Kate MacLeod

Various Reviews for Numerous Kate MacLeod Recordings - Various Reviews for Numerous Kate MacLeod Recordings

It's a beautiful autumn morning in the Heber Valley as I sit typing this week's column. There's just a slight bite in the air but, if you were watering horses, it would be quite easy to overdress. Life is good. I spent yesterday with old friends and a new one with an old soul. Both conversation and food were off the comfort menu.
In those lazy moments just before arising this morning, I mapped out a short chronology. First out of the chute, I knew, would be to slip my newly-acquired "Kate MacLeod at Ken Sanders Rare Books" CD into my computer player, which now features access to some vintage, nearly 40-year old, Marantz 3-way speakers.
Then would come coffee and horses and such. But first things first! Although I had missed the live concert recording session down at Ken Sanders bookshop last August, I knew from a glance at the CD's liner notes that Ms. MacLeod had played a Taylor guitar on the date and that, for me, had even upped the ante.
What's always grabbed me most about Kate MacLeod's guitar finger-picking style is the casual intimacy shared between her fingertips and the guitar strings. She will barely touch the instrument and it will ring like a bell. And then there's her voice and her songwriting. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Kate's been all over the Utah music map for some time, of course, and I must admit it has dumbfounded many of us among Utah's musically-active tribe why she hasn't achieved national recognition and success similar to that of Emmylou Harris, Nanci Griffith and Patty Griffin. You could even toss Joni Mitchell and Joan Baez into the mix.
Not that she isn't quite well-known to fellow musicians and songwriters whose art is expressed through the many sub-genres of folk music. An accomplished fiddle player with a style that evolved both traditionally and classically, MacLeod's music sensibility has long been on the lam from the ordinary.
But it's not just her extraordinary musicality that shines through on this album. All of the original songs she performs on the record are inspired by books she has read throughout a life spent turning pages. An obvious bibliophile, it makes perfect sense that MacLeod seems so very much at home performing this particular material in the friendly confines of Ken Sanders Rare Books a quite-rare bookshop, as it were.
She puts it this way: "I composed these across a thirty-year span from 1982 to 2012. These songs are different than songs that come solely out of my own thoughts and experience; they are more a digestion of what I've gleaned from reading and are also spontaneous responses.
"I think of books as part of our collective consciousness. They are our record of history and also a canvas for the imagination. Whether a book is a great piece of literature or not, each contains some record of humanity serious, comedic, pedestrian or genius."
The song "Riding the White Horse Home" comes from Teresa Jordan's absorbing 1993 memoir of the same title about coming of age on a Wyoming ranch. MacLeod also includes a song influenced by and titled after William Least Heat-Moon's "PrairyErth," a book she characterizes as a detailed ode to the prairie. "I remember so clearly beginning this song in my sleep," she recalls.
Following a similar format she borrows another Heat-Moon book title for "Blue Highways," which she introduces on record with: "This book actually inspired a lot of people to get a divorce and go out on the highway." She goes on to explain how, on old maps, the more inviting backcountry two-lanes are marked in blue, hence, blue highways.
Richard Patterson's "Butch Cassidy: A Biography" became, in MacLeod's creative songwriting hands, "Butch Cassidy Was Here," a search for the actual Robert Leroy Parker.
Marion Zimmer Bradley's "The Mists of Avalon," Audrey Niffenegger's "The Time Traveler's Wife," Leslie Marmon Silko's "Ceremony," James Michener's "Chesapeake," John Bunyan's "A Pilgrim's Progress," and other tomes of her time, also receive Kate MacLeod's carefully and artfully crafted cross-cultural treatment.
When time arrived for me to spend time with the horses, the sounds of her voice and guitar and harmonica lingered. I have a feeling they will remain for a good long spell. How fitting it is that literature and music continue to nurture your humble scribe and portly gray pilgrim as he continues along his own blue highway.
How perfect, also, the union of Kate MacLeod and Ken Sanders Rare Books. In that Ken has long been in the business of "creating chaos out of anarchy for a better tomorrow," everything he touches seems to receive a secular imprimatur.
Or, as Kate puts it: "Art forms are related and the creative process is often carried into new formats of expres - ParkRecord.com, Jay Meehan

Kate MacLeod was named among the "Ten Acts to Watch" by editors of the Music Hound Folk Essential Album Guide.

