Customer Reviews

Tribute to Woody Guthrie

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This cd is excellent and makes a wonderful gift for any music lover. I have played and bought this cd for many friends and all who heard it loved it. The cd contains songs and narrative written by Woody Guthrie but performed at two tribute concerts after his death by artists including Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie, Bob Dylan, Judy Collins, Pete Seeger, Country Joe McDonald, and more. The background music is provided by The Band. Woody Guthrie's songs on this album, while not all happy by any means, bring out a sense of pride in the listener for our country, for the workingman, for injustices and tragedies suffered and survived. He sings and speaks of many sorrowful things such as the sufferings of migrant workers, miners, hoboes, and the "poor and downtrodden" but the overall message is one of pride and hard work, and love and compassion for your fellow man. I can put on this album when I'm sad or frustrated, or sense myself letting the petty every-day problems of life get me down, and the soul-wrenching folk music of Woody Guthrie never fails to put things back in perspective and a smile back on my face. This is one of my all-time favorite albums that I believe everyone should own!

As much as I love both albums, which I have treasured for a long time, this collection is sadly missing two songs. The version of Vigilante Man by Richie Havens is a great omission considering it is probably the only version available. The other song by Odetta would had made this collection truly complete.
With so many re-issues of LP's onto CD formatt I would had expected a better presentation of two unique events for the fans of Woody's music & those performers who took part.
I have given it 4 stars although without the missing songs I would not buy it.

One of my favorite albums. Woodie Guthrie wrote true folk songs. The diverse voices of currently-celebrated folk singers honor his impact on American music. You get a folk sampler of these many talented voices, plus a whirlwind tour of depression-era history, workingman sentiment, politics, etc. The songs are emotionally powerful, spanning a full range from joyous celebration or playful humor to righteous anger or heartbreaking pathos.

As a Woody fan for many years,I've had this recording in every possible form and still love it.Aside from marking Dylan's first performance since his accident in '67, the rest of the line-up is filled with people who belong there.Many tributes have performers who have no reason (other than internal politics)to be included.These performances show people who knew and loved Woody and his songs.Not important but the previous reviewer states that the excluded songs were not written by Woody but by the performers.That is most certainly WRONG."Vigilante Man" by Richie Havens,"So Long (It's Been Good To Know Yuh)" by Judy Collins and "Why Oh Why" by Odetta are all written by Woody obviously.This comes from the original album.The truth shall set you free.....

Amazing! Baez, Collins, Dylan, Paxton and so many more folk rock icons, all in one fabulous concert recording. The singing and playing are uniformly impassioned and excellent, with some of the greatest performances of Woody Guthrie songs ever, in particular Judy Collins singing Deportee so movingly, Tom Paxton brilliantly performing the mock epic Biggest Thing Man Has Ever Done, a great Grand Coulee Dam by Dylan himself, and the list goes on and on. The sound quality is pretty good, but the performances are in a class by themselves. Strongly recommended for all lovers of folk music.

Woody Guthrie was America's troubadour, plain and simple, the man whose picture goes with the encyclopedia entry on "Folk Singer." Like the poets who recited Homer in ancient Greece, Guthrie recreated his songs as he performed then, changing then as occasion demanded and memory allowed. As performed by those who came in his formidable wake, such as Judy Collins, Pete Seeger, Tom Paxton, Odetta and Joan Baez, the songs of Woody Guthrie probably sound better than they ever did before, but their authenticity still rings through and that is what makes them powerful. The concerts from which these performances were taken were intended as celebrations of Guthrie's work. The program was developed by Millard Lampell, who had been a member of the Almanac Singers with Guthrie, and who created a script from Guthrie's songs and writings (narration is provided by Will Geer, Robert Ryan and Peter Fonda). Lampell also wrote the liner notes about Guthrie, "A little guy sloping down a dusty road, looking for something he couldn't name."

Guthrie wrote so many songs that I have no doubt there will be many tracks on this album you have never heard before. My favorite is Tom Paxton's version of "Pastures of Plenty," although I also like the section on the Pacific Northwest, where Bob Dylan sings about "The Grand Coulee Dam" and Judy Collins leads the audience in "Roll on Columbia," while Robert Ryan's narration fills in the gaps. Plus, of course, there is something fundamentally enjoyable about hearing Arlo Guthrie sings his father's songs. This 2-record set on highlights from concerts at Carnegie Hall in 1968 and the Hollywood Bowl in 1970 was condensed to a single CD by eliminating three songs, all of which were written by the artists who performed them rather than Guthrie. All this means is that nothing important was lost in the transition. "A Tribute to Woody Guthrie" is a necessary part of any serious collection of American folk music.

I liked this recordings, it captures a rawness and fidelity seldom heard of nowdays.great poertry between songs.well worth the cost.4 stars and i'm wery hard to please.

Great Music, Woody Guthrie's music at it's best! The only thing missing was Woody himself.

In a sense the "Tribute to Woody Guthrie" is a tribute to Bob Dylan. Only four short years after Bob's electric debut in Newport and London, in which he was booed and called a Judas, the Guthrie tribute has Bob's backup band, The Band, playing backup for everyone, including Peter Seeger, who reportedly wanted to take an axe to Newport's sound system.

Guthrie changed fold, Dylan changed it again and both their fingerprints are all over this collection.

Surprisingly, none of the then older folkies, other than Seeger, appear on the album, making this a youth's trbute to Guthrie. Tom Paxton was 31, Odetta 38. The singing is fine, as are most of the performances.

I expected to hate the spoken word interludes, but actually enjoyed them greatly.

Standout performances, in my view include Dylan singing "I Ain't Got no Home," and Judy Collins singing "Roll On Columbia."

There are no weak performances, although I was a bit disappointed that Arlo's performance of "This Train is Bound for Glory" was just a guitar intro.

If I had to pick between this album and "Folkways: A Vision Shared," I'd get this.

This album belongs in every serious collection of classic American folk music. It contains a veritable who's who of modern folk legends including Judy Collins,Joan Baez,Jack Hawkins, Odetta, Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger-with wonderful narration by Robert Ryan, Peter Fonda and Will Geer.The standout performances are Odetta's "Ramblin' Round Your City'" backed by the Band, along with Deportees by Judy Collins, and rounded out by a rousing rendition of 'This Land Is Your Land"lead by Odetta. For anyone who doesn't know Woody Guthrie's music this album is a great introduction to one of Americas' greatest storytellers.