120742bk Woody
10/6/04
3:59 PM
1. Talking Dust Bowl Blues 2:43
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26619, mx BS 050146-2
Recorded 26 April 1940
9. Jesus Christ 2:45
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-3, mx MA 135
Recorded c. April 1944
2. Blowin’ Down This Road 3:05
(Woody Guthrie–Lee Hays)
Victor 26619, mx BS 050150-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
10. New York Town 2:40
(Woody Guthrie)
With Cisco Houston
Asch 347-3, mx MA 21
Recorded 19 April 1944
3. Do Re Mi 2:38
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26620, mx BS 050153-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
4. Tom Joad 6:31
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26621, mx BS 050159-1, 050152-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
5
Page 2
11. Who’s Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little
Feet 2:35
(Traditional)
With Cisco Houston
Asch 432-4, mx MA 27
Recorded 19 April 1944
5. Dusty Old Dust (So Long It’s Been
Good To Know Yuh) 3:08
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26622, mx BS 050148-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
12. Mule Skinner Blues 2:53
(Jimmie Rodgers)
With Cisco Houston, vocal, and Pete
Seeger, banjo
Asch 432-1, mx MA 12
Recorded 19 April 1944
6. Talking Sailor 3:07
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-1, mx MA 20
Recorded 19 April 1944
13. Biggest Thing Man Has Ever Done 2:23
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 432-3, mx MA 15
Recorded 19 April 1944
7. Grand Coulee Dam 2:15
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-1, mx MA 17
Recorded 19 April 1944
14. Ludlow Massacre 3:33
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 360-2, mx 902
Recorded 24 May 1945
8. Gypsy Davy 2:55
(arr. Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-2, mx MA 139
Recorded c. April 1944
15. 1913 Massacre 3:40
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 360-2, mx 901
Recorded 24 May 1945
16. This Land Is Your Land 2:17
(Woody Guthrie)
Folkways FP 27
Recorded c. 1945
19. Talking Columbia Blues 2:37
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5012, mx D 202
Recorded c. April 1947
17. Pastures Of Plenty 2:31
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5010, mx D 199
Recorded c. April 1947
Woody Guthrie, vocal and guitar
All selections recorded in New York
Transfers & Production: David Lennick
Digital Noise Reduction by K&A Productions Ltd
Original recordings from the collections of David
Lennick & John Rutherford
18. Ramblin’ Blues 2:19
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5011, mx D 201
Recorded c. April 1947
Original monochrome photo of Woody Guthrie from Rue des Archives/Lebrecht Music & Arts;
background from Corbis Images.
Also available in the Naxos Folk Legends series ...
8.120675
8.120728 *
8.120737 *
* Not available in the USA
NAXOS RADIO
Over 50 Channels of Classical Music • Jazz, Folk/World, Nostalgia
www.naxosradio.com Accessible Anywhere, Anytime • Near-CD Quality
8.120742
6
8.120742
120742bk Woody
10/6/04
3:59 PM
Page 1
WOODY GUTHRIE
‘Pastures of Plenty’ Original Recordings 1940-1947
Writer Robert Shelton once called Woody Guthrie
“a wry-witted word-volcano”, an alliterative phrase
that would have no doubt pleased the legendary
American folk singer, whose shingle might also bear
the words prophet-singer, fascist-killer, folk-poet,
talker, hummer, whistler, dancer, rambler, fighter,
and all-time balladeer hero. Because of his long
bout with Huntington’s disease, which eventually
killed him in 1967 at the age of 55, Guthrie spent
almost as much time out of the folk music scene as
he did in it. But during the 1930s and ’40s,
Woodrow Wilson Guthrie, with his shock of unruly
hair and beat-up guitar with “This machine kills
fascists” scrawled on it, laid out the blueprints for
what would become the so-called urban folk music
revival of the 1950s and ’60s, a social and musical
movement that he could only observe from the
distant vantage point of a hospital bed.
There was probably no performer who better
embodied the spirit of what America was all about
during the Great Depression. During this darkest
period in American history, Guthrie exuded optimism, humour, and empathy for the average working
American, as songs and poems flowed from his
mind like a raging river. Woody Guthrie not only
wrote about America during the Depression, he
lived it. Born in the oil-boom town of Okemah,
Oklahoma in 1912, Guthrie was an incurable
rambler with, as Pete Seeger called it, an “itching
heel,” never content to stay in one place for long;
seeing America and writing about it. He didn’t just
write songs; he also wrote poetry, lengthy letters to
2
family and friends, and essays about his travels in
numerous articles and books such as Bound for Glory.
Guthrie began writing about the same time
another American folk hero, Will Rogers, died.
Guthrie picked up where Rogers left off, speaking
up and fighting for the workers and the
disenchanted everywhere; his voice joining those of
other political activist/singers including Pete Seeger,
Cisco Houston, Josh White, and Lee Hays.
