Folk Songs of the Hills is Merle Travis's foundational 1947 album, one of the most important records in the history of American roots music. Travis, raised in Muhlenberg County, Kentucky, assembled eight songs about the coal mining life he knew from childhood — 'Dark as a Dungeon' and 'Sixteen Tons' among them — creating in one session a body of material that would be performed, recorded, and anthologized for generations. The album demonstrated that working-class experience could be treated with literary seriousness in vernacular musical forms, a proposition that influenced the entire folk revival of the 1950s and 1960s. Folk Songs of the Hills is among the handful of American roots music recordings that genuinely altered the course of the tradition.
Tracklist
- 1 Nine Pound Hammer alt version 2:55
- 2 John Henry alt version 3:12
- 3 Sixteen Tons alt version 2:50
- 4 Dark as a Dungeon Source Recording 2:47
- 5 That's All 3:00
- 6 Over By Number Nine 3:08
- 7 I Am a Pilgrim alt version 2:32
- 8 Muskrat alt version 2:52
- 9 John Bolin 2:54
- 10 Possum Up A Simmon Tree 2:37
- 11 Barbara Allen 4:02
- 12 Lost John alt version 2:32