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The Graham Album Review #2225

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John McCutcheon: Field of Stars

(Appalseed Records, as broadcast on WVIA-FM 1/22/2025)

The recent biopic about Bob Dylan could well have the positive effect of renewing interest in folk music to perhaps a new generation. For some, the 1960s were the period of folk music, and thus making it of historical interest. But there are artists still making the music, telling stories or making protests in song, usually strumming an acoustic guitar. While some younger artist are emerging, one of the most prolific and outstanding contemporary practitioners of the art is John McCutcheon, who has just released his 45th album, called Field of Stars.

John McCutcheon is about one generation removed from the pioneers of the 1960s, though his previous album was a joint recording with one of the iconic 1960s folksingers, Tom Paxton, who epitomizes the tradition of weaving into song, topics ranging from history to political protest to humor. John McCutcheon has been doing that kind of this for about fifty hears now, since the 1970s. He has done children’s albums and theme-based projects, delivered in his direct articulate poetic style, performed with his rich baritone voice. One of his best-known songs was the historically based Christmas in the Trenches about a spontaneous Christmas truce during the first World War.

McCutcheon’s new album got its start when he had created a batch of songs, and was getting ready to record, when COVID hit. Being the prolific songwriter he is, and being isolated by the pandemic, McCutcheon turned out a whole series of songs relevant to the situation and released them on his album Cabin Fever in 2020. He followed that up with Bucket List the following year, and then the collaboration with Paxton on the album Together in 2023.

Now McCutcheon has been able to go back and record the songs that he created before the pandemic. He writes that at the time, he had lined up the musicians and booked sessions and when it all stopped with the pandemic lockdown. The new album features a typical cross-section of songs on different topics, though the pandemic does not directly enter into it. Instead McCutcheon mines history as he has so often done throughout his career, touching on a refugee ship during World War II, labor strikes in the coal mines, floods, and baseball figures, and he also reflects on his own age, having turned 70.

He is joined on the album by some notable figures from the folk and bluegrass world, including fiddler Stuart Duncan, mandolinist and vocalist Tim O’Brien, pianist Jon Caroll, bassist JT Brown, banjo man Cory Walker, along with bluegrass vocalist Claire Lynch and singer-songwriter Carrie Newcomer on backing vocals. The added personnel and the arrangements are more orchestrated than on McCutcheon’ls last couple of solo albums.

Opening is one of the more positive songs on the album, called Here a lesson on appreciating what you have. <<>>

The title track, Field of Stars, is about walking a 1000-year old traditional pilgrimage called the Camino de Santiago, spanning France and Spain. McCutchen says he intends to walk it in 2025, but imagines what it’s like from the perspective of two very different pilgrims, one of whom had passed away before he could make the trip, but whose ashes were carried by the other. Carrie Newcomer adds her vocals. <<>>

McCutcheon is a long-time baseball fan, and he has written several songs about the sport. The new album features a piece called The Hammer written after the death of baseball great Hank Aaron. <<>>

The floods that hit eastern Kentucky in 2022 were the inspiration for song called Hell or High Water. Since then, of course, there has been the climate-related flooding in North Carolina and elsewhere. <<>>

McCutcheon ventures into history again on Field of Stars with a song called MS St. Louis a ship that carried Jewish refugees from Germany and which was repeatedly denied permission to land. It’s a good example of where history can provide a lesson for the current day with political figures spewing xenophobia and anti-immigrant demagoguery. <<>>

A song called At the End of the Day is a little less weighty in its subject matter, it’s a kind of celebration of the firing up of the continent’s largest wood kiln. <<>>

A rather rare autobiographical song from McCutcheon takes a whimsical turn. Too Old To Die Young. He says he wrote it for his 70th birthday, saying “because no one else would.” <<>>

McCutcheon again turns to history in perhaps the most educational song on the album, if you will. It’s called Redneck, and it explains that the now-derogatory term was once used to describe striking miners in West Virginia, who wore red bandanas to identify themselves. <<>>

The generous 14-song, 65-minute album ends with what seems quite appropriate, a song called Blessing. McCutcheon explains that he likes to say table grace at meals, and says he wrote this for one his songwriting camps. He is joined by a vocal chorus group called Windborne for a proper prayerful atmosphere. <<>>

Now in his 70s, with a 50 year career as a folksinger, John McCutcheon remains at the top of his gane on his new 45th album Field of Stars. It’s the epitome of a classic folksinger album with stories, history, philosophy, and words of advice woven into melodic songs, with some sing-along choruses, performed in a classic acoustic setting, joined some first-rate backing musicians. McCutcheon sticks to his tried and true modus operandi, but does not fail to come up with worthwhile, engaging music throughout.

Our grade for audio quality is close to an “A” with a respectful treatment of the acoustic instruments, and McCutcheon’s rich baritone being given a warm sound.

Folk music has seen some varying degrees of interest over the years, but it has never gone away. We seem to be in for another revival of interest in it. With his half century career, John McCutcheon has become of the deans of the genre, but he remains one of today’s great voices, literally and figuratively, on his new album.

(c) Copyright 2025 George D. Graham. All rights reserved.
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This page last updated January 26, 2025