Find one living room. Add two fabulous musicians. Toss in a passel of enthusiastic music lovers. That is the recipe that came together this week for a lovely house concert with The Honey Dewdrops. The living room was mine. I hope it is the first of many such gatherings.
Coming from their home in Charlottesville, Virginia, husband and wife duo Laura Wortman and Kagey Parrish found themselves in Dalton, Georgia for the first time. With their impeccably tight harmonies and instrumentation, they took us through tunes from their two albums, If the Sun Will Shine and their latest, These Old Roots. Having reviewed the first of their albums and caught their performance in Chattanooga last fall, there were three surprises in store for me. The first surprise - Laura playing banjo on their opening tune, "Tell Me Darling," written by their friends Anne and Pete Sibley. The Honey Dewdrops play beautiful Huss & Dalton instruments and the addition of banjo to their repertoire was a treat.
The first set was mostly comprised of songs from If the Sun Will Shine. You can read my review of that album and those beautiful tunes below. That brings me to my second surprise. Kagey remembered "When Was the War" is one of my favorites and they had not played it in Chattanooga. They put it in the set and I got to hear it live. It's a poignant, haunting lyric about how survivors of war also suffer loss, "When was the war I know, I know/that's where my husband was called to go/Didn't need no priest, wasn't laid down below/but he didn't come home the boy I used to know."
For the second set The Honey Dewdrops dished up favorite tunes from These Old Roots. One of those is "Amaranth," inspired by the flowering plant of the same name. "Loves-Lies-Bleeding" is the common name, describing the long-lasting brilliant red flowers bending to the ground and makes an equally brilliant lyrical analogy to life and love. "Test of Time" is another favorite and shows the duo's ability to blend their young voices and excellent picking into a very traditional, timeless, sound.
My third surprise was a fantastic rendition of the Beatles classic "Across the Universe" featuring Kagey's mandolin. Those attending the house concert were enthralled as they touched on the gospel feel of These Old Roots with "Sweet Heaven." The Honey Dewdrops closed the evening with everyone singing along on the well-worn hymn, "Farther Along."
Great recipe! I'll take a second helping please!
For more on The Honey Dewdrops see the review below and visit these links:
http://www.thehoneydewdrops.com/
The Honey Dewdrops, If the Sun Will Shine
Review by Cheryl Phipps, May 5, 2010
The Honey Dewdrops new album, If the Sun Will Shine is love at first strum. Husband and wife duo Laura Wortman and Kagey Parrish have created a collection of beautiful music, with rich guitar and mandolin instrumentation, and emotive lyrics, often reminiscent of the past, sometimes seeming to be from a lifetime ago.
Opening with "Bluest Blue Eyes", If the Sun Will Shine immediately demonstrates Wortman's and Parrish's musical flair and harmonic vocal styles. Here is a story of bad love lost, but which proves that one can say "so long trouble, so long."
The opener importantly illustrates that this is not just an album of sad songs. These songs are about the rhythm of life. "Don't Leave Me Here" offers the most poignant and descriptive picture of that rhythm in its chorus, "On the table a book of dreams, the colors all faded / Country radio from the bedroom, cracklin' low/ On her hands the cracks and wrinkles are a map / To the places she knows and is bound to go."
Laura Wortman's voice has the quintessential southern tone, bringing the songs to life true to the character of the lyrics. Southern listeners will recognize Wortman's voice, as easily as their neighbor's or cousin's, when hearing "Wandering Boy" and "Stomping Ground."
In an album of exquisite music, "Stomping Ground" delivers some of the best. Listening to it, one forgets it is only Wortman's guitar and Parrish's mandolin producing the fullness of the instruments' sound. If the Sun Will Shine was performed live and mixed in a 1920's barn. The acoustical space and warmth of the barn is evident in the finished recording.
"1918" is a delightful interlude of picking, showcasing Kagey Parrish on the mandolin and recalling that bygone period after the turn of the century. Two other tracks take the listener back to a past era.
Though written with World War II in mind, "When Was the War," is just as relative to the current war as the one in 1861, as The Honey Dewdrops blend their old soul sound with a message that stands the test of time. The finger picking of "Fly Away Free" is a perfect throwback to old style mountain folk music.
Though written with World War II in mind, "When Was the War," is just as relative to the current war as the one in 1861, as The Honey Dewdrops blend their old soul sound with a message that stands the test of time. The finger picking of "Fly Away Free" is a perfect throwback to old style mountain folk music.
In the lyrics of "Without Tears" the melancholy surfaces, but the music is so pretty that the song is not mournful. This is the folk music of the mountains, telling the stories which connect us through shared experiences of love lost and loneliness. The album's title lyric is here, "Ain't got nobody to wake me, to see if the sun will shine."
Wortman's and Parrish's outstanding harmonies and enchanting music shine on "How We Used to Be" and "Nowhere to Stand." "Petals" finishes out the 11 original tracks, with a lovely metaphor of days slipping away and letting go of the past.
With their engaging musical style and captivating lyrics, it is no wonder that The Honey Dewdrops are already winning awards such as their first place on A Prairie Home Companion's "People in their Twenties Talent Show" in March 2008.
When the rhythm of life has you in a sad place, or if you just want to listen to beautiful stories and music, give If the Sun Will Shine a spin and you will find yourself singing, "so long trouble, so long."
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