Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard: Who's That Knocking?

Folkways Records – FTS 31055

Format: Vinyl, LP, Album
Country: US
Released: 1965
Genre: Folk, World, & Country
Style: Bluegrass
[Tracklist]
A1 Walkin' In My Sleep (2:00)
A2 Can't You Hear Me Calling (3:12)
A3 Darling Nellie Across The Sea (2:15)
A4 Difficult Run (1:30)
A5 Coal Miner's Blues (2:40)
A6 Gabriel's Call (2:12)
A7 Just Another Broken Heart (2:40)
A8 Take Me Back To Tulsa (2:13)
B1 Who's That Knocking? (2:52)
B2 Cowboy Jim (2:00)
B3 Long Black Veil (3:20)
B4 Lee Highway Blues (1:55)
B5 Lover's Return (2:45)
B6 Gonna Lay Down My Old Guitar (2:53)
B7 I Hear A Sweet Voice Calling (3:05)
[Credits]
Hazel Dickens (bass/vocals) Alice Gerrard (guitar/vocals) Lamar Grier (banjo) Chubby Wise (fiddle) David Grisman (mandolin)
Producer and Mastering Engineer: Peter K. Siegel, Sleeve Notes: Bill Vernon, Liner Notes: Neil V. Rosenberg and James Deutsch, Designer: Cooley Design Lab, Cover Photo: Dorothea Lange
[Notes]
Initially released in 1965, Who's That Knocking? is the first album by Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard. With this trailblazing record, Hazel and Alice shattered the glass ceiling of male-dominated bluegrass, which had typically relegated women to minor musical roles at best. Hazel and Alice’s hard-edged, soulful harmonies were firmly rooted in the older music traditions of the rural South. Their steadfast devotion to their powerful, driving style inspired generations of women in bluegrass, country music, and even punk. They are accompanied on this album by Chubby Wise, arguably the architect of bluegrass fiddling; David Grisman, whose mandolin improvisations changed the landscape of acoustic music; and Lamar Grier, who played banjo as a member of Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys in the 1960s. Unavailable on vinyl for decades, Who's That Knocking? was remastered in 2021 by its original producer Peter K. Siegel, and has been reissued with its original artwork and liner notes.

Strange Creek Singers

Arhoolie Records – 9003

Format: CD, Album, Reissue
Country: US
Released: 1997
Genre: Folk, World, & Country
Style: Bluegrass, Appalachian Music, Country, Hillbilly
[Tracklist]
01 When I Can Read My Titles Clear (2:13)
02 In the Pines (3:48)
03 Sunny Side of Life (2:19)
04 Poor Old Dirt Farmer (2:18)
05 Sally Ann (1:22)
06 I Truly Understand That You Love Another Man (2:29)
07 Old Black Choo Choo (2:39)
08 Today Has Been a Lonesome Day (3:16)
09 No Never No (4:11)
10 New River Train (2:55)
11 Get Acquainted Waltz (2:38)
12 Will the Circle Be Unbroken (3:41)
13 Black Lung (3:27)
14 Difficult Run (Pt. 2) (2:48)
[Credits]
Mike Seeger (mandolin/fiddle/banjo/guitar/autoharp/vocals) Hazel Dickens (bass/vocals) Tracy Schwarz (fiddle/guitar/dobro/vocals) Alice Gerrard (guitar/vocals) Lamar Grier (banjo)
Producer: Mike Seeger and Chris Strachwitz, Liner Notes: Richard K. Spottswood, Designer: Dix Bruce, Tom Diamant and Wayne Pope, Photographer: Betsy Siggins
[Notes]
Composed of Mike Seeger, Tracy Schwarz (two-thirds of the New Lost City Ramblers), Hazel Dickens, Alice Gerrard, and Lamar Grier, the Strange Creek Singers bring new life to hymnals and old-time country classics. Utilizing a combination of instrumental and vocal talent, the singers perform solo as well as in duets, trios, and quartets to bring a traditional country voice into the cities where four of them grew up. Of particular note is the song “Black Lung,” written and sung by Hazel Dickens and dedicated to her brothers, who were coal miners.

Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard – Won't You Come & Sing For Me?

Folkways Records – FTS 31034

Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Reissue
Country: US
Released: 1978
Genre: Folk, World, & Country
Style: Bluegrass
[Tracklist]
A1 I Just Got Wise (2:21)
A2 Please Mommy Please Stay Home with Me (3:05)
A3 They're at Rest Together (3:21)
A4 Sugar Tree Stomp (2:03)
A5 Memories of Mother & Dad (2:34)
A6 Train on the island (1:38)
B1 Won't You Come & Sing for Me (2:39)
B2 A Tiny Broken Heart (2:58)
B3 A Distant Land to Roam (2:56)
B4 John Henry (1:46)
B5 Weary Lonesome Blues (2:39)
B6 The One I Love is Gone (3:05)
[Credits]
Hazel Dickens (bass/vocals) Alice Gerrard (guitar/vocals) Fred Weisz (mandolin/bass vocals) David Grisman (guitar/baritone vocals) Lamar Grier (banjo) Billy Baker (fiddle) Mike Seeger (guitar)
[Notes]
Alice Gerrard's voice lifts and rises from the bottomless. And Hazel Dickens' vocal joins her in the chorus to affirm a unity through loneliness. Dickens, raised poor in the coal mining territory of West Virginia, and Gerrard, a classically trained singer approaching music from a rather more academic angle, were separated by a decade in age when they began running into each other in the lively folk scenes of Baltimore and Washington, D.C., in the '60s. They found that their voices meshed well and that they shared an eclectic approach to the music that they enjoyed singing.

