music and focus

Focusing on a song or a tune, whether you are the one playing and singing or the one doing the listening, is a way to relax, and to create. That may seem a contradiction, at first.

Whichever side of that circumstance you are on at any given time, though, it can be a doorway in to deep source of peace and refreshment.










photographs from Glasgow, Scotland, and Cambridge, Massachusetts, copyright Kerry Dexter


Music to go along with these ideas

Music Road: national drum month: bodhran
Music Road: Scotland on the harp: Corrina Hewat
Music Road: Carrie Newcomer: Before & After

you may also wish to see

Delicious Baby's Photo Friday, where travelers offer new insights to the world each Friday
this week, be sure to check out the one with peanut butter and jelly included -- two things which also help with focus.

road trip travels: missouri moon

This summer, and beyond, we're taking you along on The Great American Road Trip.

I’m partnering up with A Traveler’s Library to add musical ideas to the book and film suggestions for journeys through the regions of the United States the Library is discovering for you.

Recently, the Road Trip traveled through Missouri. There you met Rhonda Vincent, who grew up there playing in her family's band, and has gone on to make an award winning career on her own as a bluegrass artist. Here she is, first surviving a broken guitar string, then singing the song Missouri Moon.




Look for Great American Road Trip posts on Wednesdays at A Traveler's Library and here at Music Road. Also read over at the Library for information on travels to France and other adveneures, and here at Music Road for journeys real and virtual to Ireland, Scotland, Cape Breton, and other places.

For more about the road trip (and a look at some great road songs) see Great American Road Trip: Music begins

you may also wish to see
Music Road: Road Trip Music: Arkansas and Missouri
Music Road: Irish music, Irish landscape
Music Road: Dual: Julie Fowlis & Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh

Highlands history in song

The Rise and Fall o' Charlie
Alan Reid and Rob van Sante


You might perhaps know the Skye Boat Song, which is sometimes used as a lullabye, or perhaps you've heard the rousing and wtty song by Robert Burns, Charlie Is My Darlin’. There’s more to the story of Prince Charles Edward Stuart than that, though, in both song and history.

It’s a history intimately connected with Scotland, as the Rising of 1745, when Bonnie Prince Charlie, as he was known, hoped to lead a revolution to bring the British Crown back to the house of Stuart, began and in many ways ended in the Scottish Highlands. Alan Reid of the Battlefield Band and his frequent duo partner Rob van Sante have gathered songs, written songs, and gathered friends together to play and sing them to tell the story of the prince, from rising to remembrance. It makes for a cohesive whole and good listening, whether you know anything about Charles Stuart, Johnny Cope, Preston Pans, or Culloden or not. If yuo're not up on this part of history, the liner notes will fill you in a bit on the trajectory of the story, and the provenance of the music, as well.

A few of the songs, mostly those in Scottish Gaelic, are from Charlie’s time, and there are two Robert Burns songs, from not that long after. Several of the pieces come from the nineteenth century, a time when Charlie's life and quest were often quite romanticized, and Alan Reid has written four of the fourteen pieces included here. The collection opens with Sound of the Pibroch, marking the highland pipes which called the clans from glen to glen to join in the rising, and ends with Will Ye No’ Come Back Again, a song which today is still sung often at the end of gatherings to wish friends a speedy return. Between there are songs in Gaelic, songs welcoming the prince, songs celebrating victories in battle, songs questioning the future of the prince and his cause, and songs looking back and, as Reid puts it in the liner notes “beginning the long process of romanticizing the life and creating the myth” of Bonnie Prince Charlie. It’s a thoughtful collection balanced both musically, and you might say, philosophically. Reid and van Sante are joined by several gifted Scottish musicians, including rising Gaelic singer Maeve MacKinnon, cellist and singer Wendy Weatherby, fiddler Alistair White, Susan Miller on whistle and flute, Mike Katz on the pipes and Ian Fairbairn on fiddle.


you may also wish to see
Music Road: Eddi Reader sings more of the songs of Robert Burns
Music Road: Julie Fowlis: Uam

back to school savings from Amazon

music and landscape

The land has such a presence in music, especially the sort of music we find here along the music road. It can be anchor or destination, part of the journey, image in memory, a place of hope, a place of dreams -- and sometimes, all of those at once.