Much of Woody Guthrie’s musical inspiration
came from phonograph records. Although he was
not an adept composer, Guthrie based his songs on
traditional ballads and recordings by early country
music performers, most notably the Carter Family.
It was one of the unlikeliest songwriting
collaborations ever; the staid, conservative,
Appalachian-bound Carters and the dust-bowl bred
Communist-leaning free spirit from Oklahoma.
On 26 April 1940, Guthrie made his first
commercial recordings for RCA Victor in New York
City. The album, which would be called Dust Bowl
Ballads, was to include an essay about the songs
written by Guthrie, who received $300 for the
session. In the notes, (he described himself as “the
dustiest of the dust bowlers”) he wrote in his own
speaking style, complete with Southwestern
expressions, slang, and Guthrie’s own concocted
jargon. He described his music as “Oakie songs,
Dust Bowl songs, Migratious songs, about my folks
and my relatives, about a jillion of ’em, that got hit
by the drouth, the dust, the wind, the banker, and
the landlord, and the police, all at the same time.”
8.120742
Talking Dust Bowl Blues is a humorous
commentary on Guthrie’s life as a migrant Okie, in
which he leaves his dust blown farm, fills his Ford
with “gas-eye-leen,” and heads west to California
for better conditions. Guthrie’s “talking blues” was
derived from a series of recordings made in that
style beginning in 1926 by hillbilly singer Chris
Bouchillon.
Blowin’ Down this Road was adapted from
“Goin’ Down This Road Feelin’ Bad”, a traditional
song that can be found in country, blues, folk, and
bluegrass traditions. Guthrie wrote Do-Re-Mi in
1937 when, after arriving in Los Angeles, he found
that the Los Angeles Police Department had set up
illegal roadblocks on the major highways at the
California border to turn back those whom they
thought were “unemployable vagrants”. It was the
racism and class distinction experienced during this
period that helped influence Guthrie’s left-leaning
political beliefs, which would eventually result in his
joining the Communist Party.
The two-part Tom Joad (written to the tune of
“John Hardy”) was Guthrie’s outlaw ballad about
the fictional hero of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of
Wrath. Guthrie had seen the motion picture
adaptation of the book and wrote the song
“because the people back in Oklahoma haven’t got
two bucks to buy the book, or even thirty-five cents
to see the movie, but the song will get back to
them.” Guthrie’s version was seventeen stanzas, too
long for a single 78 rpm side, so Victor decided to
use both sides of the record to get it all down.
Dusty Old Dust, Guthrie’s masterpiece about
the dust storms in the Southwest in the mid-1930s,
was one of his first compositions, written just prior
to his leaving Texas for the west coast. The melody
3
for the verses was borrowed from “Billy the Kid” by
Carson Robison, but Guthrie wrote the chorus
himself. It later became better known as “So Long,
It’s Been Good to Know Yuh”.
In 1944, Alan Lomax introduced Guthrie to
Moses Asch, whose tiny Asch Records label on
West 46th Street in New York was recording
American folk music. Asch immediately recognized
Guthrie’s genius and, over the next few weeks, made
hundreds of recordings of Guthrie, Cisco Houston,
Sonny Terry, Lead Belly, and others on the New York
folk music scene. Another talking blues number,
Talking Sailor, extolled the National Maritime
Union (NMU) and was recorded on 19 April 1944,
with Cisco Houston, Guthrie’s buddy in the
merchant marines, accompanying him on guitar.
Guthrie’s first album for Asch also included
Gypsy Davy, a westernized version of “The Gypsy
Laddie” (Child No. 200), “Jesus Christ” (set to the
tune of “Jesse James”), whom Guthrie depicts as
simply a union organizer, and New York Town,
Guthrie’s wry observations on first arriving in the
Big Apple, with music inspired by blues singer Blind
Lemon Jefferson.
In May 1941, Guthrie was hired by the
Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) to write
songs for a film to promote public power and
development of the Columbia River in Oregon.
Within a month, Guthrie had written 26 songs, of
which three were used in the film, which didn’t get
released until 1949. Grand Coulee Dam (first
spelled “Coolee” on the original Asch 78) was
written to the tune of “Wabash Cannonball” and
included a litany of place names, deliberately
included by Guthrie to attract workers to the song.
The song contains some of Guthrie’s most vivid
8.120742
word pictures, including the line “in the misty crystal
glitter of that wild and windward spray.”
The BPA project also resulted in Pastures of
Plenty (sung modally to the tune of “Pretty Polly”),
in which Guthrie dreamed of government sponsored
irrigation providing water and electricity for migrant
workers. Talking Columbia Blues is another wry
commentary in the talking blues style in which he
predicts everything would be made of plastic
someday and that the country would be better off if
it were run not by pol-i-tish-uns but by ee-lecktrissity. Rambling Blues, one of Guthrie’s most
autobiographical songs, borrows part of its melody
from Lead Belly’s “Goodnight, Irene.”