"Kate MacLeod is one of those musicians so skilled her performance seems effortless" Rambles.Net, John R. Lindermuth

"Kate's music is honest and she delivers her message true and clear. This is out of the ordinary folk music." Roots Music Report

"One of the leading lights of the contemporary folk music scene...easeily one of the top releases of the year." Eric Fidler, Associated Press

Of all the songer songwriters I've come across in the 1990s, Kate MacLeod is one of my favorites." M. Regenstreif, Sing Out Magazine

If you could combine Nanci Griffith and Emmylou Harris, you'd end up with Kate MacLeod." Matthew Lawton, Totally Adult
- Various

Utah folk musician Kate MacLeod opened her performance at the Moab Folk Festival over the weekend with this promise: "We're going to make it a party." Transporting the audeience through a thoughtful set of haunting, sparse melodies flavored with her signature Celtic-inspired fiddling, MacLeod and band members Mark Hazel, Barry Carter, and Cliff Smith made good on that pledge.
Lisa Church, Salt Lake Tribune - Salt Lake Tribune

This album is just awesome. Kate MacLeod presents her music as well as any has been presented. A little bit of everything on this CD. Kate's music is honest and she delivers her message true and clear. This is out of the ordinary folk music. Unique and produced with expertise. This release will not be taken for granted by any folk music lover. An outstanding project by Kate MacLeod and the Pancakes. - www.rootsmusicreport.com

John Lindermuth - Rambles.net
“Blooming” Review - January, 2010

Kate MacLeod was named among the “Ten Acts to Watch,” by editors of the MusicHound Folk Essential Album Guide. This release, her fifth studio recording, is a solid endorsement of that recommendation.
Recorded in Nashville with Grammy Award-winning musician Tim O’Brien as producer, the album features 12 tracks, all written by Kate MacLeod, except “As Far as the Heart Can See,” co-written by Kate and Robert K. Wolf, and “The Inner Man,” a Jack Hardy composition.
In keeping with folk tradition, these are story-songs. But they are presented in a variety of musical styles, ranging from folk to pop and country. There’s more than a little bow to country in this collection with its emphasis on love, loss and hope. A distinctly western theme is apparent in such tracks as “Riding the White Horse Home (inspired by a novel of the same name by Teresa Jordan),” “My Teton Home” and “Return to Rawlins.”
Optimism is the theme in a number of the songs with the sense expressed nowhere more clearly than in the title track where she sings, “I have loved and lost before, but still believe in springtime. Everything is blooming, blooming, don’t go.”
She has a warm and poetic style in both her singing and playing. Though some of the songs are poignant, there’s understated humor in unexpected places such as the chorus of “Return to Rawlins” where she speaks of friends missing “My good looks, my wit, and my charm” or in verses of “A Smile Worth a Million.”
A performer, studio musician and teacher as well as composer, Kate MacLeod is an artist who deserves a wider audience. You may not know her by name but you’ve most likely heard some of her songs on NPR and performed by other artists such as folk singer Mollie O’Brien (Tim’s sister) and the bluegrass band Loose Ties. She performs regularly on stage and at festivals across the U.S. and abroad.
This is a strong collection with back up from some talented friends. Kate is featured on vocals and acoustic guitar. She’s backed by Tim O’Brien, harmony vocals, acoustic guitar, mandolin, bouzouki, banjo and fiddle; Darrell Scott, acoustic, electric and steel guitar, piano and pedal steel; Byron House, acoustic and electric bass, and Kenny Malone, percussion.






