Customer Reviews

No Mockingbird

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Total playing time - 42:38

Suzy Thompson subtitles this album "old-time fiddle rags and blues songs," although the scope is actually even broader. Her assisting cast includes an impressive musical cadre: Kate Brislin, Bill Evans, Paul Hostetter, Tony Marcus, Geoff Muldaur, Maria Muldaur, Dave Murray, Hoyle Osborne, Del Rey, Fritz Richmond, Mike Seeger, Jody Stecher, Eric Thompson, Larry Cohea, and Steven Strauss. They work well together and easily fall into a mountain music groove. A fiddled "Babe" opens the project, and good liner notes tell us that this is the first tune Thompson learned some three decades ago from an East Texas Serenaders record. Piano and voice are the featured instruments on Bessie Smith's "Frosty Morning Blues." Her renditions of "Red Apple Rag" and "Dickson County Blues" (from Arthur Smith), "Salt Lake City Blues" (from Cathie Whitesides), "California Blues" (from the Stripling Brothers) and "Blue Devil Blues" (from Clifford Hayes) are old-time, blues and jug band music at their best and would be great tunes of choice in fiddle contests. I would call Hank Bradley's "Teabag Blues" a hoedown, while the Romanian "Worried Yid" is actually a waltz. She also sings tales of dejection, destitution and melancholy from Victoria Spivey, Dock Boggs, Memphis Minnie, and her own title cut, "No Mockingbird."

Suzy Thompson has amassed some impressive musical experience. In the mid-70s, her all-woman Any Old Time String Band toured and recorded. As a member of Klezmorim, she appeared on their second LP, Streets of Gold, and she's recorded with various other well-known old-time, bluegrass, Celtic and Cajun artists. In the 80s, Suzy toured and recorded with the Blue Flame Stringband and the Backwoods Band, then she formed the California Cajun Orchestra featuring accordionist Danny Poullard. In 1994, she toured Scotland and England as part of the Masters of the Folk Violin Tour. Thompson also teaches at many festivals and music camps.

Suzy Thompson's "No Mockingbird" presents an interesting dichotomy of blue mountain funk and fired up fiddle. I can tell that deep down inside Suzy's a sunbeam, and this album is clearly a pepper-upper. (Joe Ross, staff writer, Bluegrass Now)

I just saw Suzy perform live this weekend. She is the consummate entertainer. A talented, humorous artist with the voice of a crystal angel. Try these tunes. You won't regret it!