Three songs come from an Asch 78 album
called American Folksay featuring traditional ballads
and songs brought to New York by Guthrie and
other members of the Almanac Singers. Who’s
Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little Feet is of Scottish
origin, based on “The Lass of Roch Royal” (Child
No. 76). Jimmie Rodgers’ Mule Skinner Blues (Blue
Yodel No. 8) was described by Guthrie as a migratory work song, appropriate for his union-leaning
interests. The Biggest Thing is a nonsense song also
known as “I Was Born About 10,000 Years Ago”
that was heard by Oscar Brand as a vaudeville song
in Manitoba, Canada when he was growing up.
Although its origins are unknown, Brand believed it
to be too sophisticated to be traditional. The lyrics
were updated to include union references and target
Adolf Hitler and the axis powers.
The Ludlow Massacre took place on 20 April
1914 and described the horrifying event that
occurred when Colorado coal miners, in their
attempt to unionize, were brutally attacked by the
state militia, who deliberately shot and burned
4
twenty of their group, a dozen of whom were
women and small children. Guthrie would later use
the same melody for his children’s song, “Clean-O.”
The 1913 Massacre refers to a Christmas Eve party
in Calumet, Michigan for another group of
organizing miners. In the crowded Italian Hall,
someone yelled “fire!” causing a mass panic that
resulted in the death of 74 people (59 of them
children). Mother Ella Reeve Bloor, a political
organizer and founder of the American Communist
Party, was an eyewitness to the tragedy and wrote
about it in her autobiography. Both Ludlow
Massacre and 1913 Massacre were issued on an
Asch 78 set entitled Struggle.
This Land Is Your Land was originally titled
“God Blessed America”. Guthrie’s original intent
was not to celebrate the beauty of America’s natural
landscape but to protest against privatization of
land by the American government and reclaim it for
the American worker. After its publication, the
offending verses were removed and the sanitized
version has since become a patriotic standard. The
melody was adapted from the Carter Family’s
“When the World’s on Fire”, which in itself came
from a Baptist hymn called “Oh My Lovin’ Brother”.
After he entered Greystone Hospital in New
Jersey in 1956, Woody Guthrie became the
touchstone of the urban folk revival. His disciples
have included Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Bob Dylan and
Bruce Springsteen, besides countless other wouldbe folk poets who were inspired by Guthrie’s selfdescribed work as America’s “word singer.”
– Cary Ginell (folklorist, radio broadcaster, and awardwinning author of four books on American music. He lives
in Thousand Oaks, California)
8.120742
120742bk Woody
10/6/04
3:59 PM
Page 1
WOODY GUTHRIE
‘Pastures of Plenty’ Original Recordings 1940-1947
Writer Robert Shelton once called Woody Guthrie
“a wry-witted word-volcano”, an alliterative phrase
that would have no doubt pleased the legendary
American folk singer, whose shingle might also bear
the words prophet-singer, fascist-killer, folk-poet,
talker, hummer, whistler, dancer, rambler, fighter,
and all-time balladeer hero. Because of his long
bout with Huntington’s disease, which eventually
killed him in 1967 at the age of 55, Guthrie spent
almost as much time out of the folk music scene as
he did in it. But during the 1930s and ’40s,
Woodrow Wilson Guthrie, with his shock of unruly
hair and beat-up guitar with “This machine kills
fascists” scrawled on it, laid out the blueprints for
what would become the so-called urban folk music
revival of the 1950s and ’60s, a social and musical
movement that he could only observe from the
distant vantage point of a hospital bed.
There was probably no performer who better
embodied the spirit of what America was all about
during the Great Depression. During this darkest
period in American history, Guthrie exuded optimism, humour, and empathy for the average working
American, as songs and poems flowed from his
mind like a raging river. Woody Guthrie not only
wrote about America during the Depression, he
lived it. Born in the oil-boom town of Okemah,
Oklahoma in 1912, Guthrie was an incurable
rambler with, as Pete Seeger called it, an “itching
heel,” never content to stay in one place for long;
seeing America and writing about it. He didn’t just
write songs; he also wrote poetry, lengthy letters to
2
family and friends, and essays about his travels in
numerous articles and books such as Bound for Glory.
Guthrie began writing about the same time
another American folk hero, Will Rogers, died.
Guthrie picked up where Rogers left off, speaking
up and fighting for the workers and the
disenchanted everywhere; his voice joining those of
other political activist/singers including Pete Seeger,
Cisco Houston, Josh White, and Lee Hays.
Much of Woody Guthrie’s musical inspiration
came from phonograph records. Although he was
not an adept composer, Guthrie based his songs on
traditional ballads and recordings by early country
music performers, most notably the Carter Family.