Bill Monroe: Anthology

MCA Nashville / Decca 088 113 207-2

Format: 2 x CD, Compilation
Country: United States
Released: 2003
Genre: Folk, World, & Country
Style: Bluegrass
[Tracklist]
1-01 New Mule Skinner Blues (02:30)
1-02 My Little Georgia Rose (03:06)
1-03 Uncle Pen (02:45)
1-04 Raw Hide (02:36)
1-05 Kentucky Waltz (03:16)
1-06 When The Cactus Is In Bloom (02:04)
1-07 Get Down On Your Knees And Pray (03:01)
1-08 In The Pines (03:11)
1-09 Footprints In The Snow (02:40)
1-10 Walking In Jerusalem (02:00)
1-11 Get Up John (02:11)
1-12 On And On (02:47)
1-13 I'm Working On A Building (2:43)
1-14 Blue Moon Of Kentucky (02:08)
1-15 Roanoke (02:39)
1-16 Goodbye Old Pal (02:04)
1-17 Molly & Tenbrooks (02:22)
1-18 I'm Sitting On Top Of The World (02:18)
1-19 I Saw The Light (02:30)
1-20 Scotland (01:55)
1-21 Panhandle Country (02:05)
1-22 Gotta Travel On (02:34)
1-23 Big Mon (02:17)
1-24 Linda Lou (02:10)
1-25 Lonesome Road Blues (02:28)
2-01 Time Changes Everything (02:15)
2-02 I'm Going Back To Old Kentucky (02:23)
2-03 Toy Heart (02:15)
2-04 Live And Let Live (02:40)
2-05 Old Joe Clark (02:24)
2-06 Columbus Stockade Blues (03:05)
2-07 Drifting Too Far From The Shore (02:29)
2-08 Somebody Touched Me (02:32)
2-09 Jimmy Brown The Newsboy (02:26)
2-10 I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry (02:13)
2-11 Devil's Dream (02:24)
2-12 Highway Of Sorrow (02:22)
2-13 Roll On Buddy, Roll On (02:11)
2-14 (We're Going) Just Over In The Glory Land (02:23)
2-15 Fire On The Mountain (02:05)
2-16 The Long Black Veil (02:40)
2-17 I Wonder Where You Are Tonight (02:34)
2-18 Dusty Miller (02:19)
2-19 Midnight On The Stormy Deep (03:42)
2-20 Sally Goodin (03:15)
2-21 Walls Of Time (03:19)
2-22 I Haven't Seen Mary In Years (03:04)
2-23 With Body And Soul (03:06)
2-24 Walk Softly On This Heart Of Mine (02:35)
2-25 My Last Days On Earth (04:42)
[Credits]
Bill Monroe (mandolin/vocals) James Monroe (bass/guitar/vocals) Jimmy Martin (guitar/vocals) Carter Stanley (guitar/vocals) Edd Mayfield (guitar/vocals) Del McCoury (guitar/vocals) Jimmy Maynard (guitar/vocals) Franklin G. Buchanan (guitar/vocals) Roland White (guitar/vocals) Peter Rowan (guitar/vocals) Rudy Lyle (banjo/vocals) Charlie Cline (fiddle/ocals) Kenny Baker (vocals) Boudleaux Bryant (vocals) Milton Estes (vocals) Culley Holt (vocals) Arlene Hardin (vocals) Bobby Hardin (vocals) Cindy Nelson (vocals) Curtis Young (vocals) Carl Butler (guitar) Jack Cooke (guitar) Jimmy Elrod (guitar) Grady Martin (guitar) Norman Blake (guitar) Jackie Phelps (guitar) Jimmy Selph (guitar) Joe Stuart (banjo/fiddle/guitar) Hubert Davis (banjo) Joe Drumright (banjo) Tony Ellis (banjo) Lamar Grier (banjo) Lonnie Hoppers (banjo) Vic Jordan (banjo) Bill Keith (banjo) Don Lineberger (banjo) Curtis McPeake (banjo) Robert Lee Pennington (banjo) Don Stover (banjo) Rual Yarbrough (banjo) Sonny Osborne (banjo) Gordon Terry (fiddle/vocals) Vassar Clements (fiddle) Red Hayes (fiddle) Tommy Jackson (fiddle) Connie Ellisor (fiddle) Carl Gorodetzky (fiddle) Bobby Hicks (fiddle) Byron Berline (fiddle) George Binkley III (fiddle) Richard Greene & Beryl Marriott (fiddle) Dennis Molchan (fiddle) Hal Smith (fiddle) Dale Potter (fiddle) Red Stanley (fiddle) Merle "Red" Taylor (fiddle) Horace "Benny" Williams (fiddle) Tommy Williams Jr. (fiddle) Roy Christensen (cello) Joel Price (bass/vocals) Ernie Newton (bass/vocals) Mark Hembree (bass) Howard Watts (bass) Farris Coursey (drums) Joe Zinkan (bass)
Producer: Owen Bradley, Paul Cohen, Harry Silverstein and Walter Haynes, Photographer: Les Leverett, Designer: Mike Fink, Liner Notes: Mary Katherine Aldin, Engineer: Gavin Lurssen
[Notes]
So much has been said about the founding father of bluegrass music that it would be nice if there was an all-encompassing collection of Bill Monroe's music to accompany the legend. Although the almost-correctly titled Anthology comes close, there is still a wealth of Columbia and RCA-Victor recordings missing from this Decca-centric collection, which runs chronologically from 1950 to 1969 (with one final track from 1981). Unfortunately, this means that the classic lineup of Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs, with fiddler Chubby Wise and bassist Howard Watts, is not represented. Still, bluegrass luminaries Vassar Clements, Jimmy Martin, Kenny Baker, Del McCoury, Peter Rowan, and many others, all drifted in and out of the Blue Grass Boys during their twenty-some years, and make appearances on classic tracks like "Sally Goodin," "Uncle Pen," "Blue Moon of Kentucky," and "New Mule Skinner Blues." All told, this may be the perfect collection of Monroe's work for Decca, but it falls only slightly short of being the Bill Monroe Anthology.-- AllMusic Review by Zac Johnson