THROWBACK THURSDAY: Kingdom Coming in the Year of Jubilo

Here is a classic American tune that perhaps you first heard in an old cartoon.

Like this one:



Or maybe you remember it from Ken Burn's Civil War series.

Or maybe ever so often it just bounces around in your subconscious, just part of your American musical DNA.

It's called "Kingdom Coming" or sometimes "Year of Jubilo." And it was written in 1862, during the Civil War, by a  popular songwriter of the day named Henry C, Work (1832-1884).

Warning: The song was written for a minstrel show. And we all know about minstrel shows. Indeed, this song does contain a racist epithet: "darkies" and it's meant to be sung in minstrel show dialect.

But before we condemn Henry C. Work, consider his life. Born a Connecticut yankee, he was a devout abolitionist and supporter of the Union in the war,  It ran in the family. His parents’ house was used as a stop in the Underground Railroad for escaped slaves fleeing to Canada.

Despite the minstrel show conventions found here, the lyrics mostly ridicule the "massa," who has been frightened away from his own plantation by Union gunships.

It's a song of liberation in which the slaves celebrate, locking the cruel overseer in the smokehouse and helping themselves to the massa's liquor cabinet.

“The whip is lost, the handcuffs broken, but the master will have his pay ..."

I couldn't find any Youtubes of the song from the 1860s, but here's an old version by National Barn Dance radio star Chubby Parker:



Will Rogers sang it the 1932 film Too Busy to Work in which Rogers, playing a drifter named "Jubilo," who is reunited with his long-lost daughter,



Singer Pokey LaFarge did a wonderful version of "Kingdom Coming" in the 2013 compilation Divided & United: The Songs of the Civil War. He cleaned it up a little, changing "darkies" to "brothers."



But my favorite version still is that of The Holy Modal Rounders, who recorded two versions of it through the years, both titled "Year of Jubilo." They joyously screw with the lyrics. In the Rounders' versions you don’t see Lincoln’s gunships, you see Lincoln himself with “a piece of paper in his hand,” presumably the Emancipation Proclamation. “Abe Lincoln come, ha ha/Jeff Davis go, ho ho,” they sing.)

Have yourself a jubilant Thursday!

WACKY WEDNESDAY: The Whole World Digs That Sound From the U.S.A.

They wanna hear some American music, American music
They wanna hear that sound right from the U.S.A. ...
The whole world digs that sound from the U.S.A.

The Blasters sang it.

I believe it.

That settles it.

And so I'm going to indulge in a little American exceptionalism, musically speaking, and present a little showcase how different styles of the American music we love deeply in out hearts have been reinterpreted by pickers and singers from all over the globe.

Some of the music below might make you laugh at first. That's OK. After all, it's Wacky Wednesday. But after a chuckle or two, listen to these songs. There are some fine musicians here and their art is a testament to the glory of American music (not to mention the kinship of musicians throughout the globe and the strands of human culture that unite creative people everywhere.).

Obviously, American music has been influenced by all sorts of sounds that originated in Europe, Africa, Mexico, pre-statehood Hawaii etc. But hard-working American musicians turned it all into something new. And around the world, those who heard the call soaked it in and added their own sounds and made it new again.

In fact, the artists I like best out of these are the ones who take our roots music and add elements of their own culture. One of the best examples of this is a Romanian blues band called Nightlosers. Years ago I reviewed their album Plum Brandy Blues. And I still love it.




And how about a little late-'60s/early-'70s psychedelic garage soul from Ghana: I give you The Psychedelic Aliens!



And now, some hardcore, Casbah-rockin' punk sounds from war-torn Syria. This band from Damascus is called Mazhott. And they rock! Their sound is quite addictive.

According to a 2009 interview in Taqwacore Journal, they started out around 2007.