It was one of the unlikeliest songwriting
collaborations ever; the staid, conservative,
Appalachian-bound Carters and the dust-bowl bred
Communist-leaning free spirit from Oklahoma.
On 26 April 1940, Guthrie made his first
commercial recordings for RCA Victor in New York
City. The album, which would be called Dust Bowl
Ballads, was to include an essay about the songs
written by Guthrie, who received $300 for the
session. In the notes, (he described himself as “the
dustiest of the dust bowlers”) he wrote in his own
speaking style, complete with Southwestern
expressions, slang, and Guthrie’s own concocted
jargon. He described his music as “Oakie songs,
Dust Bowl songs, Migratious songs, about my folks
and my relatives, about a jillion of ’em, that got hit
by the drouth, the dust, the wind, the banker, and
the landlord, and the police, all at the same time.”
8.120742
Talking Dust Bowl Blues is a humorous
commentary on Guthrie’s life as a migrant Okie, in
which he leaves his dust blown farm, fills his Ford
with “gas-eye-leen,” and heads west to California
for better conditions. Guthrie’s “talking blues” was
derived from a series of recordings made in that
style beginning in 1926 by hillbilly singer Chris
Bouchillon.
Blowin’ Down this Road was adapted from
“Goin’ Down This Road Feelin’ Bad”, a traditional
song that can be found in country, blues, folk, and
bluegrass traditions. Guthrie wrote Do-Re-Mi in
1937 when, after arriving in Los Angeles, he found
that the Los Angeles Police Department had set up
illegal roadblocks on the major highways at the
California border to turn back those whom they
thought were “unemployable vagrants”. It was the
racism and class distinction experienced during this
period that helped influence Guthrie’s left-leaning
political beliefs, which would eventually result in his
joining the Communist Party.
The two-part Tom Joad (written to the tune of
“John Hardy”) was Guthrie’s outlaw ballad about
the fictional hero of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of
Wrath. Guthrie had seen the motion picture
adaptation of the book and wrote the song
“because the people back in Oklahoma haven’t got
two bucks to buy the book, or even thirty-five cents
to see the movie, but the song will get back to
them.” Guthrie’s version was seventeen stanzas, too
long for a single 78 rpm side, so Victor decided to
use both sides of the record to get it all down.
Dusty Old Dust, Guthrie’s masterpiece about
the dust storms in the Southwest in the mid-1930s,
was one of his first compositions, written just prior
to his leaving Texas for the west coast. The melody
3
for the verses was borrowed from “Billy the Kid” by
Carson Robison, but Guthrie wrote the chorus
himself. It later became better known as “So Long,
It’s Been Good to Know Yuh”.
In 1944, Alan Lomax introduced Guthrie to
Moses Asch, whose tiny Asch Records label on
West 46th Street in New York was recording
American folk music. Asch immediately recognized
Guthrie’s genius and, over the next few weeks, made
hundreds of recordings of Guthrie, Cisco Houston,
Sonny Terry, Lead Belly, and others on the New York
folk music scene. Another talking blues number,
Talking Sailor, extolled the National Maritime
Union (NMU) and was recorded on 19 April 1944,
with Cisco Houston, Guthrie’s buddy in the
merchant marines, accompanying him on guitar.
Guthrie’s first album for Asch also included
Gypsy Davy, a westernized version of “The Gypsy
Laddie” (Child No. 200), “Jesus Christ” (set to the
tune of “Jesse James”), whom Guthrie depicts as
simply a union organizer, and New York Town,
Guthrie’s wry observations on first arriving in the
Big Apple, with music inspired by blues singer Blind
Lemon Jefferson.
In May 1941, Guthrie was hired by the
Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) to write
songs for a film to promote public power and
development of the Columbia River in Oregon.
Within a month, Guthrie had written 26 songs, of
which three were used in the film, which didn’t get
released until 1949. Grand Coulee Dam (first
spelled “Coolee” on the original Asch 78) was
written to the tune of “Wabash Cannonball” and
included a litany of place names, deliberately
included by Guthrie to attract workers to the song.
The song contains some of Guthrie’s most vivid
8.120742
word pictures, including the line “in the misty crystal
glitter of that wild and windward spray.”
The BPA project also resulted in Pastures of
Plenty (sung modally to the tune of “Pretty Polly”),
in which Guthrie dreamed of government sponsored
irrigation providing water and electricity for migrant
workers. Talking Columbia Blues is another wry
commentary in the talking blues style in which he
predicts everything would be made of plastic
someday and that the country would be better off if
it were run not by pol-i-tish-uns but by ee-lecktrissity. Rambling Blues, one of Guthrie’s most
autobiographical songs, borrows part of its melody
from Lead Belly’s “Goodnight, Irene.”
