was recently visiting in Israel and gave 2 acoustic performances in the country. Ted is an excellent electric and acoustic guitarist, harmonica player, and bass player, as well as a deep voiced singer of Blues, Country, R & B and Rock and Roll. Ted has a repertoire filled with a nice set of self penned songs that he's written over the last 25 years, and many standards of Blues, Country, and Folk-Rock that he's made sound like he wrote them himself.
Ted was a regular fixture of the Blues and Folk music scene in Israel throughout the 1980's, playing many Jacob's Ladder Festivals, as well as being a regular in clubs and kibbutz venues around the country. Ted moved back to Toronto in late 1993, and very rarely performs on stage these days, except during his visits to Israel.

Just about a year ago, Ted visited Israel and participated in a whirlwind reunion tour with singer Libi and many of the musicians and friends who used to accompany her and/or Ted over the years. Last year's reunion tour was a real blast of nostalgia and lots of wild fun too.
This year's visit was a bit more low key - but it is always a pleasure to hear Ted live on stage, this time accompanied by Assaf "Sweet Tooth" Rozov on acoustic guitar, vocals and dobro, and Dov Hammer on harmonica and vocals - both of them musicians who grew up in the Ted Cooper Band of the late 1980's.
Today, each one of them has a mature voice of his own to contribute to this trio, and the result was very smooth and enjoyable.

I really look forward to the next time Ted decides to grace us with a visit and gives a few rare performances on stage...

More Paul Pena Music

I finally got my hands on a copy of the live CD recorded by singer and harmonica player Big Bones (see his MySpace page at Big Bones) together with Paul Pena back in 1991.
Paul Pena is a minor Blues legend that wrote hit songs like "Jet Airliner" and "Gotta Move" (which is a favorite in recent years of the Derek Trucks Band).
A guitarist and singer who became legally blind at an early age, Paul Pena led a life that was sometimes charmed, and sometimes full of pain. When he passed away in the fall of 2005, I started searching for his recordings...

"Giant Killers" Paul Pena and Big Bones
This is a live acoustic set, but it has some nice surprises, such as guest (instrumental) performances by Alvin Youngblood Hart on a couple of songs, and when you hear Paul Pena's incredibly deep voice on songs such as "Swing Low Sweet Cadillac", you might not believe such notes are possible in a human!
Big Bones plays solid harmonica and also has a fairly deep and full voice on most of the songs. Paul Pena plays resophonic slide guitar on all tracks, and sings on a few.
I'm so glad I got my hands on this CD,
and you can also get yourself a copy by contacting Big Bones directly:
Big Bones Email

Paul Pena links:
The official Paul Pena website

Article on Paul in CV MusicWorld

Paul Pena memorial page on Friends of Tuva website

Paul Pena entry in Wikipedia

Re-Discovering Paul Pena

It's been just over a year since Paul Pena passed away at the age of 55, and I finally got my hands on his recording - "New Train" (the CD cover pictured at right).
I guess I must have subconsciously known about Paul Pena for years, his name has been around in Blues circles since the early 1970's, but it wasn't until I read his obit last year that I really took notice...

Paul Pena was a singer, guitarist, bass player, and songwriter. He had a hard life, having been born with a serious case of congenital Galucoma which left him legally blind from the age of 10 onward. He still became a talented musician, playing in the band of Blues icon T-Bone Walker during the early 70's.
Paul recorded 2 albums under his own name as leader:

"Paul Pena", released in 1972 by Capitol Records (currently out of print)
"New Train", recorded in 1973, released in 2000 by Hybrid Recordings

Following the recording of his 2nd album (New Train, 1973)he suffered a sort of blacklisting in the industry due to an unscrupulous producer (Albert Grossman) who refused to release the recordings and also would not release Paul from his binding contract. If it weren't for a stroke of luck and a hit song to provide him with royalty checks, Paul Pena would have starved - Pena just happens to be the writer of the song "Jet Airliner" which was a big Top 10 hit for
Steve Miller in 1977. He also happens to be the author of a number of other interesting songs.

