Adam McCulloch (r) “A rip-roaring yarn” Earlier this year, when researching my posts for “Babylon” (Child 14), I came across a terrific Scottish recording of the tune, “The Bonnie Banks of Airdrie” by Adam McCulloch. McCulloch’s album In These Times, … Continue reading →
Jeffrey Foucault and Mark Erelli This is the second post this week on Norman Blake’s “Billy Gray.” Read the first here. Outlaw Rhetoric That I haven’t read Aristotle‘s Poetics yet is a gap in my education. I’ll need to get right … Continue reading →
Norman Blake (photo by Henry Horenstein) This is the first of three posts on “Billy Gray.” Read the second here, and the third here. Prelude: But I regress… After last week’s focus on re-thinking gender roles in both new murder … Continue reading →
Christine Stulik (photo by Logan Futej) This is part two of our interview with Eileen, and the third post of the week. You can read the first part of the interview here, and read our introduction to their song “I’ll … Continue reading →
Becky Poole (photo by Logan Futej) Here is Part One of our interview with the Chicago-based duo, Eileen. Today, we meet the duo and dive more deeply into the song “I’ll Lay You Down,” which we introduced in the previous … Continue reading →
Eileen, the band (Christine Stulik [l] and Becky Poole [r], photo by Logan Futej) Prelude (or Preamble, take your pick) “The murders of men tend not to alarm us because, on a certain level, we perceive men as voluntarily accepting … Continue reading →
Prince Charles Edward Stuart arrived on Northwest coast of Scotland in July 1745. When he arrived on Eriskay it was the first time Charles had ever been in Scotland and yet he announced his arrival with the words “I am … Continue reading →
Robert Burns Robert Burns was born in 1759, 13 years after the last battle fought on the United Kingdom mainland at Culloden Moor near Inverness. In celebration of Robert Burns’ 254th birthday this week’s Murder Ballad Monday takes a tangential … Continue reading →
“Cain and Abel,” by Titian When I wrote last year about Jesus and the murder ballad, I thought I would finish that week by looking back to other Biblical stories that also provided symbols for music in this genre. I … Continue reading →
Elvis Presley, 1970 In considering Chris Smither’s song “Every Mother’s Son” in preparation for this week’s first post, I kept being drawn to the contrast between it and Elvis Presley’s blockbuster “In the Ghetto.” The two songs appeared within three … Continue reading →