Three songs come from an Asch 78 album
called American Folksay featuring traditional ballads
and songs brought to New York by Guthrie and
other members of the Almanac Singers. Who’s
Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little Feet is of Scottish
origin, based on “The Lass of Roch Royal” (Child
No. 76). Jimmie Rodgers’ Mule Skinner Blues (Blue
Yodel No. 8) was described by Guthrie as a migratory work song, appropriate for his union-leaning
interests. The Biggest Thing is a nonsense song also
known as “I Was Born About 10,000 Years Ago”
that was heard by Oscar Brand as a vaudeville song
in Manitoba, Canada when he was growing up.
Although its origins are unknown, Brand believed it
to be too sophisticated to be traditional. The lyrics
were updated to include union references and target
Adolf Hitler and the axis powers.
The Ludlow Massacre took place on 20 April
1914 and described the horrifying event that
occurred when Colorado coal miners, in their
attempt to unionize, were brutally attacked by the
state militia, who deliberately shot and burned
4
twenty of their group, a dozen of whom were
women and small children. Guthrie would later use
the same melody for his children’s song, “Clean-O.”
The 1913 Massacre refers to a Christmas Eve party
in Calumet, Michigan for another group of
organizing miners. In the crowded Italian Hall,
someone yelled “fire!” causing a mass panic that
resulted in the death of 74 people (59 of them
children). Mother Ella Reeve Bloor, a political
organizer and founder of the American Communist
Party, was an eyewitness to the tragedy and wrote
about it in her autobiography. Both Ludlow
Massacre and 1913 Massacre were issued on an
Asch 78 set entitled Struggle.
This Land Is Your Land was originally titled
“God Blessed America”. Guthrie’s original intent
was not to celebrate the beauty of America’s natural
landscape but to protest against privatization of
land by the American government and reclaim it for
the American worker. After its publication, the
offending verses were removed and the sanitized
version has since become a patriotic standard. The
melody was adapted from the Carter Family’s
“When the World’s on Fire”, which in itself came
from a Baptist hymn called “Oh My Lovin’ Brother”.
After he entered Greystone Hospital in New
Jersey in 1956, Woody Guthrie became the
touchstone of the urban folk revival. His disciples
have included Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Bob Dylan and
Bruce Springsteen, besides countless other wouldbe folk poets who were inspired by Guthrie’s selfdescribed work as America’s “word singer.”
– Cary Ginell (folklorist, radio broadcaster, and awardwinning author of four books on American music. He lives
in Thousand Oaks, California)
8.120742
120742bk Woody
10/6/04
3:59 PM
Page 1
WOODY GUTHRIE
‘Pastures of Plenty’ Original Recordings 1940-1947
Writer Robert Shelton once called Woody Guthrie
“a wry-witted word-volcano”, an alliterative phrase
that would have no doubt pleased the legendary
American folk singer, whose shingle might also bear
the words prophet-singer, fascist-killer, folk-poet,
talker, hummer, whistler, dancer, rambler, fighter,
and all-time balladeer hero. Because of his long
bout with Huntington’s disease, which eventually
killed him in 1967 at the age of 55, Guthrie spent
almost as much time out of the folk music scene as
he did in it. But during the 1930s and ’40s,
Woodrow Wilson Guthrie, with his shock of unruly
hair and beat-up guitar with “This machine kills
fascists” scrawled on it, laid out the blueprints for
what would become the so-called urban folk music
revival of the 1950s and ’60s, a social and musical
movement that he could only observe from the
distant vantage point of a hospital bed.
There was probably no performer who better
embodied the spirit of what America was all about
during the Great Depression. During this darkest
period in American history, Guthrie exuded optimism, humour, and empathy for the average working
American, as songs and poems flowed from his
mind like a raging river. Woody Guthrie not only
wrote about America during the Depression, he
lived it. Born in the oil-boom town of Okemah,
Oklahoma in 1912, Guthrie was an incurable
rambler with, as Pete Seeger called it, an “itching
heel,” never content to stay in one place for long;
seeing America and writing about it. He didn’t just
write songs; he also wrote poetry, lengthy letters to
2
family and friends, and essays about his travels in
numerous articles and books such as Bound for Glory.
Guthrie began writing about the same time
another American folk hero, Will Rogers, died.
Guthrie picked up where Rogers left off, speaking
up and fighting for the workers and the
disenchanted everywhere; his voice joining those of
other political activist/singers including Pete Seeger,
Cisco Houston, Josh White, and Lee Hays.
Much of Woody Guthrie’s musical inspiration
came from phonograph records. Although he was
not an adept composer, Guthrie based his songs on
traditional ballads and recordings by early country
music performers, most notably the Carter Family.
It was one of the unlikeliest songwriting
collaborations ever; the staid, conservative,
Appalachian-bound Carters and the dust-bowl bred
Communist-leaning free spirit from Oklahoma.
