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(Smithsonian Folkways)Subtitled Field Recordings from the Collection of Mack McCormick 1958-1971, this 66-song set is full of gripping storytelling and arresting instrumentals from the American southThis invigorating 66-song set of broadside ballads, blues, spirituals and other field recordings from the mid-20th century American south comes with a telling title. It reveals the power dynamics at play when songs performed by African Americans were taped by white male folk collectors. The extensive archives of folklorist Mack McCormick were also selective: he called his subjects “tribal people”, as they lacked middle-class aspirations, and the recordings are also largely of men.Nonetheless, this lavish, liner-note-heavy set aims to expand our ideas of who these men were, and of the talents they had. Lightnin’ Hopkins is its superstar, his voice and guitar full of fire and grit on eight tracks. But other gripping storytellers jostle alongside him. There’s James Tisdom, a regular at Texas rodeos, barbecues and fairs, whose steel guitar and half-spoken Salty Dog Rag are both spikily frisky. Then there’s the oaky-voiced Mance Lipscomb, a Texas tenant farmer who went on to play major folk festivals, singing about angels, the Titanic and a white farm owner, Tom Moore, who terrorised Black workers (Lipscomb’s name wasn’t included on an earlier release of McCormick’s, for fear of reprisals). Continue reading...