Customer Reviews

Prairie in the Sky

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If you're a Willy Nelson, or a Tracy Nelson fan, you should know Mary McCaslin. She sings in an unaffected folk manner, and she is witty, to boot. This album personifies what the girl the cowboy is waving to on the cover of Quicksilver's "Happy Trails" album would sing on her front porch swing. The beautiful "Cole Younger" piece haunts like Emmylou's "Pancho and Lefty", but is less refined and more gritty, "campfirey"(if that's a word), and sung in a very persuasive first person. This is a fun album, especially if you toss into a shuffle play mix on the CD changer with Riders in the Sky, Bob Wills, and Willy Nelson. Enjoy!

I first became aware of Mary McCaslin after hearing "The Last Cannonball" on another CD. Her melancholy story of riding "The Last Cannonball" was an immediate favorite. Much to my surprise, I found her other performances on this CD to be equally compelling. If you like songs about the west, ballads with just the right mixture of folk and country, or superb background guitar work, you will like this CD. Turn up the volume to get a full appreciation of all of the background nuances. Several of these songs will raise goosebumps on your spine, and at least one will have you blinking back a tear or two. Extraordinarily fine folk music from a very talented performer!

It's such a pleasure to read reviews that reveal a deep appreciation for albums such as this, a true country/folk jewel that we would hope many folks could have the opportunity to hear. The Amazon reviews open up a lot of new possibilities for audiophiles. I've had "Prairie in the Sky" for years on vinyl and just picked-up the CD concerned it might fall out of print. This is a classic that could so easily fall through the cracks. Mary McCaslin comes through with such a sincere love of the material and subject matter. While this would probably get tagged as "Alternative", it's country music far more honest than most of what we hear on the radio. Mary's voice, clean guitar playing, and well written songs all combine to take the mind to other times and other places. The songs offer a range of emotions and images from light-hearted to melancoly. This is a great old favorite for me, and I highly recommend it.

If it has been a while or if you have never had the experience, Prairie in the Sky is a great place to start. McCaslin has a crystal-clear voice and she sings with heart. I listen to her albums over and over and always find something new.

This review has also been used for McCaslin's "Broken Promises" CD.

Okay, okay I have had enough. Recently I received a spate of e-mails from aging 1960's folkies asking why, other than one review of Carolyn Hester's work late in 2008, I have not done more reviews of the female folkies of the 1960's. To balance things out I begin to make amends here. To set the framework for my future reviews I repost the germane part of the Carolyn Hester review:

"Earlier this year I posed a question concerning the fates of a group of talented male folk singers like Tom Rush, Tom Paxton and Jesse Colin Young, who, although some of them are still performing or otherwise still on the musical scene have generally fallen off the radar in today's mainstream musical consciousness, except, of course, the acknowledged "king of the hill", Bob Dylan. I want to pose that same question in this entry concerning the talented female folk performers of the 1960's, except, of course, the "queen of the hill" Joan Baez. I will start out by merely rephrasing the first paragraph from the reviews of those male performers.

"If I were to ask someone, in the year 2008, to name a female folk singer from the 1960's I would assume that if I were to get an answer to that question that the name would be Joan Baez (or, maybe, Judy Collins but you get my point). And that would be a good and appropriate choice. One can endlessly dispute whether or not Baez was (or wanted to be) the female voice of the Generation of '68 but in terms of longevity and productivity she fits the bill as a known quality. However, there were a slew of other female folk singers who tried to find their niche in the folk milieu and who, like Baez, may today still quietly continue to produce work and to perform. The artist under review, Carolyn Hester, certainly had the talent to challenge Baez to be "queen of the hill."

Well, as the CD under review will testify to, the singer /songwriter Mary McCaslin also was in contention, back in the days. I am not familiar with the current status of Ms. McCaslin as a performer although I know several years ago I attended a benefit concert to raise funds for her medical needs. Nevertheless I can remember the first time I heard her in a coffeehouse in Cambridge doing Woody Guthrie's "Oklahoma Hills Back Home". And that was appropriate as Ms. McCaslin is certainly in her singing style and her songwriting interests attached to the Western United States. That tradition got an additional acknowledement in that Cambridge performance when she brought down the house with her version of the country classic "Pass Me By If You're Only Passing Through".

That western theme and, in addition, several more inward searching tracks, make this a very representative McCaslin effort. Needless to say "Pass Me By" sticks out on the first theme and "Prairie In The Sky" on the second. She also does a very fine version of the old Ames Brothers (I think) "Ghost Riders In The Sky". So, all in all, whatever her later personal journey back in the days she could have been a contender for "queen of the hill". Listen up.

My favorite Mary McCaslin cd. Recommend it highly. You will be singing along in no time.

In the late 70's, High Fidelity Magazine did a review of this album, and raved about it. I took a chance, and thoroughly enjoyed it. Recently I realized I missed having female voices around, & rather than call rent-a-niece, I returned to this old fave. Sometimes you can go home again, and it's not close to stalking!