Stranger Songs
Tuesday November 19th, 2024 with Mike Regenstreif
Immigration, Part 1: The Man from God Knows Where
The theme for this edition of Stranger Songs is Immigration, Part 1: The Man from God Knows Where, the first of two editions of Stranger Songs on the theme of immigration.
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| fragment of The Stranger Song Leonard Cohen - Songs of Leonard Cohen - Columbia/Legacy 
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| As I wrote in Sing Out magazine in 1999 .... Thomas Russell was a leader of the United Irish Rebellion in the 1790s. Two centuries later, singer and songwriter Tom Russell was playing a gig in Downpatrick, Ireland when he was approached by an old man in a bar. “Thomas Russell,” he said, “we hung you across the road in 1798.” Tom bought the old man a pint of beer and heard the story of his namesake and of the narrative poem about him called “The Man from God Knows Where.”
For several years prior to that encounter, Tom had been working on a song-cycle that began when a phrase, “American primitive man in an American primitive land,” occurred to him. Originally, Tom conceived the piece as a long tone-poem that would tell some of the history of America absent from the standard history texts. But as he wrote, Tom soon recognized that his own family’s history would provide much of the raw material he needed to tell a compelling story of immigration and the pursuit of the American Dream. So, more than 200 years after Thomas Russell’s hanging, the man from God knows where is resurrected to observe and to chronicle the struggles, tragedies and joys of the Russells and Malloys who immigrate to the United States from Ireland in the nineteenth century, and of the Larsens and Olsens who come from Norway, and of their lineage through to today’s Tom Russell. Tom Russell’s The Man from God Knows Where is more than just a song-cycle, it’s a fully realized folk-opera featuring Tom and a superb cast of American, Irish and Norwegian singers. Using singers with authentic Irish, Norwegian and rural and urban American accents helps provide authenticity to the voices of Russell’s ancestors and to the other characters who are brought to life in the folk-opera. As well, Tom frequently utilizes distinctly Irish and Norwegian instruments and musical forms to complement the more familiar American folk styles that run through the score to The Man from God Knows Where. Tom wrote most of the songs we hear in The Man from God Knows Where. There are also some traditional folksongs, a song written by David Massengill, and a poem by Walt Whitman. |
| The Man from God Knows Where Tom Russell - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Wayfarin' Stranger Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Patrick Russell Tom Russell & Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Mary Clare Molloy (American Wake) Dolores Keane - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| The Outcast Dave Van Ronk - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Ambrose Larsen Sondre Bratland & Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| The Dreamin' Tom Russell & Dolores Keane - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| fragment of The Stranger Song Leonard Cohen - Songs of Leonard Cohen - Columbia/Legacy
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| The Old Northern Shore Sondre Bratland & Kari Bremnes - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| The Man from God Knows Where/America Tom Russell & Walt Whitman - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Anna Olsen Kari Bremnes - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Rider on an Orphan Train Tom Russell - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Acres of Corn Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| The Man from God Knows Where Tom Russell - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Sitting Bull in Venice Tom Russell - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| The Old Rugged Cross Iris DeMent & Kari Bremnes - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Anna Olsen’s Letter Home Kari Bremnes - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Eg er framand Sondre Bratland - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| When Irish Girls Grow Up Dolores Keane & Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Casey Jones Tom Russell - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Chickasaw County Jail Tom Russell - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Wayfarin’ Stranger (Passage of Time) Knut Reiersrud - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Throwin’ Horseshoes at the Moon Tom Russell & Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| The Man from God Knows Where Tom Russell - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| The Outcast (revisited) Dave Van Ronk - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Wayfarin’ Stranger (revisited) Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Love Abides Tom Russell & Iris DeMent - The Man from God Knows Where - HighTone |
| Wayfaring Stranger American Patchwork Quartet - American Patchwork Quartet - Carolina Jasmine |
| fragment of The Stranger Song Leonard Cohen - Songs of Leonard Cohen - Columbia/Legacy
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This is an amazing folk opera. Thank you Mike for bringing it to my attention and thank you Tom Russell for creating this masterpiece.
3:55 PM, November 19th, 2024