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Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds
Singing It All Back Home
(Dusty Willow)
★★★★
THE MUSIC of the Appalachian mountains has its origins in many old English and Scottish folk songs which found their way across the Atlantic as a result of migration and this album, a collaboration between Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds of The Men They Couldn’t Hang, pays fitting tribute to that legacy.
Traditional opener I Must and Will Be Married is followed by new interpretations of classic folk songs like Hangman and Foggy Dew. But the highlight is the version of the tragic ballad Matty Groves, a near-perfect example of the art of storytelling in song with its tale of doomed love across the class divide.
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