The live music scene on a regional basis seems to be dominated by tribute bands, groups who attempt to recreate the music of some famous band. Everywhere you go, it seems that live music venues are increasingly booking tribute bands, rather than original artists. While it seems to attract live audiences, that sort of things just does not work on record, when the original recordings by the emulated band are readily available. But there have been some interesting projects, often put together by record companies as anthologies of different interpretations of the songs of a particular artist or band. Or you can pick someone obscure but influential, and cast some light on that artist. And that’s what we have this week, an outstanding new recording by veteran blues and pop singer Maria Muldaur, paying tribute to a musical mentor of hers who proved to be not only one to help Ms. Muldaur’s early career, but is an interesting and lesser-known figure in the blues world, Victoria Spivey. The album is called One Hour Mama.

Ms. Muldaur met Victoria Spivey towards the end of the latter’s career, and Ms. Spivey became an advocate, serving as a catalyst to encourage the Jim Kweskin Jug Band to hire the young Maria D’Amato, who would then go on to marry guitarist Geoff Muldaur. Another artist Ms. Spivey advocated for was Bob Dylan when he first came to New York.

Victoria Spivey was born in 1906, and began performing professionally in her teens, doing mainly blues. But she had a fascinating multi-faceted career as a blues singer, having a hit in the 1920s, and then went on to be a staff composer for a publishing company; was half of a vaudeville duo with a dancer; and later launched her own record label, called Spivey Records, which released a fair amount of music from the early 1960s folk scene. She also had a part in a Hollywood movie, the first with an all African American cast, and wrote as a jazz critic. She continued working and advocating for up-and-coming artists until her death in 1976.

Maria Muldaur has likewise had an interesting career, with her role in the Jim Kweskin Jug Band in the mid 1960s, and then her big hit Midnight at the Oasis from 1973. Over the years she has long a series of albums, most of them blues-oriented, often with a distinct New Orleans tinge. Now at age 82, Maria Muldaur undertook this as a kind of labor of love, paying tribute to Ms. Spivey, performing some of the songs Spivey wrote, along with a few old-time blues songs that were part of Spivey’s repertoire. Ms. Muldaur was joined by three different backing bands, James Dapogny’s Chicago Jazz Band, recorded in Michigan; Tuba Skinny, recorded in New Orleans; and a group headed by saxophonist Johnny Bones, from Berkeley, California. The instrumentation is all acoustic, similar to pre-World War II blues recordings, but the arrangements are as tasteful as they are authentic. Perhaps the most remarkable part of the album is Ms. Muldaur herself, at age 82 sounding not the least bit diminished as a vocalist. She has always had a bit of gruffness to her delivery, but her voice has remained pretty much the same, just as strong and bluesy as she as 50 years ago. She is also joined on the album by two other veteran performers with half-century-plus careers, Elvin Bishop and Taj Mahal.

Opening is My Handy Man written by Andy Razaf, and typical of the double entendre laced blues songs of 1920s and 30s. <<>>

The track featuring Elvin Bishop is a Lonnie Johnson song called What Makes You Act Like That with the smaller West Coast band, featuring jazz pianist David K. Matthews; and Danny Caron on guitar, a veteran performer who worked with the late Charles Brown. <<>>

The first of the songs by Victoria Spivey is a great minor-key blues called Don’t Love No Married Man, featuring the same backing band as the previous track. <<>>

Another tune by Spivey is Dreaming Of You an old-fashioned Tin Pan Alley-style love song. <<>>

Featuring the New Orleans group Tuba Skinny is Organ Grinder Blues by Clarence Williams. The brass arrangement gives it an authentic pre-World-War II sound. <<>>

The title track One Hour Mama features the larger ensemble. It’s one of the highlights of the album, with a great performance by Ms. Muldaur, and the typically suggestive lyrics. <<>>

Another of the songs by Victoria Spivey takes a direction more like 1920s jazz. Funny Feathers again featured the Tuba Skinny band. <<>>

Taj Mahal makes his guest appearance on another old-fashioned sounding song called Gotta Have What It Takes also co-written by Victoria Spivey. It’s a fun lover’s spat. <<>>

With 43 solo albums to her name, over a close to 60 year recording career, at age 82, Maria Muldaur has made I think one of the best albums of her life on One Hour Mama paying a great tribute to one of her mentors, Victoria Spivey, and sounding as good as she ever has. The album has the air of a loving tribute, and the authentic arrangements are real and heartfelt, and not just an attempt to be retro. The three separate all-acoustic backing groups, and notable guest vocalists make for a varied sound, but it all works very well.

Our grade for audio quality is close to an “A” for clean authentic sound, and resisting the temptation to sound like an old-time lo-fi recording.

In the past I have observed that the blues, along with jazz, is one of the forms of music in which performers can get better with age. Maria Muldaur has done that in a stellar way on her new album.

(c) Copyright 2025 George D. Graham. All rights reserved.
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<<>> indicates audio excerpt played in produced radio review

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