One of those songs, "Gonna Move", sounded much too familiar to me the minute I heard the rhythm track at the start of the song, and then I realized that I have been hearing the Derek Trucks Band and Susan Tedeschi (Derek's wife) performing that song as a regular part of their live repertoire.

Another moving song (no pun intended) is the title track - "New Train",
a song of spirituality and a hope for peace, here are the lyrics:

"I remember a time back in the big city near my home
To the clocks tolling the morning
'Hear the sound of a Gospel choir, singing soft and low
On a rainy day the sun was dawning
But it's been a long long time, since I've heard the rhyme
Of a time and a season hidden in the past
And the days are growing harder, time is growing shorter
Brother hating brother spreading fast...

You gotta get on the new train and ride
We gotta find our way to freedom
You gotta get on the new train and ride
Buy our ticket for a brand new season

Trippin down south in the Easter time
See the folks coming out from worship
Everyone talking about the glories of the resurrection
While all of them thinking that they're perfect
When there comes a helpless man
who's down and needs a hand
And the will of Christ is done by one from prison
So he gets a hand from one, and is condemned by some
but divine love we all have and this he lays on him


You gotta get on the new train and ride
We gotta find our way to freedom
You gotta get the new train and ride
Buy our ticket for a brand new season

As I look back on my history
See a house with children playin' in the street
Mama sittin' cross legged tellin' us
Be our brother's keeper
And I take my strength from daddy's song
You know I love what I see
'Cause it's taught allot to me
Made me strong and helped this boy understand
That this world is here for giving
And life is here for living
Let the choir sing and let me sing it with the band

You gotta get on the new train and ride
We gotta find our way to freedom
You gotta get on the new train and ride
Buy our ticket for a brand new season"
[copyright 1973, 2000 Paul Pena]

For more information on Paul Pena:

The official Paul Pena website

Article on Paul in CV MusicWorld

Paul Pena memorial page on Friends of Tuva website

Paul Pena entry in Wikipedia

Blues and Male Existentialism

Why do men write Blues songs?
Why do we sing the Blues?

Well, some might say that women invariably give us the Blues,
and that is why there is so much music out there trying to tell the story of
how hard it is for a man to get lovin' from a woman.

In the spectrum of man/woman relationships,
there is so much misunderstanding,
so much lack of real communication,
deception,
cheating in a small way (acts of omission),
cheating in a big way (infidelity),
and outright cruelty...
The Blues is one way to deal with the pain, the feeling of being left out of the loop, not getting the joke, or simply not getting enough loving.

I was watching a movie on late night TV called "Kiss the Sky" - a 1999 movie which depicts an existential search by 2 guys having a mid-life crisis, who decide to visit the far east and look for answers. The movie contains some pretty serious conversations about the nature of the man/woman relationship, expectations, unsaid and misunderstood feelings and desires, double standards, jealousy, and also Zen.

I don't think that I'll spoil the story if I tell you that even though for most of the movie they both seem to be of the same mind, each of them finds a different answer ultimately to their existential angst, the search for "true freedom" and "true happiness" and their problems in relating to the women in their lives.

I recommend this movie, I think it is both fun and insightful, and it seems like there aren't nearly enough movies of that kind these days...

Blues Icon Etta Baker dies at 93

Etta Baker is one of the first guitarists who's recordings taught me fingerpicking techniques. Her special and unique version of the old folk ballad "Railroad Bill" was one of my favourite songs when I was growing up and forming my musical tastes. She was also known for playing slide guitar with a pen knife - and her slide version of "John Henry" inspired me to start learning the art of slide guitar as well.
Bless her soul, may she rest in peace.



here is an obit article from Sept 25, 2006
in the Charlotte Observer in North Carolina:

Etta Baker's signature picking drew folks to music's down-home artistry
STEVE LYTTLE AND CARRIE LEVINE
slyttle@charlotteobserver.com | clevine@charlotteobserver.com

Etta Baker, who traded a job at a Morganton shoe factory to become a blues music legend, died Saturday in Fairfax, Va.

