Customer Reviews

Weaver Of Visions: The Kate Wolf Anthology

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am new to Kate Wolf's work. This anthology is a victory for those who have captured in two discs a rare beauty and serenity which borders on the spiritual. If you explore one singer songwriter this year who weaves spells with words and music that lives on beyond the transience of life itself this should be the one.Thanks to Emmylou Harris and especially to Nanci Griffith for keeping the candle burning, across the Great Divide.

It's hard to describe in words just how perfect Kate Wolf is -- the voice, the songs ... Then again, I don't really have to: this excellent two disc compilation does it all for me, skimming the cream off her recordings. Fittingly enough, it includes a good heaping serve of live tracks, because Wolf in concert was a very special experience. If the compilers managed to miss a couple of my own favourites, well, that's simply a tribute to the consistent quality and depth of her songs. Listeners new are guaranteed to fall in love with Kate Wolf; listeners old will welcome a fine, fine compilation.

Pacheco/RedtailHawk, Medicine Wheel,Across the Great Divide. I have several Kate Wolf Cd's and I seem to listen to this one the most, but there are many other songs and its hard to pick a favorite. Kate wasn't a country bluegrass stompin kind of singer but a beautiful folk singer. I wish I could go to the Kate Wolf Festival held in California every year,where a line up of wellknown singers sing there versions of her music. The information is on her website.

This anthology contains some of the best singer-songwriter contemporary folk I've ever heard. I've been listening to this set for several months now, and am not even remotely tired of it. Kate Wolf's voice and songwriting will touch your heart..."Give Yourself to Love" brings tears to my eyes. I discover the music of dozens of different folk artists every year, but once in a rare while I will hear the work of a musician and think, "this is what I've been looking for, without even knowing it"...this is how I now feel about Kate Wolf.

Within about 3 seconds of a Kate Wolf song, your life changes a little. I mean, I don't even like the country bluegrass foot stompin stuff but when she sings it gets important and you want to listen. The ballads are a form of heart surgery with the patient always surviving and leading a better life as a result. My wife and I have been fans since '86 and were both saddened by her departure to "the other side" as she puts it.

I first discovered Kate Wolf's music twenty years ago while traveling the Mendocino Coast. It's not really about Northern California, but like a fine wine it has a certain regional stamp to it which adds to its quality. In time I bought all of her CD's and her music, which gradually intertwined and merged with my life until it seemed as if the songs were a personal gift from her to me, which I eventually learned was an illusion held in common by just about all of her fans. And in all those years, whenever I brought up the subject of Kate Wolf with my friends in Southern California, I invariably got a blank stare in return, followed by the question, "Who's Kate Wolf?"

The mystery of Kate Wolf is why her enormous popularity is still mainly confined to Northern California, why such a great artist has only produced twelve reviews on this page, and why this quintessential Kate Wolf album isn't even among Amazon's top ten thousand selling CD's.

I don't know how many (if any)other musicians have an annual music festival dedicated to their memory, but Kate Wolf does and last week up near the Redwoods, the 11th annual such festival took place. The music was bluegrass, folk, and singer/songwriters with only an occasional Kate Wolf number thrown in, but her spirit was invoked from the stage more than once, and the festival closed out with the singing of one of Kate's signature songs, "Give Yourself to Love." The audience stood and sang along just as if it were a national anthem (and maybe it should be.)

So if this is your genre, if Kate's advice to "Give Yourself to Love" makes sense to you, or if her gentle warning that "We've Only Got These Times We're Living In" rings true, give her a listen, and you too can become part of California's best kept secret.

Nobody has ever captured the spirit of the rural West in music better than Kate Wolf. This generous set will satisfy almost anybody but those who have to have it all; for those who are just new to this artist, this is the best place to start - all killer, no filler. Some tracks are immediately addictive, while others reveal their pleasures more gradually.

Kate's songs are a celebration of passion, humanity, nature, healing, friendship, love, and much more. Her partners supported her with expert skills and arrangments that explored all the roots of American music, yet her style, concept, and delivery were completely her own. If Weaver of Visions is your first introduction to Kate, it may be a revelation.

if you are a folk music fan.. if you love great lyrics and wonderful.. instrmental backup.. if you love passion and feeling.. if you love a beautiful,clear, fresh voice.. you will love this album.. stumbled onto it today at a music store, and listened to it twice ... thats five hours.... just ordering three more sets for my children.

I feel so bad that I lived in San Fransisco and Oakland and travelled up and down California and the West Coast in the late 1970s and early 1980s when Kate was doing her best work and only saw her sing once. When I hear something like Sweet love on this CD, I wonder why I am not always listening to Kate. There is something to her voice that gets through to me, something pure. Now that I sing and play guitar and banjo and fiddle, I tend to listen to any singer or player that I hear trying to scope them out learn something, evaluate, figure out how to put what they do into my performance. Even though Kate plays the kind of music I have always wanted to play, I just sit there and listen to the song and receive its thoughts in my heart and mind. Part of Kate's magic is the superb arrangements and backup that gets from the musical genius Nina Gerber her main accompaniest. Nina is now out there solo alot. If you like guitar and this kind music check out Nina too.
Oh Kate, why didn't we realize how much of a golden treasure you were when you were among us. In her memory think of a performer you might miss like we all miss Kate--well that isnt fair because thats a big ideal to measure up to--how about someone you would miss half or a quarter as much as I miss Kate, and make sure you go see them while you can, and maybe bring a friend, bring two.

Kate Wolf was one of the finest songwriters of her generation, and sang in a lovely rough-hewn country voice reminiscent of Sara Carter. Every recording she made in her career had beauty in it, and this loving compilation by Kate's son Max collects the best of them. ACROSS THE GREAT DIVIDE, GIVE YOURSELF TO LOVE, CORNFLOWER BLUE and TELLURIDE are, in my estimation, the best of them, but there isn't a song here that isn't moving in one way or another. It's people like Kate Wolf, an incandescent spirit who left this earth long, long, long before their time, that make one want to belive in a place called Heaven.