Utah Singer-Songwriter Kate MacLeod's New Record Produced by Nashville Pros
By David Burger
The Salt Lake Tribune, Sept. 2009
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Thirty years ago, Kate MacLeod moved to Salt Lake City to study at the Violin-Making School of America.
So what was she doing playing guitar with Grammy-winning bluegrass and country musician Tim O'Brien in Nashville earlier this year?
MacLeod was recording her new contemporary folk album, "Blooming," a gorgeous, spellbinding album produced by the acclaimed O'Brien and played by a group of experienced Nashville session musicians that makes "Blooming" one of the best collections of songs made by a local musician in 2009.
The Salt Lake City-based MacLeod will celebrate the new Americana album with a record-release party this weekend at the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center.
"Wow" was what MacLeod recalled saying when O'Brien, an old but busy friend, agreed to produce her record using musicians he regularly works with. "They have a very wide experience with traditional as well as contemporary music," she said in an interview. "These guys are the specialists."
With MacLeod singing and on acoustic guitar, O'Brien not only produced but sang harmony vocals and played acoustic guitar, mandolin, bouzouki, banjo and fiddle on the album. He brought in Darrell Scott, Byron House and Kenny Malone, and they recorded the 12 songs in four days in a Nashville studio.
"I was quite impressed with her material," said O'Brien in an interview. "She's a real songwriter. It's part of her life. It's intrinsic to her being. It's a pure art form, what she does."
Classically trained in the violin, MacLeod grew up in Washington, D.C., before relocating to Utah to study at the Violin-Making School of America, where she ended up working for 10 years. She has since studied other musical genres, including traditional music of North America and the British Isles, lending her acoustic-driven music a taste of Celtic influence. With a multioctave voice reminiscent of Emmylou Harris, MacLeod has become an established solo musician woven
into the rich local tapestry in town; among other activities, she is an integral member of Red Rock Rondo, the sextet led by Phillip Bimstein that performed an award-winning Zion Canyon song cycle last year that was featured in a PBS documentary.

'Blooming' is such a great title for Kate's CD because there's a fresh, radiant quality to everything she does -- especially her music," said Bimstein. "Kate is a warm, wonderful songwriter. I love the way her melodies twine around her chord changes like graceful vines -- perfect vehicles for her searching lyrics full - Various

Breakfast is seen as somewhat of a departure from Kate's previous (solo) recaord, Feel the Earth Spin, in the obvious sense that it features a full-ish band rather than a pared-down setting (through when I say band, I mean just guitar, bass and drums, courtesy of Mark Hazel, Barry Carter and Cliff Smith respectively). But Breakfast isn't as radical a departure in the sense that it's still a showcase for Kate's beautiful and melodious singing, which is well to the fore and given ample room to breathe by the uncomplicated, played-as-live arrangements. It all sounds really good, satisfyingly balanced while remaining acutely listener-friendly; and there's a kind of earthy-Fairport feel about the proceedings, not least in the way that Kate doesn't hog all the limelight (Mark takes the lead vocal on Whole World Round and No More Cane, and duets with Kate on Jack Hardy's delicious Forget me Nots and Dylan's Time Passes Slowly). And Kate's well-regarded instrumental skills on fiddle, acoustic and electric guitar and harmonica are satisfyingly represented in the mix too. As far as repertoire goes, out of the thirteen tracks here, no less than six of the songs have thier sources in traditional (American and British ), and they're blessed with sensible acoustic folk-rock arrangements which don't threaten to overwelm ( I particulary liked what Kate does with the Greenwood Side), and some are mighty tasty to boot ( like the spring harmonica and fiddle work on Whole World Round). My only reservation among those six is No More Cane, which I feel is way too smooth for the worksong/holler vibe of the original. Five of Kate's songs complete the set-list; these are every bit poetic and literate as we've come to expect from Kate, with a relaxed and contentedly reflective quality, the finest of these new songs perhaps being Autumn and Love is Gone. The five originals also include a new arrangement of Potter's Wheel (previously heard on Feel the Earth Spin). Kate's vibrant and perennially attractive writing style, combined with her skill in making traditional material come up fresh in these new band arrangements, makes Breakfast a very winning release indeed, which I acually much prefer to some of the more-lauded folk-rock ventures of the recent years. - David Kidman www.netrythms.co.uk

