Book Reviews: Dirty Linen

The Book of Ballads and Sagas
by Charles Vess
Green Man Press
The Book of Ballads and Sagas, a six-issue series in comic book format from Green Man Press, illustrates selected ballads from the Scottish, Irish and English traditions. Drawn by artist Charles Vess, and penned by a variety of noted authors, these small, elegant folios-turned-comic books retell the ballads and sagas that have come down to us through familiar folk sources. [Green Man Press/ 10518 Rich Valley Road/ Bristol, VA 24202] - Nick Crews (Rochester, NY)

Popular Music and the Underground: Foundations of Jazz, Blues, Country & Rock 1900- 1950
by Chuck Mancuso
Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company,ISBN 0-8403-9088-2 (1996)
Documenting the music of half a century is a massive undertaking, and Chuck Mancuso must be congratulated, not only for having the tenacity to do it, but to do it so comprehensively. Pop music, jazz, blues, country, and folk are all included with sidebars about artists, styles, hits, and so on all presented in a very straightforward manner. The real drawback is that it's all rather dry. It comes across more like a textbook, and that's unfortunate, given the vibrancy of so much of the material. Leavening the facts with anecdotes wouldn't have hurt, bringing the people to life. But, as he admits, Mancuso isn't a great stylist, and it's amazing the amount of information he's been able to pack into these pages. He does a sterling job of weaving the strands together (although his bias in favor of cabaret music, bringing it right up to date, does go a bit beyond the purview he'd set himself). [Kendall/Hunt Publishing/ 4050 Westmark Dr./ Dubuque, IA 52002] - Chris Nickson (Seattle, WA)

Bluegrass - An Informal Guide
by Richard D. Smith
a cappella books; ISBN: 1-55652-240-1; $12.95
This book covers everything from Bill Monroe and the Stanley Brothers to Flatt & Scruggs, bluegrass gospel, Nashville- influenced country grass and Newgrass Revival as well as Japanese and European bands. Smith has a sense of humor and is a folksy writer, describing how bluegrass began, where it is today and how the instruments developed along with the genre. He gets right to the point, explaining briefly what attributes set bluegrass musicians apart and what to listen for. Smith includes a good sampling of bluegrass CDs and videos to buy. While the diehard bluegrass fan might find it somewhat incomplete, it contains a good sampling for a beginner.

Smith, a mandolin player and record reviewer for Bluegrass Unlimited magazine, is quick to acknowledge other reference sources and biographers used in his research. Though his personal knowledge seem extensive, his research lends credibility to the work and a determination to get the facts straight. [Independent Publishers Group/ 814 N. Franklin St./ Chicago, IL 60610] - Stephen Ide (Norton, MA)

The Imagined Village
by Georgina Boyes
Manchester University Press, 1993
The subtitle for Georgina Boyes's excellent study, Culture, Ideology, and the English Folk Revival, may lead readers to think that names such as Martin Carthy, Ashley Hutchings, or June Tabor will figure heavily in her book. They do not. For the most part, the book is about not what we think of today as the "revival," but the original revival, dating to about the turn of the century, during which such crucial concepts as "folklore," "folksong" and "the folk" first came to be tested. It is a fascinating and detailed look at the very origins of the idea of English folk culture, doled out with large portions of scholarly gravity and a small side of biting wit.

The book centers on detailed analyses of the works and ideologies of the scholars and activists of the revival's heyday; the authoritarian, anti-feminist Cecil Sharp, the difficult-to-control (and therefore threatening) Mary Neal, the Fascist Rolf Gardiner, and the intellectual F.R. Leavis. Some of these names will be absolutely new to students of the revival, and Boyes discusses each in detail. In so doing, she reveals the revival to have been an intellectual battle for the right to decide who, or what, was "authentically popular" and "authentically English." She explains and questions the essentializing, primitivist, romantic tendencies that defined early folklore scholarship and lays open for us some of the thorniest issues -issues of race and issues of gender -that often silently underlie discourses about folk culture. For all of these things, Boyes' book deserves to be read and cherished.

The book's drawback for people whose interest is today's revival is that it stops where it does: having mentioned A.L. Lloyd and Ewan MacColl and the beginnings of today's movement, but not having analyzed that movement yet. Today, we are engaged in a revival of the revival, in which Carthy saves from oblivion songs discovered on nearly lost recordings by Cecil Sharp, mirroring the rescue operations of Sharp himself that produced the recordings; ironically, the fruits of an early salvage mission themselves need to be salvaged! In this re-revival, Hutchings takes to the stage portraying and romanticizing not an English peasant, but Sharp, the Folklorist-Collector! Now more than ever, it is crucial to gain an understanding of the competing ideologies of culture that made the folk revivals of yesterday and tomorrow possible. This book is an excellent contribution to that effort, and one that will be consulted by every serious future book on the topic. [available from St. Martin's Press/ 175 Fifth Avenue/ New York, NY 10010] - Steve Winick (Philadelphia, PA)

All Music Guide to Rock
Edited by Michael Erlewine, Vladimir Bogdanov, and Chris Woodstra
All Music Guide Series/Miller Freeman Books ($24.95)
This guide book is massive in listings with more than 15,500 recordings by 2,500 performers notated in the 973-page text. Casual browsing finds artists such as Los Bravos, Kim Wilde, Jason & the Scorchers, and the Hindu Love Gods... names not usually included in music guides. Comprehensive and detailed, each listing includes the artist name, vital statistics (date and place of birth and death), style (rock, folk, rap, etc), biography (a snapshot of the artist's life and musical career... major performers are given longer biographies), and album reviews (write-ups and descriptions of the albums the artist has produced). Next to each album listing are keys that indicate "essential recordings," "first purchase," "landmark recordings," and an album rating (one to five stars).

Of added benefit to the reader, and of special interest to musicologists, are special appendices which go into great depth and detail on 43 musical genres tied to "rock." Some of these are: Motown, Garage Rock, Lo-Fi, Bubblegum, Folk Rock, and Australian Rock. There's even a magazine and newsletter section with special reviews.

All in all, the All Music Guide to Rock makes for fascinating reading and browsing. [Miller Freeman Books/ 600 Harrison Street/ San Francisco, CA 94107] - T.J. McGrath (Hamden, CT)

Electric Guitars and Basses: A Photographic History
by George Gruhn andWalter Carter
Miller Freeman Books ($39.95)
Electric Guitars and Basses: A Photographic History displays some amazing beauties: The Gibson Ultratone, the Gretsch Anniversary (1964), the Fender Electric XII, the Rajah Zeetar, the Rickenbacker Combo 450, and the Mosrite Ventures. There are full-color photos and text outlining the history of the electric guitar. Electric basses are also given plenty of space. Included are the "Coke bottle" peghead shape of the Danelectro bass in the 1960s, the lucite Ampeg Dan Armstrong bass of the 1970s, and the classic simplicity of the Fender Precision bass (still going strong after 40 years). - T.J. McGrath (Hamden, CT)