Eric Bibb: philosopher, storyteller, a treasure to cherish
By David McGee
LIVE AT THE SCALA THEATRE, STOCKHOLM
Eric Bibb
Stony Plain
LIVE FROM THE NORTHERN PLAINS
Jennifer Lynn & The Groove Revival
J&R Collective
LIVE IN THE PARLOUR
Christine Santelli & Heather Hardy
In the press materials accompanying the release of his new live album, recorded at the Scala Theatre in Stockholm, Eric Bibb is referred to as “more than a blues troubadour—he is a storyteller and philosopher.” That claim is borne out with every note played, every lyric sung at Stockholm’s Scala Theatre on the night Bibb performed there in 2022. Something else is also apparent in the authority of Bibb’s performances; in the depth of feeling with which he invests every one of the 10 songs here (half of them Bibb originals, the other half being Bibb arrangements of traditional blues and folk tunes plus covers of blues chestnuts by Lead Belly and the Mississippi Sheiks’ Walter Vinson); in his obvious connection to his audience and they to him; in the palpable integrity he exudes as an artist fully invested in the messages he delivers—in these aspects Eric Bibb is picking up the mantle Harry Belafonte wore with authority during his entire career. In fact, the Lead Belly tune, “Bring Me Little Water, Sylvie,” a tune Lead Belly wrote in 1935, based on the memory of his uncle hollering to his wife Sylvie to bring him water while he was plowing the field, was once a Belafonte showcase moment. Finally released in 1946, Lead Belly’s “Sylvie” has since been covered by a host of household names including Bob Dylan, the Weavers, the Spinners, skiffle king Lonnie Donegan, even Bonanza’s Pernell Roberts (Eric also recorded a version with his folk singer father Leon Bibb) but most notably by Belafonte, whose 1955 recording with the Norman Luboff Choir limned the gospel underpinning of Lead Belly’s lyrical cry. So does Eric Bibb’s version lean on Belafonte’s spiritual foundation in a gentle arrangement lead by Bibb’s tender acoustic guitar supported by brush drums and world music atmospherics provided by kora and fiddle.
‘Goin’ Down the Road Feeling’ Bad,’ Eric Bibb, from Live at the Scala Theatre
Like “Sylvie,” the other nine songs here are true to Bibb’s philosophical, storytelling nature in exploring the human condition in various manifestations. With the sensitive backing of a group of Swedish musicians and a string quartet, Bibb opens with a strutting rendition of “Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad,” with tasty harmonica, fiddle and pedal steel solos summoning both the singer’s anguished feelings and the triumph of his determination to break free of his misery. A more cautious approach to better days informs the dirge-like take on Walter Vinson’s “Things is ‘Bout Coming My Way,” with the shadow trailing the singer’s efforts supplied by brooding solos via upright bass, harmonica and a wailing pedal steel, all of which lend an air of uncertainty to the lyrical assertion “after all my hard travelin’/things ‘bout coming my way.”
‘Silver Spoon,’ an Eric Bibb original, from Live at the Scala Theatre
‘Rosewood,’ Eric Bibb’s recounting of the 1923 racial massacre in a small Florida town, from Live at the Scala Theatre
Amidst these songs addressing resilience and self-affirmation Bibb offers a bracing, and beautiful, song of, essentially, thanksgiving in his finger-picked gem “Along the Way,” in which he matter of factly advises, “Take the time to bless the ones who done you wrong/what won’t kill you makes you strong/take some time to bless your friends and family every day/take the time to look at what you learned along the way,” a litany of graciousness that also includes “take the time to give yourself a pat on the back…” From his 2014 Blues People album (a moving, broad brush examination of the African-American experience from slavery to the Civil Rights movement), Bibb offers his own “Silver Spoon,” a stark at least semi-autobiographical portrait of a blues troubadour’s trials and tribulations as he made his way into the world and to a place he could call home, with the “silver spoon” of the title clearly being a symbol of high irony in light of the travails enumerated herein. Also from Blues People, one of his monumental story songs, “Rosewood,” the hushed account of the horrific racial massacre in a little Florida town in 1923, serves as an object lesson for our own times, when the country is finally coming to grips with Rosewood, Tulsa’s Greenwood and other murderous events springing from racial intolerance.