On 26 April 1940, Guthrie made his first
commercial recordings for RCA Victor in New York
City. The album, which would be called Dust Bowl
Ballads, was to include an essay about the songs
written by Guthrie, who received $300 for the
session. In the notes, (he described himself as “the
dustiest of the dust bowlers”) he wrote in his own
speaking style, complete with Southwestern
expressions, slang, and Guthrie’s own concocted
jargon. He described his music as “Oakie songs,
Dust Bowl songs, Migratious songs, about my folks
and my relatives, about a jillion of ’em, that got hit
by the drouth, the dust, the wind, the banker, and
the landlord, and the police, all at the same time.”
8.120742
Talking Dust Bowl Blues is a humorous
commentary on Guthrie’s life as a migrant Okie, in
which he leaves his dust blown farm, fills his Ford
with “gas-eye-leen,” and heads west to California
for better conditions. Guthrie’s “talking blues” was
derived from a series of recordings made in that
style beginning in 1926 by hillbilly singer Chris
Bouchillon.
Blowin’ Down this Road was adapted from
“Goin’ Down This Road Feelin’ Bad”, a traditional
song that can be found in country, blues, folk, and
bluegrass traditions. Guthrie wrote Do-Re-Mi in
1937 when, after arriving in Los Angeles, he found
that the Los Angeles Police Department had set up
illegal roadblocks on the major highways at the
California border to turn back those whom they
thought were “unemployable vagrants”. It was the
racism and class distinction experienced during this
period that helped influence Guthrie’s left-leaning
political beliefs, which would eventually result in his
joining the Communist Party.
The two-part Tom Joad (written to the tune of
“John Hardy”) was Guthrie’s outlaw ballad about
the fictional hero of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of
Wrath. Guthrie had seen the motion picture
adaptation of the book and wrote the song
“because the people back in Oklahoma haven’t got
two bucks to buy the book, or even thirty-five cents
to see the movie, but the song will get back to
them.” Guthrie’s version was seventeen stanzas, too
long for a single 78 rpm side, so Victor decided to
use both sides of the record to get it all down.
Dusty Old Dust, Guthrie’s masterpiece about
the dust storms in the Southwest in the mid-1930s,
was one of his first compositions, written just prior
to his leaving Texas for the west coast. The melody
3
for the verses was borrowed from “Billy the Kid” by
Carson Robison, but Guthrie wrote the chorus
himself. It later became better known as “So Long,
It’s Been Good to Know Yuh”.
In 1944, Alan Lomax introduced Guthrie to
Moses Asch, whose tiny Asch Records label on
West 46th Street in New York was recording
American folk music. Asch immediately recognized
Guthrie’s genius and, over the next few weeks, made
hundreds of recordings of Guthrie, Cisco Houston,
Sonny Terry, Lead Belly, and others on the New York
folk music scene. Another talking blues number,
Talking Sailor, extolled the National Maritime
Union (NMU) and was recorded on 19 April 1944,
with Cisco Houston, Guthrie’s buddy in the
merchant marines, accompanying him on guitar.
Guthrie’s first album for Asch also included
Gypsy Davy, a westernized version of “The Gypsy
Laddie” (Child No. 200), “Jesus Christ” (set to the
tune of “Jesse James”), whom Guthrie depicts as
simply a union organizer, and New York Town,
Guthrie’s wry observations on first arriving in the
Big Apple, with music inspired by blues singer Blind
Lemon Jefferson.
In May 1941, Guthrie was hired by the
Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) to write
songs for a film to promote public power and
development of the Columbia River in Oregon.
Within a month, Guthrie had written 26 songs, of
which three were used in the film, which didn’t get
released until 1949. Grand Coulee Dam (first
spelled “Coolee” on the original Asch 78) was
written to the tune of “Wabash Cannonball” and
included a litany of place names, deliberately
included by Guthrie to attract workers to the song.
The song contains some of Guthrie’s most vivid
8.120742
word pictures, including the line “in the misty crystal
glitter of that wild and windward spray.”
The BPA project also resulted in Pastures of
Plenty (sung modally to the tune of “Pretty Polly”),
in which Guthrie dreamed of government sponsored
irrigation providing water and electricity for migrant
workers. Talking Columbia Blues is another wry
commentary in the talking blues style in which he
predicts everything would be made of plastic
someday and that the country would be better off if
it were run not by pol-i-tish-uns but by ee-lecktrissity. Rambling Blues, one of Guthrie’s most
autobiographical songs, borrows part of its melody
from Lead Belly’s “Goodnight, Irene.”