The Barra MacNeils, for example, sing of history and present day in their home place of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.
Julie Fowlis often turns to songs set in the landscapes of her native Hebrides, in Scotland.
Carrie Newcomer finds inspiration in geodes, common rocks in the landscape where she lives in Indiana.














two quiet mountain landscapes:
the Canadian Rockies and the Mountains of Mourne in Northern Ireland


you may also wish to see

Delicious Baby's Photo Friday, where travelers offer new insights to the world each Friday

thinking about Cape Breton: music and landscape
Irish music, Irish landscape

Road Trip Music: Arkansas and Missouri

Arkansas and Missouri both lie along the Mississippi River, and have other rivers important in their geography. They also each stand at a crossroads, or a gateway if you will, of southern ways and heartland lifestyles. Things to keep in mind as you listen to the soundtrack choices as the Great American Road Trip: Music travels on.


The Arkansas delta was home ground for a man who became a legend in American and Americana music. Several of his best known songs -- Five Feet High and Rising and Big River, to name two -- came from his experiences growing up in Dyess, Arkansas. As the road trip travels from river bank to mountain across the landscape of Arkansas, take a listen to The Essential Johnny Cash.

John Hartford grew up on the river, too, honing his fiddle and singing skills where the Mississippi and Missouri rivers converge in Saint Louis. In later years when he lived in Tennessee, he chose a home on the river there, too. Hartford was known for his wit and his storytelling as much as for his musicianship. All of these come out as friends and frequent band members gather to create a tribute to the man, his, music, and the river, on
Memories Of John.

Rhonda Vincent has a voice and a gift for singing that’d make any country star proud. She did work in mainstream country for several years, and learned from that that her true heart was in the bluegrass music she’d grown up playing with her family band in Missouri. Since coming back to bluegrass, Vincent has gone from strength to strength, creating award winning albums, selling out concerts, and in a circular turn of things seeing her videos played on country music television, and having country stars such as Keith Urban guest on her albums. Hers is a distinctive, heartland style of music, true to bluegrass, Missouri, and Vincent’s own gifts and vision. One good place to hear all this is her album Good Thing Going.


you may also wish to see
Rhonda Vincent: Beautiful Star
Music Road: Alison Brown: The Company You Keep

a shout out to the Irish side of things, the Kansas City Irish Fest is coming up in September

This is part of The Great American Road Trip, in which I’m partnering up with A Traveler’s Library to add musical ideas to the book and film suggestions for journeys through the regions of the United States which you’ll find there. Stop by and see what the Library has to inspire travels through Arkansas and Missouri. The song Farther Along features in the Library's book selection. I can't say I've ever thought of it as a funeral hymn, as the author of the book seems to. In any case, click on the song title above to hear Gretchen Peters and two well known friends sing the song.


For more about the road trip (and a look at some great road songs) see Great American Road Trip: Music begins

national drum month: bodhran

July is national Drum Month in the United States. The bodhran is a frame drum often used in Irish and Scottish music. A drum story...






During the time Cathie Ryan was part of the band Cherish the Ladies, her primary role was that of lead singer. But she wanted to challenge herself further. "I really wanted to be part of the music somehow. I was just so exciting to me, Eileen Ivers on the fiddle, Joanie Madden, Maureen Doherty, Siobhan Egan, Mary Coogan with their instruments -- I wanted to be a part of that sound they made. I thought about the bodhran, and Joanie actually also wanted me to play it, because we had a lot of treble instruments but there was no bass, so it was nice to bring some bottom to the sound.

"So I bought a tourist bodhran," Ryan said, "and I started practicing in my apartment, and driving my neighbor crazy! That's why my publishing company is called Wake the Neighbors Music, because I was up in my apartment banging away, and my neighbor finally said, could you please not be practicing so much? So I started practicing with the tipper on a big dictionary. It didn't have the bounce of the goatskin, but it helped," Ryan said. Though she practiced by playing along with traditional music, "of course, being from Detroit I brought sort of a funk approach into my bodhran playing, which was maybe not always welcome in Cherish!" she continued, laughing.









Ryan is now well into a solo career, with four well respected recordings. The bodhran, and her unique approach to rhythm, are still part of her work.