Smart and Vibrant singer-songwriter Kate has shifted focus a little for this, her third album release( it follows on the two she made for her mentor Andrew Calhoun 's excellant Waterbus record label, Trying To Get it Right and Feel the Earth Spin), Kate's avowed intent was to make a recording in response to those who said they like to hear her sing all by herself, just like in the kitchen. I wouldn't take that as critism to her other albums were in any way over-produced, for they proved credible examples of sensitivity-accompanied singer-songwriter product. Feel the Earth Spin is thus a commendably honest record, atmospheric and uncomplicated, with Kate playing guitars (acoustic and occasional electric) and a little violin and harmonica backup; at the time of writing her own liner note, Kate was unsure of what to think of it, but it sems to capture the essence of Kate's writing on a well-planned sequence of songs that includes just one non-original (Mary McCaslin's Way Out West). Strong and inspired is it too, as evidenced by The Annual Menhaden, a latter-day paean to the east-coast fishing community harvasting the small fry, and the poignant poeticality of My Baby Leaving and Shadow Changes; then the curious melodic sweep and emotional ambivalence of Cliffhanger that might appear to carry resonances of Richard Thompson. Well, maybe at times there's also a slightly elusive quality of her lyrics, despite their basic immediacy and their attractive economy of expression. Perhaps, too, her songs are best viewed as snapshots rather than linear narritives- like these no-frills recordings in fact. Kate's delivery is really entrancing- her wispy phrasing and ethereal tone is pitched just right for the material. By any standards, Kate should count on this release a success.

Feel The Earth Spin-Review
Catalyst Magazine, Barry Scholl...
MacLeod is a justifiably celebrated singer/songwriter who here goes it entirely alone via the majic of the recording studio, contributing all vocals, guitars, violin and harmonica. Although true "solo" albums are often faulted for their lack of organic interplay, that isn't a probem here. MacLeod's songs are built on around a solid arpeggiated guitar and her plaintive voice. One has no problem imagining these highly personal songs in a solo guitar and voice setting, without the additional filigree.
Still reeling from wolrd events, I found myself sitting on my back patio in Torrey, watching the light flicker on the yellow leaves of distant cottonwoods as the autumn sun advances by degrees, and returning again and again to "Wild Birds", "Shadow Changes" and "Winter Love". These are unhurried, spacious and haunting - the perfect soundtrack for these uncertain times.
Citing familiar comparisons is an occupational hazard to critics - and often an irresistible temptaion, as well - but here is goes. In places, MacLeod sounds a bit bit like Nanci Griffith (without the cloying cuteness) and in others like Natalie Merchant ( minus the grandstanding). A first rate collection. - David Kidman www.netrythms.co.uk

Kate MacLeod is a living argument for the voice as a bluegrass instrument. Hers is reedy, a bit uneven, like Robin Holcolmb's mannerisms. She's a fine songwriter as well, and maybe one of the best additions to Andrew Calhoun's Waterbug label. A native of Maryland, MacLeod now makes Utah her home, and there's definitly a western feel to her music. Celtis music is a subtler but no less impotant influence on her music, and she still performs with a celtic band in Utah. - Pamela Murray Winters