She was 93.

Baker's unusual two-fingered picking style on the guitar earned her a reputation as a master of the Piedmont blues, a resonant blend of bluegrass and blues that dates back more than a century in the mountains of N.C. and Tennessee. The self-taught musician from humble roots in Caldwell County influenced legions of musicians and crossed a variety of musical styles.

Baker's oldest child, Darlene Davis, said Sunday evening that her mother died Saturday afternoon, after traveling from her Morganton home to Fairfax, Va., to visit another daughter who requires dialysis. Davis said Baker's health had been declining since the late 1990s.

"Mother's been up and down for the past couple of years, but she felt like she needed to be there with my sister," Davis said.

Davis said family en route to Morganton and funeral arrangements hadn't yet been set.

"She embodied everything we love about the South," Tim Duffy, who worked with Baker through his Music Maker Relief Foundation, told the News & Observer of Raleigh.

Despite her age and health problems, Baker remained active in the music business. She played guitar on the most recent CD by blues-rock guitarist Kenny Wayne Shepherd that sold a million copies. She also recorded a CD of banjo music scheduled for release next year.

Beth Pollhammer, the founder of the Charlotte Blues Society, said Baker's music was a unique hybrid of white rural music and black music and her two-finger picking style was extremely unusual for the blues. She described Baker as an impeccable player and a phenomenal self-taught musician.

"So much of blues is a feeling. It's not a sound," Pollhammer said. "When people were moved by her playing, it was because of her life force and what she put into it, her soul, when she played.

"When she played, it was like she was talking. If you love the blues and you're listening that way, it's more of a feeling."

Pollhammer also said that Baker, in person, was charming.

"When you met her, it was just like you'd known her forever," Pollhammer said. "She was very sweet, very open. She was a beautiful woman, a beautiful spirit."

Baker was the product of a Caldwell County family and the daughter of "Medicine" Boone Reid, who played banjo, guitar, harmonica and violin in the N.C. foothills and mountains.

She learned to play guitar from her father but didn't become a full-time musician until she was in her 60s.

She raised nine children and was working at a shoe factory in Morganton in 1958 when she was approached by a professional musician and asked to change careers.

" `Etta, why don't you quit the Buster Brown plant and play music for a living?' " Baker recalled in an interview in June 2005, during Etta Baker Day festivities in Morganton. "This was on a Wednesday. I went in and told 'em I was quitting on Friday, and I did. I never did go back."

Baker's fame grew over the decades, and her versions of "One-Dime Blues" and "Railroad Bill" became classics.

Veteran blues musician Taj Mahal said Baker's guitar picking on "One-Dime Blues" was "beautiful stuff."

"It just cut right through me," he told the News & Observer. "I can't even describe how deep that was for me."

A CD containing "One-Dime Blues" helped her earn national recognition in 1991. She won a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts and also was awarded the Folk Heritage Award from the N.C. Arts Council.

During the years, she suffered the kinds of problems that would make a compelling blues song.

She was involved in a serious car accident in 1964 in which a grandson was killed. And in 1967, her husband died and a son was killed in the Vietnam War -- within a span of one month.

About a decade ago, she began losing the strength to play guitar. Rather than give up music and quit touring, however, she just changed instruments and took up the banjo.

Wayne Martin, a fiddle player on her upcoming CD, said Baker was still playing a month ago.

"I consider her to be one of the most important traditional artists of our lifetime," Martin told the News & Observer. "She touched hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people with her music.

"It's amazing that she raised nine kids, attending to their needs, then had a career that didn't even start until she was in her 60s."

Davis, Baker's daughter, said music was her mother's way of meeting other people. She loved meeting people on engagements in Europe or Texas, Davis said, because the music brought them together.

"She loved that, because she was able to bring happiness to other people through something she loved," Davis said.

Davis said her mother advised her to always be honest, to work for what she wanted, and to always be friendly, nice and respectful to others.

"She's loved by people all over the world," Davis said. "Everyone was welcome just to come and visit and be with her. She made them welcome."