Three songs come from an Asch 78 album
called American Folksay featuring traditional ballads
and songs brought to New York by Guthrie and
other members of the Almanac Singers. Who’s
Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little Feet is of Scottish
origin, based on “The Lass of Roch Royal” (Child
No. 76). Jimmie Rodgers’ Mule Skinner Blues (Blue
Yodel No. 8) was described by Guthrie as a migratory work song, appropriate for his union-leaning
interests. The Biggest Thing is a nonsense song also
known as “I Was Born About 10,000 Years Ago”
that was heard by Oscar Brand as a vaudeville song
in Manitoba, Canada when he was growing up.
Although its origins are unknown, Brand believed it
to be too sophisticated to be traditional. The lyrics
were updated to include union references and target
Adolf Hitler and the axis powers.
The Ludlow Massacre took place on 20 April
1914 and described the horrifying event that
occurred when Colorado coal miners, in their
attempt to unionize, were brutally attacked by the
state militia, who deliberately shot and burned
4
twenty of their group, a dozen of whom were
women and small children. Guthrie would later use
the same melody for his children’s song, “Clean-O.”
The 1913 Massacre refers to a Christmas Eve party
in Calumet, Michigan for another group of
organizing miners. In the crowded Italian Hall,
someone yelled “fire!” causing a mass panic that
resulted in the death of 74 people (59 of them
children). Mother Ella Reeve Bloor, a political
organizer and founder of the American Communist
Party, was an eyewitness to the tragedy and wrote
about it in her autobiography. Both Ludlow
Massacre and 1913 Massacre were issued on an
Asch 78 set entitled Struggle.
This Land Is Your Land was originally titled
“God Blessed America”. Guthrie’s original intent
was not to celebrate the beauty of America’s natural
landscape but to protest against privatization of
land by the American government and reclaim it for
the American worker. After its publication, the
offending verses were removed and the sanitized
version has since become a patriotic standard. The
melody was adapted from the Carter Family’s
“When the World’s on Fire”, which in itself came
from a Baptist hymn called “Oh My Lovin’ Brother”.
After he entered Greystone Hospital in New
Jersey in 1956, Woody Guthrie became the
touchstone of the urban folk revival. His disciples
have included Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Bob Dylan and
Bruce Springsteen, besides countless other wouldbe folk poets who were inspired by Guthrie’s selfdescribed work as America’s “word singer.”
– Cary Ginell (folklorist, radio broadcaster, and awardwinning author of four books on American music. He lives
in Thousand Oaks, California)
8.120742
120742bk Woody
10/6/04
3:59 PM
1. Talking Dust Bowl Blues 2:43
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26619, mx BS 050146-2
Recorded 26 April 1940
9. Jesus Christ 2:45
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-3, mx MA 135
Recorded c. April 1944
2. Blowin’ Down This Road 3:05
(Woody Guthrie–Lee Hays)
Victor 26619, mx BS 050150-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
10. New York Town 2:40
(Woody Guthrie)
With Cisco Houston
Asch 347-3, mx MA 21
Recorded 19 April 1944
3. Do Re Mi 2:38
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26620, mx BS 050153-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
4. Tom Joad 6:31
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26621, mx BS 050159-1, 050152-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
5
Page 2
11. Who’s Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little
Feet 2:35
(Traditional)
With Cisco Houston
Asch 432-4, mx MA 27
Recorded 19 April 1944
5. Dusty Old Dust (So Long It’s Been
Good To Know Yuh) 3:08
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26622, mx BS 050148-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
12. Mule Skinner Blues 2:53
(Jimmie Rodgers)
With Cisco Houston, vocal, and Pete
Seeger, banjo
Asch 432-1, mx MA 12
Recorded 19 April 1944
6. Talking Sailor 3:07
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-1, mx MA 20
Recorded 19 April 1944
13. Biggest Thing Man Has Ever Done 2:23
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 432-3, mx MA 15
Recorded 19 April 1944
7. Grand Coulee Dam 2:15
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-1, mx MA 17
Recorded 19 April 1944
14. Ludlow Massacre 3:33
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 360-2, mx 902
Recorded 24 May 1945
8. Gypsy Davy 2:55
(arr. Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-2, mx MA 139
Recorded c. April 1944
15. 1913 Massacre 3:40
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 360-2, mx 901
Recorded 24 May 1945
16. This Land Is Your Land 2:17
(Woody Guthrie)
Folkways FP 27
Recorded c. 1945
19. Talking Columbia Blues 2:37
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5012, mx D 202
Recorded c. April 1947
17. Pastures Of Plenty 2:31
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5010, mx D 199
Recorded c. April 1947
Woody Guthrie, vocal and guitar
All selections recorded in New York
Transfers & Production: David Lennick
Digital Noise Reduction by K&A Productions Ltd
Original recordings from the collections of David
Lennick & John Rutherford
18. Ramblin’ Blues 2:19
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5011, mx D 201
Recorded c. April 1947
Original monochrome photo of Woody Guthrie from Rue des Archives/Lebrecht Music & Arts;
background from Corbis Images.