On this album, recorded in 2002 but unreleased until 2005, Utah based folk singer and songwriter MacLeod is fronting an emsemble whose approach might be best described as gentle folk-rock. They present a tasteful mixture of MacLeod's original songs, six traditional songs and a couple of songs borrowed from other contemporary writers. They open with MacLeod's "Thirst Quencher", an almost incidental song that compares life to a nice summer day. She follows with "Potter's Wheel", Previously heard on Feel the Earth Spin, her 2001 album, a metaphorical piece about determining what's truly important in life. The best of MacLeod's original songs is "Autumn", a poetic love song shrouded in images of the changing seasons.
Highlights among the traditional songs include a mid-tempo arrangement of "Handsome Molly" and an intense reading of " Prodigal Son". On these songs, MacLeod reminds us that in addition to being a compelling singer, she is also a very fine fiddler. She also sings a version of "The Greenwood Side", in which the pancakes show us that a folk-rock arrangement needn't overpower the story in a traditional ballad. A couple of the traditional songs, "No More Cane" and "Whole World Round", feature lead vocals from pancakes guitarist Mark Hazel. MacLeod's harmonies and fiddling on the latter song are haunting.
MacLeod also includes very nice versions of Jack Hardy's "Forget Me Nots" and Bob Dylan's "Time Passes Slowly" that fit nicely with the original and traditional songs. In addition to the fiddle, MacLeod plays guitar, both acoustic and electric and is complemented by Mark Hazel, Barry Carter on Bass and Cliff Smith on drums and percussion. - Sing Out!

Breakfast is seen as somewhat of a departure from Kate's previous (solo) recaord, Feel the Earth Spin, in the obvious sense that it features a full-ish band rather than a pared-down setting (through when I say band, I mean just guitar, bass and drums, courtesy of Mark Hazel, Barry Carter and Cliff Smith respectively). But Breakfast isn't as radical a departure in the sense that it's still a showcase for Kate's beautiful and melodious singing, which is well to the fore and given ample room to breathe by the uncomplicated, played-as-live arrangements. It all sounds really good, satisfyingly balanced while remaining acutely listener-friendly; and there's a kind of earthy-Fairport feel about the proceedings, not least in the way that Kate doesn't hog all the limelight (Mark takes the lead vocal on Whole World Round and No More Cane, and duets with Kate on Jack Hardy's delicious Forget me Nots and Dylan's Time Passes Slowly). And Kate's well-regarded instrumental skills on fiddle, acoustic and electric guitar and harmonica are satisfyingly represented in the mix too. As far as repertoire goes, out of the thirteen tracks here, no less than six of the songs have thier sources in traditional (American and British ), and they're blessed with sensible acoustic folk-rock arrangements which don't threaten to overwelm ( I particulary liked what Kate does with the Greenwood Side), and some are mighty tasty to boot ( like the spring harmonica and fiddle work on Whole World Round). My only reservation among those six is No More Cane, which I feel is way too smooth for the worksong/holler vibe of the original. Five of Kate's songs complete the set-list; these are every bit poetic and literate as we've come to expect from Kate, with a relaxed and contentedly reflective quality, the finest of these new songs perhaps being Autumn and Love is Gone. The five originals also include a new arrangement of Potter's Wheel (previously heard on Feel the Earth Spin). Kate's vibrant and perennially attractive writing style, combined with her skill in making traditional material come up fresh in these new band arrangements, makes Breakfast a very winning release indeed, which I acually much prefer to some of the more-lauded folk-rock ventures of the recent years. - David Kidman www.netrythms.co.uk

In my experience, Kate is a rare talent. She is both a generous performer and a mature personality. As a founding board member of the Estrada Institute, I have worked with literally dozens of musicians, from bluegrass bands to string quartets, punk rock bands to classical guitarists. I can honestly say that Kate is among my very favorite professional entertainers. It has been my pleasure to work with Kate MacLeod for the past three years as she has become a valued repeat performer duing the Estrada Institute's summer season in Torrey, Utah. Each year, the board members of the Entrada Institute look forward to her return performance. She always delivers an engaing and heart-felt show. She is truly a genuine person, a thoroughly professional musician, and a class act all the way. - Barry Scholl, Entrada, Torrey, UT