‘Things is About Comin’ My Way,’ the Walter Vinson tune featured on Eric Bibb’s Live at the Scala Theatre
In true Bibb fashion the artist winds up the festivities largely on upbeat notes: his “River Blues” (from his 2000 album Get Onboard) another sotto-voce, gracefully fingerpicked ode, suggests taking the temperature down—“please don’t preach/sometimes we can agree to disagree”—in transforming what seems to be a plea for reconciliation with a loved one to a larger message of tolerance and empathy on a grander scale: “We need a little time/to think about nothin’, nothin’ at all/let’s go to the river, listen to the sound/of the water fall.” This is followed by a plaintive reading of “500 Miles,” the penultimate tune preceding the big finish, a warm reading of the traditional “Mole in the Ground,” which has been traced back to Bascom Lamar Lunsford’s 1928 recording for Brunswick and most famously interpolated by Bob Dylan on “Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again” on Blonde on Blonde. Its fanciful verses about the singer wishing he could take on other forms—a mole in the ground, a tree in the woods, “a babe in my mama’s arms”—in order to find satisfaction, safety or fulfillment otherwise denied him in his present state have been widely and wildly interpreted and misinterpreted over the years; but here, in a rootsy, backwoods arrangement, it’s akin to a welcome exhale at the close of this journey Bibb has taken us on, with the entrance and exit of various acoustic stringed instruments exuding relaxed reflection and thoughtful consideration of mores and values as life goes on outside the song. Belafonte usually wound up his live shows on such a note, so did Pete Seeger, so did Harry Belafonte, and Eric Bibb has long been following that same humanistic path. Like the artist himself, philosopher and storyteller, his live album is a treasure to cherish.
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Let’s all concede the improbability of anyone topping Gregg Allman singing “Midnight Rider” and “Whipping Post.” At the same time, be open enough to hear muscular-voiced blues singer Jennifer Lynn throw her full soul into both numbers with the powerhouse backing of the Groove Revival quartet and with the result being you hearing the tunes with new ears. Both songs are featured among the 10 tracks on the superb Live From the Northern Plains. A no-nonsense and unflagglingly vulnerable vocalist, Lynn’s every note comes from an honest place, free from even a scintilla of Gregg affect, to the point where it simply soars into its own stratosphere on both numbers. The impact of her performance is further deepened by the rhythm section’s indefatigable drive as guitarist Richard Torrance divests himself of two searing, merciless lead guitar sorties enhancing the dramatic narrative of “Midnight Rider” and the ferocity of desperation and despair articulated in “Whipping Post.” While we’re handing out plaudits, let’s tip our hats to Barb Jiskra for her robust, humming keyboard underpinning the vocals and solos.
‘Whipping Post,’ Jennifer Lynn and the Groove Revival, from Live From the Northern Plains
Recorded at the Belle Mehus Auditorium in Bismark, North Dakota, on this band’s home turf, the live set includes three other covers and five original tunes from Lynn-Torrance (with drummer Jim Anderson collaborating with his bandmates on “I Hope We Make a Change,” a stomping, ominous slab of late-‘60s-style hard rock messaging (think of early Zep or Grand Funk, when both were more supple than in their later superstar incarnations, earnestly declaiming for a better world ahead). The other covers include a lowdown, howling take on Bonnie Raitt’s (via Chris Smither) “Love Me Like a Man,” with Jiskra working all manner of bluesy commentary on the 88s in backing Lynn’s fierce, take-no-prisoners vocal; a Southern soul-drenched take on John Fogerty’s “Long As I Can See the Light” with a decided gospel feel surfacing in its arrangement and lead vocal; and a potent rendering of “House of the Rising Sun” that bears some semblance to the Animals’ classic (at least in the ominous ambience and certainly in Jiskra’s evocation of Alan Price’s pulsating support on organ). Once again Lynn goes up against a near-sacred vocal performance and establishes her own anguished outpouring as distinguished from Eric Burdon’s, to which Torrance adds his own explosive, red-hot workout on guitar.