"My style works, for what I do now with my own band especially, because I love just that little bit of a funky rhythm on jigs and reels, it's a very cool sound. It's a great instrument. I love it, it just has such a primal sound. Everybody loves rhythm, when you're a kid in kindergarten you're bangin' away on the tambourine and on the little drum. I'm not a brilliant bodhran player, I don't claim to be, but I think it adds to the songs, and makes you a part of the tunes."



photographs are from Burlington, Vermont, Carlingford, Ireland, and Alexandria, Virginia.

you may also wish to see

Delicious Baby's Photo Friday, where travelers offer new insights to the world each Friday
Music Road: Cathie Ryan: Songwriter
Music Road: Voices: Cherish the Ladies

want to try the bodhran for yourself? Ray Gallen’s Irish Heartbeat: A Bodhran Tutorial dvd is a good basic introduction.

Road Trip Music in Louisiana

Cajun, Creole, swamp music, country, zydeco, bluegrass, Gulf coast blues and a dash now and then of other flavors make up the music of Louisiana. It’s a place that has often been a crossroads for musical travelers, and at the same time it’s a place with a deep connection to home and tradition. As the Great American Road Trip: Music travels through Louisiana, our soundtrack takes in both those ideas.


Christine Balfa, her husband Dirk Powell, her cousin Courtney Grainger, and their friend Kevin Wimmer carry forward Christine’ s family tradition in their music. Christine’s dad, Dewey Balfa is considered one of the giants of traditional Cajun music. In their own music, Christine and her band respect and share that, and mix in their own strengths to this music which often combines old French language and new country rhythms. A good place to experience the best of what they are up to in their band, which is called Balfa Toujours, is on the album Deux Voyages

















Marcia Ball was born just about on the border between Texas and Louisiana, which is a fitting description of where her music has taken her as well. Piano and voice are her chosen instruments. With them she creates a mix of country, blues, rock, and Louisiana and Texas which is all Americana, at times tender, at time raucous, and always interesting. An album that’s an especially good showcase of the quiet and lively sides of her work is Blue House.

you may also wish to see
Music Road: Cinco de Mayo: music
Music Road: Road Trip Music in Virginia
Music Road: music and landscape: bluegrass, Ireland, New England

This is part of The Great American Road Trip, in which I’m partnering up with A Traveler’s Library to add musical ideas to the book and film suggestions for journeys through the regions of the United States which you’ll find there. Stop by and see what the Library has in mind to inspire travels through Louisiana.
For more about the road trip (and a look at some great road songs) see Great American Road Trip: Music begins

kickstart an Irish music recording

Shannon Heaton is a top class flute player, singer, composer, and performer. You’ve encountered her work in Irish music here along the music road before.

Shannon most often performs in a duo with her husband Matt, and with the quartet Long Time Courting. She also has a plan to record a solo flute album. Part of the way she’s financing this is through a Kickstarter project.

Kickstarter is an online method which allows artists of all sorts to raise funds for creative projects, with the stipulation that if the pledge goal set by the artist is not reached within a a short time (in Shannon’s case the deadline is 19 July) then that’s it: the backers who've pledged are not charged anything. So it is a challenge of sorts.

update: The challenge was met, and recording is underway. Stay tuned here along the music road for news about the album. further up date: the CD is out! follow this link for more: Music Road: Shannon Heaton: The Blue Dress




Shannon talks about the project

To learn more about the project, follow that link above. To hear Shannon's music, check out the video below.




you may also want to see
Music Road: Another Fine Winter's Night: Matt & Shannon Heaton

Music Road: Lovers' Well: Matt & Shannon Heaton

Music Road: holiday gift list: Irish music

over at Irish Fireside, Corey and Liam are raising funds for a trip around Ireland by rail this summer.

music and connection: celebrating summer

sharing joy, creating connection, celebrating the moment -- the best music invites you to think, and to celebrate, and to share.

what experiences have you had with music this season? what's coming up?


















photographs are from Glasgow, Scotland, Burlington, Vermont, and White Plains, New York. all are copyright Kerry Dexter



you may also wish to see
Music Road: photographing music: connections
Music Road: Cathie Ryan: Songwriter
Music Road: Road Trip Music in North Carolina
Irish Music Festivals: a traveler's handbook

and
Delicious Baby's Photo Friday, where travelers offer new insights to the world each Friday

Road Trip Music in Mississippi

From the red clay roads of its northern counties to the ports and harbors along the Gulf, Mississippi is a state drenched in music. The story of Delta blues is there, with Robert Johnson and Charlie Patton. You could call Elvis Presley a country blues singer as much as he was a rock’n’ roller. Claire Holley is a contemporary writer and singer from the Magnolia state. Country star Faith Hill is from Mississippi. So is songwriter and producer Marty Stuart. The film O Brother, Where Art Thou? with a soundtrack comprising folk, blues, bluegrass, country, and gospel music, is set there.

