Rock Island Grange cover

Rock Island Grange

Foghorn Stringband

Album · 2018 · Self-released

Rock Island Grange is the ninth album by the Foghorn Stringband, self-released in 2018. It was recorded live over three days at the Orcas Grange, a historic hall on Orcas Island in Washington State where mandolinist and fiddler Caleb Klauder grew up, by Bruce Harvie. The sessions grew out of a December 2016 tour of the Pacific Northwest, when the band played the Grange Hall and Klauder asked Harvie, whose bootleg tapes document the hall’s performance history, to record a mix of old and new material.

The band is Klauder on mandolin and fiddle, Reeb Willms on guitar, Stephen “Sammy” Lind on fiddle and banjo, and Nadine Landry on bass; all four sing. The 19 tracks include the Carter Family songs “Lonesome Valley,” “Give Me the Roses” and “Lonesome Homesick Blues,” Hazel Dickens’s “Only the Lonely,” the Cajun two-step “Mon Vieux Wagon,” the ballads “Rose Connolly” and “Pretty Fair Miss Out in the Garden,” and fiddle tunes including “Grigsby’s Hornpipe” and “Ridin’ in an Old Model T,” which the Dixie Ramblers recorded in 1937. “Train on the Island” was learned from Dirk Powell, “The Rose Waltz” comes from the Nebraska fiddler Bob Walters, and Willms learned “Ain’t Got Time” from Laurel Bliss. “Going Home,” by Klauder, is the only original.

The CD booklet carries extensive notes on the source of every tune, according to a review in Lonesome Highway.

Tracklist

  1. 1 Reuben’s Train Source Recording Traditional · key Eb · 143 bpm 3:34
  2. 2 Rose in the Mountain / Tennessee Girls 4:33
  3. 3 Pretty Fair Miss Out in the Garden alt version 3:16
  4. 4 Grigsby's Hornpipe 2:42
  5. 5 The Violet and the Rose 3:16
  6. 6 Lonesome Homesick Blues alt version 2:34
  7. 7 Natural Bridge Blues 2:24
  8. 8 Ain’t Got Time Source Recording Buford Abner · key C · 131 bpm 2:04
  9. 9 Banks of Old Tennessee / Kennesaw Mountain Rag 3:19
  10. 10 Only The Lonely alt version 3:47
  11. 11 Jake's Got the Bellyache 2:02
  12. 12 Mon Vieux Wagon 1:51
  13. 13 Ridin' in an Old Model T 1:54
  14. 14 Lonesome Valley 3:06
  15. 15 Train on the Island alt version 2:21
  16. 16 Going Home 2:46
  17. 17 Give Me the Roses 3:05
  18. 18 Rose Connolly 3:26
  19. 19 The Rose Waltz 4:01

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