Also available in the Naxos Folk Legends series ...
8.120675
8.120728 *
8.120737 *
* Not available in the USA
NAXOS RADIO
Over 50 Channels of Classical Music • Jazz, Folk/World, Nostalgia
www.naxosradio.com Accessible Anywhere, Anytime • Near-CD Quality
8.120742
6
8.120742
120742bk Woody
10/6/04
3:59 PM
1. Talking Dust Bowl Blues 2:43
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26619, mx BS 050146-2
Recorded 26 April 1940
9. Jesus Christ 2:45
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-3, mx MA 135
Recorded c. April 1944
2. Blowin’ Down This Road 3:05
(Woody Guthrie–Lee Hays)
Victor 26619, mx BS 050150-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
10. New York Town 2:40
(Woody Guthrie)
With Cisco Houston
Asch 347-3, mx MA 21
Recorded 19 April 1944
3. Do Re Mi 2:38
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26620, mx BS 050153-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
4. Tom Joad 6:31
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26621, mx BS 050159-1, 050152-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
5
Page 2
11. Who’s Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little
Feet 2:35
(Traditional)
With Cisco Houston
Asch 432-4, mx MA 27
Recorded 19 April 1944
5. Dusty Old Dust (So Long It’s Been
Good To Know Yuh) 3:08
(Woody Guthrie)
Victor 26622, mx BS 050148-1
Recorded 26 April 1940
12. Mule Skinner Blues 2:53
(Jimmie Rodgers)
With Cisco Houston, vocal, and Pete
Seeger, banjo
Asch 432-1, mx MA 12
Recorded 19 April 1944
6. Talking Sailor 3:07
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-1, mx MA 20
Recorded 19 April 1944
13. Biggest Thing Man Has Ever Done 2:23
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 432-3, mx MA 15
Recorded 19 April 1944
7. Grand Coulee Dam 2:15
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-1, mx MA 17
Recorded 19 April 1944
14. Ludlow Massacre 3:33
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 360-2, mx 902
Recorded 24 May 1945
8. Gypsy Davy 2:55
(arr. Woody Guthrie)
Asch 347-2, mx MA 139
Recorded c. April 1944
15. 1913 Massacre 3:40
(Woody Guthrie)
Asch 360-2, mx 901
Recorded 24 May 1945
16. This Land Is Your Land 2:17
(Woody Guthrie)
Folkways FP 27
Recorded c. 1945
19. Talking Columbia Blues 2:37
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5012, mx D 202
Recorded c. April 1947
17. Pastures Of Plenty 2:31
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5010, mx D 199
Recorded c. April 1947
Woody Guthrie, vocal and guitar
All selections recorded in New York
Transfers & Production: David Lennick
Digital Noise Reduction by K&A Productions Ltd
Original recordings from the collections of David
Lennick & John Rutherford
18. Ramblin’ Blues 2:19
(Woody Guthrie)
Disc 5011, mx D 201
Recorded c. April 1947
Original monochrome photo of Woody Guthrie from Rue des Archives/Lebrecht Music & Arts;
background from Corbis Images.
Also available in the Naxos Folk Legends series ...
8.120675
8.120728 *
8.120737 *
* Not available in the USA
NAXOS RADIO
Over 50 Channels of Classical Music • Jazz, Folk/World, Nostalgia
www.naxosradio.com Accessible Anywhere, Anytime • Near-CD Quality
8.120742
6
8.120742
8.120742
“Pastures of Plenty”
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
Talking Dust Bowl Blues 2:43
Blowin’ Down This Road 3:05
Do Re Mi 2:38
Tom Joad 6:31
Dusty Old Dust (So Long It’s Been Good
To Know Yuh) 3:08
Talking Sailor 3:07
Grand Coulee Dam 2:15
Gypsy Davy 2:55
Jesus Christ 2:45
New York Town with Cisco Houston 2:40
Who’s Gonna Shoe Your Pretty Little Feet
with Cisco Houston
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
Original 1940-1947 Recordings
2:35
Mule Skinner Blues with Cisco Houston 2:53
Biggest Thing Man Has Ever Done 2:23
Ludlow Massacre 3:33
1913 Massacre 3:40
This Land Is Your Land 2:17
Pastures Of Plenty 2:31
Ramblin’ Blues 2:19
Talking Columbia Blues 2:37
NOTES AND FULL RECORDING DETAILS INCLUDED
www.naxos.com
h & g 2004 Naxos Rights International Ltd
Made in the EU
Design: Ron Hoares
Total
Time
56:36
ADD
8.120742
Transfers and Production by David Lennick
Digital Noise Reduction by K&A Productions Ltd
8.120742
WOODY GUTHRIE Pastures of Plenty
WOODY GUTHRIE Pastures of Plenty
WOODY GUTHRIE