‘I Hope We Make a Change,’ Jennifer Lynn and the Groove Revival, from Live From the Northern Plains
‘You Can Take It All,’ Jennifer Lynn and the Groove Revival, from Live From the Northern Plains
Lynn and company demonstrate their nimble, propulsive side on the original songs, opening with a strutting “Gypsy Soul” (the title track from the band’s acckauned second release, a 2023 EP) in which the singer admits to trading the stability of domestic life and possible financial stability for lure of rock ‘n’ roll’s calling, confessions Torrance expressers in his freewheeling guitar solos. On a slow, grinding blues steeped in heartbreak, “Going ‘Round in Circles,” Lynn belts out her heartache in lacerating fashion; “Low Down Dirty Shame” is a fine rollin’ and tumblin’ report from a failed relationship complete with a twin-guitar attack (“it’s a lowdown dirty game that we play/nobody wins but we play just the same/it’s a lowdown dirty shame…”), and the set closer, the gospel-tinged “You Can Take It All,” taking things home with a final message of hope and reconciliation, beautifully and tenderly rendered by Lynn at her most emphatically persuasive with Torrance lending additional weight to the message with his assertive backing vocals. “I know I’m not perfect but know that I’ll try,” Lynn confesses, “it might be the best thing that we ever find/I know that you’re scared but baby, so am I/don’t let this slip away,” with the final phrase ascending triumphantly and leaving the audience with an uplifting message at the end of a heartfelt journey in song on a certain night in Bismark, North Dakota. This show belongs on the road.
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The guitar-fiddle duo as a full-time pursuit has been an historical rarity and pretty much confined to history at this point. The jazz world can point to giants such as Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli as the principal soloists in the Quinette du Hot Club de France (1934-1939), whose efforts followed the pioneering work of single-string virtuoso guitarist Eddie Lang and groundbreaking jazz violinist Joe Venuti, who recorded from 1926 to 1933, their collaboration ending when Lang died following a tonsillectomy from which he never awoke. In the blues world, the guitar-fiddle duo is almost the sole province of the Mississippi Sheiks in the early 1930s. Of course there have been guitar-fiddle duos popping up since then, but these tend to be one-off or side efforts of artist otherwise engaged in band or solo pursuits and a good many of these are pop- and classical-oriented projects.
A native of upstate New York and long-time resident of Hoboken, NJ, Christine Santelli is a well-established blues artist who has expanded her audience beyond the tri-state area into other parts of the country where blues is welcomed but her meat and potatoes remains the venues in and around her home turf. She’s gained additional notice in recent years for Bettye Lavette having covered original Santeli tunes. In these pages, she’s been duly and properly celebrated for the astonishing growth in her songwriting over the years, with her 2012 singer-songwriter masterpiece, Dragonfly, a Deep Roots Album of the Year honoree, followed a mere one year later with a Deep Roots EP of the Year in the brilliant five-song stunner, Limelight ’69 complete with its towering closing track, “Closing Time,” a full band gem that manages to sound completely contemporary while evoking any number of great ‘50s R&B ballads (especially Smokey Robinson’s “I’ve Been Good to You”)with its alluring performance further enhanced by significant contributions courtesy the bluesy piano work by Brian Mitchell (of Levon Helm’s band) and another of many stellar, searing solos by Jason Green, simply one of the finest guitarists of his generation then and getting better with age.
In recent years, while still working with her band, Ms. Santelli has struck up a musical partnership with fiddler Heather Hardy, who comes by way of the punk band the False Prophets, then the Sam Taylor band, then her own Li’l Mama Band, all which lead to her induction into the Arizona Blues Hall of Fame in 2000. Ms. Hardy, who also sits in with Ms. Santelli’s full band on occasion, brings the kind of deep musical vocabulary Ms. Santelli’s songs deserve, nay demand. The beautiful music they make together is captured in the set released as Live in the Parlour, the release of which came with a notice from Ms. Santelli of a new studio album being the works. Only one of the 12 songs here is a cover, it being a romp through the venerable “Iko Iko” that draws in the audience and gives room for Ms. Hardy to tear it up with some lively Cajun-flavored bow work. The remaining 11 tunes are Santelli originals, with the clear highlights being three tunes from Any Better Time, a towering entry from Tales From the Red Room and a gem from Limelight ’69, “Poor Me,” originally intended for Dragonfly but ultimately excised. These were all band arrangements in their original incarnations, but here they become intimate singer-songwriter performances that underscore the craftmanship informing the writing and the seamless way Ms. Hardy becomes a complementary voice to Ms. Santelli’s with her artfully and empathetically designed solos.