Don't awaken me if I am dreaming that Kate and Kat, together, recorded this heavenly CD of traditional and original songs. Two expressive but distinctly different voices twine around their favorite songs, songs that have influenced their own compasitions along with some of their original favorites. MacLeod's more ethereal voice weaves in and out of Eggelson's more earthy tones, while singing their way through seven songs. MacLeod plays guitar and violin, while Eggelson plays guitar and hammered dulcimer. They bow, hammer, pluck and pick their way through five instrumentals. The CD opens with their entwining, enticing harmonies singing "Good Ships in Order", a traditional amalgam of "I Will Put My Ship in Order" and "Silver Dagger". The title instrumental, composed by Eggelson, hauntingly follows. They sing MacLeod's original fishing song, "The Annual Menhaden", and the reflection on capitol punishment "Tom Egan" that tells of a man wrongly executed for a murder he did not commit back in 1882. THey sing Eggelson's dark "Measure for Measure", and the brighter "Go to the Water". This renditionof the latter song is better than the one on Eggelson's own CD. Their cappella version of the traditional "The Two Sisters" is a stunner. They choose a particular version of variant to wrap their voices around.
- Rich Warren

In my experience, Kate is a rare talent. She is both a generous performer and a mature personality. As a founding board member of the Estrada Institute, I have worked with literally dozens of musicians, from bluegrass bands to string quartets, punk rock bands to classical guitarists. I can honestly say that Kate is among my very favorite professional entertainers. It has been my pleasure to work with Kate MacLeod for the past three years as she has become a valued repeat performer duing the Estrada Institute's summer season in Torrey, Utah. Each year, the board members of the Entrada Institute look forward to her return performance. She always delivers an engaing and heart-felt show. She is truly a genuine person, a thoroughly professional musician, and a class act all the way. - Barry Scholl, Entrada, Torrey, UT

Artist:Kate MacLeod
Album: Uranium Maiden
Label: Self Released, 2022
Tracks: 17
Website: https://www.katemacleod.com
Songwriter, fiddler, and composer of thematic music, recorded over six years MacLeod pays tribute to her home state of Utah with this collection of 17 songs and instrumentals inspired by and about its landscapes and people with true stories of pioneer women, coal miners, and explorers alongside environmental issues and other contemporary themes and featuring contributions from 22-plus musicians, including Native American Nino Reyos.

Accompanied by resonating guitar, taken at a mid-tempo pace, the project begins with 'Now Is The Time To Be Alive' inspired by the journals and letters of Everett Ruess, a young artist who disappeared in the desert near Escalante in 1934, a celebration of freedom to be yourself whatever the risks ("I risk my life to crumbling sandstone/ While the clown of death will tease me. Now is the time to be alive").

Joined by Triggers and Slips and featuring fiddle solo, it's followed by the Neil-Youngish Americana of 'Time Zone', basically a song about going out with friends ("wearing our favorite hats and dresses") to hear live music while, in contrast, a duet with Reyos and featuring mountain dulcimer and Native American flute and drum, the environmentally-themed 'U-235',from whence comes the album title, questions the use of uranium for destructive purposes, Utah waters polluted from mining and many having died from being downwind of nuclear testings where "People argue over sand/Some buy and sell into the billions. Make some millions/Put a price on desert land/And watch how the uranium maiden/So innocent in repose/Can rise with its might/When misused and abused".

The first of four instrumentals comes with 'The Train Across the Great Salt Lake' built around tempo shifting guitar chugs and Mary Otterstrom's fiddle, leading into the dreamy, mandolin backed, Emmylou-like front porch folksy sway of 'Pick, Pick Apples', a song is about the thousands of fruit trees that were planted by pioneers in Fruita, now the heart of Capitol Reef National Park.

