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CD Review
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Songlines, CD Review >>
I stopped by Dirk Powell’s Cypress House studio near Parks, Louisiana, while this album was coming into being last spring. Bandleader Steve Riley explained that the title song, by fiddler David Greely, was intended to be a reference to “the domino effect that one generation has on the next”. This theme is borne out by the lustrous cover photograph, showing the five Playboys surrounded by extended familial and musical relations. They include veteran DL Menard, whose Cajun country & western-flavoured ‘La Vie D’un Vieux Garçon’ figures on the album’s song list, and Morris Ardoin, whose Creole music bloodline is represented here by an ‘Ardoin Medley’, harking back to Morris’ father Bois-Sec and Bois-Sec’s legendary cousin Amédé. There’s an infectious medley of tunes by the late Denis McGee, with Riley putting aside his handsomely decorative accordion style (learned from Marc Savoy) to second Greely on fiddle, as he also does on Varise Conner’s ‘Mazurka’. Unique in origin and emotional appeal are the mournful ‘Marie Mouri’, set to a poem by an antebellum slave, and ‘Les Clefs De La Prison’, transferred to three-part a capella male harmony by Greely and Linda Handelsman from the adolescent female solo by Elita Hoffpauir on a 1934 recording by John and Alan Lomax.
In their original contributions to the album, the Playboys showcase their considerable instrumental and vocal skill and render the disc as superbly suited to a Saturday evening dance as to a Sunday evening contemplation. Wilson Savoy, son of Marc, makes use of the DualDisc DVD format – a welcome bonus – to visually document a Playboys dance in progress, as well as capturing some studio performances and testimony by the Playboys about their heritage.
-- Jeff Kaliss 02/01/06 >> go there
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