‘Good Day for a Hangin’,’ Christine Santelli and Heather Hardy, from Live in the Parlour
‘Guilty,’ Christine Santelli and Heather Hardy, from Live in the Parlour
You hear it immediately on the set opener, “Poor Me,” a murder ballad, in fact, but one with a sense of humor in the telling and an occasion for the first of many adventurous fiddle solos serving as table setters for the display Ms. Hardy delivers as the set unfolds, starting immediately with the following tune, “Lily’s Song,” also from Any Better Time. This touching ballad gently urging someone wounded in love to move on with strength and confidence—“You’re strong now, you know how/the sun has shown through the clouds/go find your way back home…”—finds Ms. Hardy crafting both a plaintive country-tinged solo, imbued with the soulful touch you might associate with Mark O’Connor, and adding a lovely harmony vocal to Ms. Santelli’s poignant reading. “Good Day for a Hangin’,” also from Any Better Time, is replete with a complex vocal–deliberate and probing, more hopeful and despairing all at once. The simply strummed guitar and the aching undercurrent transforming into anguished and bruising over the course of an extended fiddle solo—including a breathtaking sustained note near the end of it–elevates the tune to a whole other emotional plane than the album version offers. In “Guilty,” also from Any Better Time, the singer takes full, if chagrined, responsibility for the particulars of falling in love with a partner who flees in the night, leaving his wedding ring behind. As sanguine as the vocal seems at times, the fiddle tells another story—using a swooning wah-wah effect, Ms. Hardy coaxes tones and textures out of her instrument, all betraying the singer’s internal combustion. From Tales From the Red Room comes the powerful “She Wasn’t Wrong,” stripped down to guitar and fiddle and done at slightly more sedate pace than the recorded version, a decision that emphasizes the arrangement’s country feel even as the vocal, deliberate and measured, is rather cabaret-ish in a reportorial way and doubly haunting in its depiction of an aspiring female musician—referred to at one point as “this child”—who came to the city to pursue her dream, fell into and by dint of unwavering belief in herself rose above a bad scene that “turned her harder than stone.” That things seem to have worked out seems, in Ms. Santelli’s muted reading, less a triumph of self-determination than a mixed blessing, the details of which are not fully disclosed at song’s end. Again, the fiddle and the harmony vocal blend in dramatic subtext that suggests the shadow hanging over the protagonist remains, in some fashion.
‘She Wasn’t Wrong,’ Christine Santelli and Heather Hardy, from Live in the Parlour
‘Lily’s Song,’ Christine Santelli and Heather Hardy, from Live in the Parlour
Upbeat notes are supplied by the frisky song of empowerment, “Woman,” another occasion for some wah-wah fiddle atmospherics accompanying a freewheeling vocal. Similarly, the set closer, “I Rise,” another self-affirming missive, is driven by a swaggering, assured vocal and some borderline psychedelic effects courtesy the wah-wah violin (some may hear vestiges of It’s a Beautiful Day’s David LaFlamme in the jazzy improvised solo bearing some of “White Bird”’s avant flourishes). Other delights surface in “Lil’ Doggie,” in which the rarely heard Santelli falsetto surfaces, and in the noir-ish slow blues stomp of “Cadillac Delight” setting up its closing simple declarative declaration, “I’ll be damned if I’m accused of anything but being me,” delivered with assured swagger over Ms. Hardy’s sublime minimalist fiddling. Well, Live in the Parlour is many things, but it most certainly is Christine Santelli being Christine Santelli; and clearly, every time Santelli and Hardy take the stage the assembled faithful are blessed with an occasion to appreciate a guitar-fiddle duo working not for novelty’s sake but rather in the spirit of the Mississippi Sheiks in leaving listeners with something meaningful to ponder after the last notes have dissolved into the night’s ether.