As the Great American Road Trip: Music makes its way through Mississippi, the soundtrack comprises two albums from another Mississippi native, Caroline Herring. Herring is a storyteller whose music is informed by history, contemplation, faith, and language. Some of her stories are personal ones, some are character pieces drawn from history, some are set in Mississippi and some have their origins in other landscapes. On her album Twilight there is a vividly imagined emotional and geographic journey on the song Delta Highway. Trace, on Herring’s album Wellspring, takes a journey of history through the lives which have been lived along the Natchez Trace.

Herring tells these tales in a distinctive alto voice that well suits her stories, and with melodies that engage. There are gems on both these albums, stories of Mississippi, Texas, the west, and the heart, all well worth your attention.

you may also wish to see
Music Road: Caroline Herring: Golden Apples of the Sun

Music Road: ten songs

Music Road: Road Trip Music in Tennessee

This is part of The Great American Road Trip, in which I’m partnering up with A Traveler’s Library to add musical ideas to the book and film suggestions for journeys through the regions of the United States which you’ll find there. Stop by and see what the Library has in mind to inspire travels through Mississippi.


For more about the road trip (and a look at some great road songs) see Great American Road Trip: Music begins

celebrating the USA: born on the fourth of July

The United States of America is a gorgeous country, from sea to shining sea.

In his Americana Symphony Mark O’Connor weaves in ideas from country, folk, classical, bluegrass, and Native American music, all to create what he sees as a new American music. An adventure a bit like the history of the country and its people.

Bright colored strands of Irish and American history come from Cathie Ryan and Matt and Shannon Heaton. Hanneke Cassel flavors her Scottish music with Americana and her Americana music with more than a taste of Scotland. Carrie Newcomer writes songs and asks good questions that go deep into the heartland, and heart, of America.


Then there is the Great American Road Trip, a virtual journey in which I’m partnering up with A Traveler’s Library to add musical ideas to the book and film suggestions for journeys through the regions of the United States which you’ll find there. We’ve been traveling this road since January, and there’s much more to come.

Stops along the Great American Road Trip thus far include New York City: Irish Musicians, the saltwater music iof Del Suggs in Florida, and songs of the coal country in West Virginia. Stay tuned on Wednesdays as we continue...

Happy Fourth of July!

celebrating canada: music & image

Ontario music often finds a mix of tradtions, including Irish, Scottish, German, and French. April Vertch adds contemporary touches of bluegrass as well:
Ontario fiddle player and singer April Verch: Steal the Blue


There's strong Celtic tradition across Canada, from immgrants from Ireland, Scotland, and the Celtic regions of France
Alberta Celtic Canadian band The McDades: Bloom

Cape Breton Island is a music and celebration all its own, with strong Scottish tradition and unique flavors of northeast Canada. Hear many of the best CB players in informal settings on
Cape Breton Radio Live take 02


a bit more about the music of Cape Breton Music road trip: Cape Breton













photos copyright Kerry Dexter, from Cape Breton and Alberta


stay tuned for more music from Canada here along the music road, including a preview of this year's Celtic Colours Festival, which takes place in October on Cape Breton

you may also wish to see:

Music Road: songs of place: Canada

Delicious Baby's Photo Friday, where travelers offer new insights to the world each Friday

celebrating canada: Gordon Lightfoot

Though not all of Gordon Lightfoot's songs come from the landscapes of Canada, you can hear the prairie and the plains, the wilderness and the cities, the sea coasts and the forests, through his work. Gord's Gold is a fair introduction, or reintroduction, to his work.

If you are thinking who is Gordon Lightfoot anyway? perhaps the country blues of the song Sundown, the road song Carefree Highway, or the bittersweet love song If You Could Read My Mind will jog your memory. They are all on this twenty one track collection, along with several fine songs anchored in Canadian history and place including Canadian Railroad Trilogy and Early Morning Rain, as well as others you may know such as Cotton Jenny, Cold on the Shoulder, and Bitter Green.


Two other Gordon Lightfoot songs of Canada well worth your listening didn’t make it to this collection: Alberta Bound and Christian Island (Georgian Bay). For those, give a listen to the album Don Quixote.









you may also wish to see

Gretchen Peters: Northern Lights which includes a thoughtful take on Lightfoot’s Song for a Winter’s Night

Ian & Sylvia’s version of Early Morning Rain

Music Road: songs of place: Canada