Guitarist Rashwan says:

The Mighty Mazhott

We sing about stuff that matters to young people, in general, and social [issues]. [For example], the high school diploma, here, is unbelievably difficult, so, we wrote about that. We wrote about fathers forcing their young daughters to marry older men, about our generation that is frustrated and lost and don’t know wot to do with their lives,  about less separating of boys and girls, and about how we need more attention and freedom.

Below, from the group's Bandcamp page is their 2013 EP M is for Mazhott. (And if you like these amazing songs, fork over a couple of bucks and buy it! I did.)



And of course, there is Japanese bluegrass. The Ozaki Brothers, Yasushi and Hisashi, are bluegrass pioneers in the Land of the Rising Son, who as pre-teens in World War II, had to secretly listen to the American folk music they love because the government had banned it, according to WAMU's Bluegrass Country website,

Here's a 2009 video of the brothers singing "Are You Washed in the Blood of the Lamb."



And let's close out with some Argentine rockabilly by a band called Coyotes!



God bless America!

(Hat tip to Tripp Jennings, who inadvertently inspired this with an unrelated Tweet last week,) 

TERRELL'S SOUND WORLD PLAYLIST

Sunday, March , 2015 
KSFR, Santa Fe, N.M. 
10 p.m. to midnight Sundays Mountain Time 
Host: Steve Terrell
Webcasting!
101.1 FM
email me during the show! terrell(at)ksfr.org

Here's the playlist below

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THROWBACK THURSDAY: Springtime in the Rockies

Tomorrow, Friday March 20, is the first day of Spring.

About damn time!

So in celebration of the changing of the season, here are three of my favorite songs about spring.

First, Gene Autry, performing the title song -- or close to it-- of one of his classic singing cowboy movies, Springtime in the Rockies, which was released in 1937.

Five years later, Betty Grable made a movie with the same title.




But Autry didn't write this song. A Mormon history blog called Keepapitchinin tells the tale:

The ballad became a hit single for Gene Autry, and later for country singer Hank Snow. The nostalgic words set to their simple melody suggest that this is an old folk song, its words polished by countless anonymous singers. But it is a 20th century creation, its lyrics written by a Mormon girl, Mary Hale Woolsey, born in Springville, Utah, in 1899.

Mary attended Provo High School, then Brigham Young University where she served as a class officer and wrote for student publications. With a keen ear for the spoken word, Mary wrote several operettas performed by local theater and church groups and found a ready market for her radio plays.

She successfully collaborated with professional musicians. “Springtime in the Rockies” was published in 1929 with music written by Robert Sauer and was followed by other songs in the sentimental western genre – “When the Wild, Wild Roses Bloom,” “Colorado Skies,” and “On the Trails of Timpanogas” were all popular for a time.

So there is our history lesson for the day. Here are two other spring favorites:

Here is Bobby Troup, the guy who wrote "(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66."



But I first heard "Their Hearts Were Full of Spring" by The Beach Boys, who based their version on that of The Four Freshmen. Here is a downright haunting live rendition from sometime in the '80s:



Finally, here's Elvis and some pals with "Spring Fever" from his motion picture classic from 50 years ago, Girl Happy.

Happy springtime to all!

WACKY WEDNESDAY: Some Favorite Cartoon Themes

No, it's not Saturday morning, it's Wacky Wednesday. But this week I'm going to share some of my favorite cartoon theme songs.

Sometimes at night when I go to bed and close my eyes, these songs play in my head. Taunting me.

Some of the lyrics were inspirational to me. For instance I always aspired to live up to the Yogi Bear credo: "He will sleep to noon but before it's dark, he'll have every picnic basket that's in Jellystone Park."

Somehow I fell short of that. Oh well, on with the show, cartoon pals.




There were a couple of Rocky & Bullwinkle themes, (This one had the best sound quality of what was available on YouTube



Listen to the next one and try NOT to think of Andy Kaufman



Thank you for your service, Beetle Bailey!



This next one actually was aired at night. Big time!



And here's my spiritual guide, El Oso Yogi.



And don't forget my Popeye Serenade in a Wacky Wednesday earlier this year. CLICK HERE