Pete Seeger's Rainbow Quest - with Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, and Mississippi John Hurt, Hedy West, & Paul Cadwell (2005)

Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee were among the most enduring blues acts of the post-war era, forming an association that was to last three decades. Terry's distinctive harmonica style combining whoops and hollers blended well with McGhee's warm voice and tasteful guitar picking. Along with Pete Seeger, Leadbelly and Woody Guthrie, Brownie and Sonny were part of the burgeoning New York folk scene around 1940, and in their musical reunion here with Pete they perform a captivating mix of traditional blues and folk music.

Mississippi John Hurt's superb guitar playing and gentle, expressive voice made him one of the most acclaimed figures in blues history, and his appearance here shows his skills had not diminished since his classic 1928 recordings. Hedy West brought the musical heritage of her Georgia roots to the folk revival of the 1960s and performs several songs accompanying herself on the 5-string banjo. Paul Cadwell drew his material from turn of the century ragtime and plays a number of rags, cakewalks and traditional banjo pieces.

Rare Historic Performances

Shanachie is doing a gret service to all fans of folk and blues by reissuing the mid-1960s "Rainbow Quest" TV show hosted by Pete Seeger on DVD. Each DVD features two shows. This one has an hour of Pete with the great folk-blues players Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry and a second hour show featuring Pete swapping songs and stories with Hedy West, John Hurt and Paul Cadwell. Hedy was an underappreciated singer of old time ballads and other material--she sings a civil rights song in German here--who recorded for Vanguard, among others. It is very hard to find much of her material in print these days, so it is great to get some perfomrance footage on DVD. Mississippi John was one of the great blues rediscoveres in the 1960s and his gentle perfomances and stories are charming. Paul Cadwell is a mean banjo picker of turn of the 20th century tunes. Pete is Pete--a consummate singer, musician and host. It is just a shame that the show is only an hour long as each performer deserved additional time in the spotlight. Cudos to Shanachie for putting two one-hour shows on each DVD, rather than just one. It would have been nice to get an information booklet telling more about the performers, but I'm just happy these shows are coming out on DVD, so I will not complain. July 28, 2005

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