'Storm on the Desert' has more of a rock feel with its steady drum beat and closing violin solo, born of a phone argument ("our love is/When we disagree/A storm on the desert") while staying in an old haunted house as a lightning storm raged outside, followed in turn by the second instrumental, 'Apology to the Native Rock', originally featured on her Deep in the Sound of Terra album, and serving as an apology to the planet for our misuse and abuse of earth's resources.

The first of the two discs ends with the quietly fingerpicked 'Shadow Changes', Kurt Bestor-on piano and Alicia Wrigley electric bass, MacLeod sounding like a Utah answer to Sandy Denny, it's another revisiting, this time from her 2001 album Feel the Earth Spin, expressing her feelings about living in one place for a long time and "All the reasons/I will never go".

The second disc is the all acoustic side of things, kicking off with 'Red Rock', a love song to Utah's red rock country ("The grains of sand/That line the canyons and fill the miles/Are a small example of the time/That it takes to make a world wise/They are a small example of the time/That it takes to make a rock smooth/And a true example of the power of small") and another transplanted echo of Denny's English folk with Mandy Danzig's trilling mandolin and Charlotte Bell on oboe.

Robert Dow on acoustic bass, strummed and featuring fiddle and harmonica, 'Lightning Man Dreaming' is a thank you to a river guide on one of her river trips with Colorado River and Trails expeditions who carried her guitar up and back down an inclined hike strapped on his back with ropes, the title referring to cave conversations about the ancient Australian rock art of the same name and basically about connection to the land.

Mark Hazel on harmonies, the waltzing 'Angels On My Mind' dates back to the 1980s and is a true story about a friend of MacLeod, a miner in the Wilberg mine in central Utah, who was ill one day and didn't go to work. That same day the mine shaft where he would have been caught fire with the loss of 24 lives: he never returned to mining and the last verse calls for alternative "for the hard-hearted black coal" to "leave the mines lazy,…those dark-shafted fire holes".

Taking a traditional mountain music feel and commissioned by Utah Heritage Arts, again featuring mandolin and fiddle with a mingling of Harris and Parton echoes 'A Fire I Can Borrow From' is a true story based on the journals of a pioneer woman while living in a cabin in Sanpete Co. ("I woke up this morning/With the cold creeping in/Between the greasewood and the willow/And the adobe of the cabin/The first thing I'll do/Before I wake the little children/Is to see if the fire from the night/Still has a red coal burning") and how the neighbours looked out for one another.

A solo violin vignette channelling the swirling of desert 'Sand in Breeze' gives way to the last instrumental, the violin and piano arrangement of 'Sunrise on the Colorado Plateau' written about the large expanse of desert region within southeastern Utah with its similarities in both appearance and geologic history to the Grand Canyon. Attention then turns to one of Utah's most famous natives with the fingerpicked country of 'Butch Cassidy Was Here', an account of Robert Leroy Parker who went on to become the outlaw/folk hero of legend ("he took to rustling cattle/From the long arms of the rich/He fought against the onset of big business/ And he took to stealing fortunes/From the mining companies' spit/And he grew to love the smell of gold/And he grew to love the chase of it").

The musical portraits wind up with, first, Stephen Keen on accordion and Hal Cannon on harmonies, the swayalong 'Companeros On The Rio', written about a rafting trip down Cataract Canyon, in 2019, and another celebration of friendship ("We might have been strangers at the put-in/No longer strangers by the end of the Green"), and finally, striking a bluegrass note with Dan Salini on pedal steel and Hazel on harmonies, 'Every Year Among the Pines', another commission by Utah Heritage Arts, based on an annual gathering of descendants from the small town of Widtsoe, Utah, that may now be a ghost town ("The fields went dry/And hope ran thin"), but still lives in memories of "a kinder home that anyone can remember".

It may be about Utah but the experiences and sentiments should touch a chord with communities far beyond its borders, while the music and her songs assuredly make this one of the best Americana albums you'll encounter this year.

Mike Davies - Reviewer - Mike Davies