Rising Fawn Gathering is a 2009 CD from Norman and Nancy Blake, released on Plectrafone Records, the old-time country division of the Western Jubilee Recording Company. It is a joint project with the Irish group the Boys of the Lough and with James and Rachel Bryan. Wikipedia dates the recording to October 2007 and the release to 20 January 2009, and credits Norman and Nancy Blake as producers.
Norman Blake plays guitar, mandolin and dobro, and Nancy Blake guitar, mandolin, cello and mandola. James Bryan plays fiddle, Rachel Bryan guitar, fiddle and mandolin, and the Boys of the Lough members who appear are Malcolm Stitt on guitar, Brendan Begley on accordion, Cathal McConnell on flute and whistle, and Dave Richardson on concertina and mandolin. The program pairs American material such as “The Sweet Sunny South” and “While the Band Is Playing Dixie” with hornpipes, marches and other tunes, among them “The Stockton & Redesdale Hornpipes,” “The Teelin March” and “Derry So Fair.”
The title is the Georgia community where the Blakes live: Rising Fawn, in Dade County. A 2024 press release for another album, Pilgrimage to Rising Fawn, describes sessions recorded at the Blakes’ home there. Norman Blake, who married Nancy in 1975 and was inducted into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2022, already had a Rising Fawn connection in his band name: in 1979 he and Nancy added fiddler James Bryan to form the Rising Fawn String Ensemble.
Tracklist
- 1 The Sweet Sunny South alt version 5:54
- 2 O'Connell's Trip to Parliament / The Twin Katies 2:51
- 3 Castleberry's March 3:11
- 4 Da Unst Bridal March 2:59
- 5 The Stockton & Redesdale Hornpipes 3:29
- 6 The El Paso Waltz 2:58
- 7 The Bonny Bunch of Roses 5:57
- 8 Joe Bane's / The Gypsy Princess 4:08
- 9 The Teelin March 3:46
- 10 Eamon An Chnoic (Ned of the Hill) 3:02
- 11 While the Band Is Playing Dixie 4:59
- 12 Derry so Fair 6:02
