Best of the Vanguard Years

Ian & Sylvia | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (August 11, 1998)
• Original Release Date: August 11, 1998
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Vanguard Records
• ASIN: B000009NLP
• Also Available in: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #40,446 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Along with Gordon Lightfoot, the team of Ian Tyson and Sylvia Fricker represented the best that Canada had to offer during the folk boom of the early and mid- '60s. The duo's earthy voices and wraparound harmonies helped them become one of the most commercially successful '60s folk acts. And while they gained much attention for their interpretations of songs by the likes of Bob Dylan ("This Wheel's on Fire"), Joni Mitchell ("The Circle Game"), and the aforementioned Lightfoot ("Early Morning Rain"), it's their originals that remain evergreens 20-odd years after their mid-'70s split- up. To wit: Tyson's "Four Strong Winds" (covered memorably by Neil Young) and "Someday Soon" (a longtime staple of Judy Collins's repertoire), and Fricker's "You Were on My Mind" (a mid-'60s hit for the We Five). All of these, and plenty more, are found on this highly satisfying 25-song collection. --Billy Altman

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars music built to last, January 8, 1999

By 

Jerome Clark (Canby, Minnesota) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Best of the Vanguard Years (Audio CD)

Amazing how Ian and Sylvia's music, which some purists once foolishly dissed as too slick and commercial-sounding to pass the authenticity test, holds up more than three decades after the passing of the folk revival that brought them out of Canada and onto the international stage. Ian Tyson, once again a significant figure on the folk scene, is today the undisputed king of the new cowboy music. Probably he has fans who've never heard, or even heard of, the songs he and partner, subsequent wife, and finally ex-wife Sylvia Fricker Tyson recorded in the 1960s. This generally well-chosen set, taken from their classic Vanguard recordings, is a chance to hear the duo, depending on where you're coming from, for the first or yet one more time. There's a good mix of the couple's originals, including hits such as "You Were on My Mind," "Four Strong Winds," and "Some Day Soon," covers of Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell, Johnny Cash, Phil Ochs (whose "Changes" is a highlight here), and Bob Dylan, and traditional songs and ballads. Among these last are the gorgeous French-Canadian "Un Canadien Errant" and an affecting rendition of the Caribbean sailor's lament "Mary Ann," plus solid readings of Anglo-Celtic-American standards "Nancy Whiskey," "Katy Dear," and "The Greenwood Sidie." On the other hand, "Rocks and Gravel," from the African-American prison-song tradition, needs more vocal heft than the Tysons are able to bring to it. Among the newer material David Rea's pretentious "Ninety Degrees by Ninety Degrees" makes an unwelcome reappearance. Ian's "Play One More," surely his most uninspired composition (hobbled, moreover, with a clumsy arrangement), comes inexplicably out of moth balls, leaving the listener to wonder why a neglected masterpiece like "Four Rode by" was left hanging in the closet. On the other hand, another overlooked jewel, "The Renegade," among the finest of the many splendid songs Ian has composed, is here in all its tragic glory. All in all, with the exceptions noted, this is music built to last.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great folk duo, December 30, 2001

By 

Smallchief - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Best of the Vanguard Years (Audio CD)

I may be a minority of one but Ian and Sylvia are my favorite of the 60s folk groups. Sylvia has an earth-mother voice, Ian is a good picker and writes great songs, and they had a Canadian accent to their music which made them different from the legions of American groups. Cowboys are Ian's favorite subject and his "Four Strong Winds" is one of the greatest folk songs ever. It's about a drifter, and his girl, and goin' out to Alberta in the Fall. He also wrote the definitive rodeo song: "Some Day Soon." Judy Collins possibly did it better than Ian and Sylvia, but just barely.
One of the best songs is "The Renegade" by Ian, a defiant declaration by an American -- or rather Canadian -- Indian. Sylvia does a Dylan song, "This Wheel's on Fire," and makes it sound like a song that Dylan didn't write. "Nancy Whiskey" is a anti-drinking song, that made me want a drink. "Rocks and Gravel" is a bluesey, bass-heavy chain gang song. Ian and Sylvia's version of "Early Morning Rain" is one of the best. "Ninety Degrees by Ninety Degrees" is incomprehensible and un-folk, but the vocal harmonies are intriguing.
Ian bought a ranch in Alberta with the money he made from "Four Strong Winds." Just like in the song, Sylvia chose not to live out there where the "winds blow lonely" and there "ain't too much to do." That was the end of Ian and Sylvia. Life imitates art.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If you have ears you need some Ian and Sylvia, April 24, 2006

By 

Tony Thomas (SUNNY ISLES BEACH, FL USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Best of the Vanguard Years (Audio CD)

What distinguished Ian and Sylvia was a driving respect for music, and Ian strong roots in real Western music, and a musical integrity and ingenuity that surpassed that of most "folksingers" of their period. They never drifted off into the direction of smooth pop oriented singing. There might have been the usual attempt to take them in a "folk rock" direction in the last years they were together, something they did take seriously and made fun of from the stage of their performances in the late 1960s.

However, these recordings have a strength of their commiment to music that has the bite, the twang, the strength, and the snap of real folk music and of folk originated blues and country music. The standards of production particularly their work with the great guitarists Johnny Herald and Monte Dunn, not to mention Ian Tyson's own developing skill with the guitar, and the tastefulness of the ensembles has not been matched since in acoustic music.

Ian and Sylvia's music works now even when the pop folk sensibility that surrounded them has deservedly withered away. I spend a lot of time talking with, playing with, hanging out with people who treasure completely traditional folk music which is not at all what Ian and Sylvia ever pretended to play, although especially at the beginning it was one of their most important sources. I have found even three or four decades after the duo ended, that a tremendous respect and a lot of listening goes on to Ian and Sylvia which is not true for other folkies like Joan Baez or Bob Dylan.

Of course, Ian Tyson continued a great career of his own, longer and actually larger than what happened with Ian and Sylvia as a writer of songs rooted in his Canadian Western origins. The skills unveiled in songs like "You were on my mind" and "Four strong winds" have won Ian a bunch of Grammies and Junos (the Canadian equivalent). He is still out there performing, making great albums and being who he has always been, a straight shooter, a no bs artist.

Sometime in the 1980s, an urban legend appeared that is still strong that Sylvia Fricker had died, killed herself, or otherwise left this life. She is very much alive, still singing, and over the years has done great folk oriented shows for the CBC.

Oh, one thing I forgot.

Aside from all this analysis, Ian and Sylvia are just so darned good that anyone with ears desperately needs to have as much of their music as they can either afford or steal!

There is now a complete recordings set out on CD from Vanguard and if you can afford that, you might want to get it.