Tony Trischka takes his banjo and a band of friends to create an ambitious song cycle set in America's Civil War. William Dart looks at Shall We Hope - a fascinating project that, not surprisingly, touches on our own times.
Tony Trischka Photo: Abbieduquette, ex Wikimedia Commons CC4.0
Tony Trischka has been making his many banjos speak with the utmost eloquence for over 50 years, ever since he was with the Down City Ramblers in 1965.
His 2014 album, Great Big World cemented his pre-eminance in the field, along with his almost frighteningly unpredictable eclecticism.
He now returns with a new set that’s well worth seven years of patient waiting. Titled Shall we Hope, it’s a bluegrass song-cycle, admittedly with some Celtic trimmings. Its subject is the Civil War set in a Southern landscape and the man himself describes it as a dramatized listening experience, inviting us into the lives of characters from America’s past as they grapple with the dark realities of war and death, and the meaning of freedom.
Shall We Hope is a powerful piece of work, as brave as it is thoughtful. Trischka's greatest act of courage perhaps comes when he takes Walt Whitman’s "O Captain, My Captain!", the poet’s stirring ode to Abraham Lincoln, into the Land of Bluegrass.
Somehow, the tingling energy and zesty rush of this five-man combo of fiddle, banjo, guitar, mandolin and bass seem to suggest that brighter skies may lie ahead in 2021.
Music Details
'Song title' (Composer) – Performers
Album title
(Label)
'Sextet from Lucia di Lammermoor' (Donizetti arr Peabody) – Eddie Peabody
Eddie Peabody, Original Recordings from the 1920s and 30s, Vol 2
(Eddie Peabody, King of the Banjo)
'The Boatman's Dance' (Trad) – Tony Trischka, William Burroughs
World Turning
(Rounder)
'The Danny Thomas' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Great Big World
(Rounder)
'This Favoured Land' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'On the Mississippi' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'Carry Me over the Sea' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'I Know Moon-Rise' (Russell) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'Leaving this Lonesome Landscape' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'Big Round Top March/Drummer Boys' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'Christmas Cheer the Weary Day' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'Dearest Friend and Only Lover' (Trischka) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'Soldier's Song' (Trad) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
'Oh Captain, My Captain!' (Trischka, Whitman) – Tony Trischka
Shall We Hope
(Shefa)
