Best live performance of a musician

Subject: Best live performance of a musician
From: Leadbelly
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 02:11 PM

Please think it over! In your opinion, which was the best performance of a single folk-musician you have had the chance to listen to? Don't mean on the radio but live.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Wesley S
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 02:20 PM

I doubt that many of us could narrow it down to one. And I can't say they are the "best" so I'll call these favorites. I'll mention Tom Rush last November as a fine performance. And John Hammond in a small club back in the 90's. I could think of more but I'll stop there.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 04:06 PM

The late John Stewart in San Diego a few years ago at a reunion concert with old Kingston Trio mates, Nick Reynolds and Bob Shane.
John was not only a large physical presence on stage, he commanded your attention with a spiritual sort of power that almost defies description. He did it without staging, gesturing or pyrotechnics. He did it the "old fashioned way" - force of personality and musical talent. A big loss.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Bert
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 10:26 PM

I'll go with Wesley, You can't narrow it down to one.

How could anyone decide between Seamus Kennedy singing "McDonald deformed farm" and Bill Sables singing "The Lambtom Worm". And that is leaving out hundreds of others.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 11:14 PM

I saw Joan Baez in concert and she was awesome. Also Limelighters were great in concert..likewise Maura O'Connell...mg

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: GUEST,Bob Ryszkiewicz
Date: 06 Mar 08 - 11:15 PM

Hard/near impossible to get it down to one, but -

1/ Roger "Jim" McGuinn, Montreal, Golem, early 1980's
2/ Chuck Berry, Rhode Island College, circa 1966(he's "Folk" to me kids)
3/ Bruce Murdoch, La Sala Rossa. Montreal, January, 2008
4/ Tom Rush, Rhode Island. late 60's
5/ Jesse Winchester, Montreal, The Yellow Door, early 70's
6/ Penny Lang, Montreal, La Sala Rossa, late 2007
7/ Ken Lyon, Providence, Rhode Island, Mouthpiece, circa 1967
8/ Doc Watson, Montreal, Back Door, early 70's
9/ John Hammond, Montreal, Back Door, early 70's
10/ David Rea, Montreal, Back Door, early 70's
11/ Yngwie Malmsteen, Steve Vai, Joe Satriani, Montreal, Bell Center, circa 2003

And the winner is,(if I HAD to pick ONE;) although they are all just about equal -
Roger "Jim" McGuinn. Incredible he was involved in that many hits.
A memorable evening...
bob

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 02:38 AM

Peter Bellamy, The Grove, Leeds 1971 or 2.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: redsnapper
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 04:47 AM

It's very hard to narrow this down... I've seen a number of exceptional performances by individuals. One that does stick in my memory though is by the late Isaac Guillory in the late 1980s. Another was by the late Jo-Ann Kelly (much later a friend) in Reading in 1970.

RS

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 05:20 AM

Piss on a rope by Ian Maver in the local a couple of weeks ago.
Very strong song sung with passion and probably not to everyones taste.
Maddy Prior at LEeds Irish club in the eighties
(I know she was singing just to me!)
All the performers at Gainsbro FC,The Tap and Spile in Grimsby,Stokesly Music club,The Station,Loftus, Staithes music Fest,
Cottingham live,Flaxton FC,The three Tunns hotel in Thirsk.
And so many others
All exceptional for the passion,and the joy of the singing and playing.
All stars on the night and all now hero's of mine

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Grab
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 08:22 AM

Bob, how do you rate Malmsteen, Vai and Satriani as folk musicians? ;-)

Either Bert Jansch or Dougie Maclean for me, I think.

Graham.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: dj bass
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 08:29 AM

Brenda Wootton, Wadebridge 1976 (I think - could have been 75). She could and did go from rousing chorus with the whole room singing their hearts out to the quietest ballad in which you could hear a pin drop. Stunning!

DJ

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: mattkeen
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 09:20 AM

Yves Lambert (& le Bébert Orchestra) Sidmouth 2007

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 09:43 AM

Jack Hudson next Tuesday at The Vernon Arms, Locko Road, Spondon, Derby. Two quid to get in and a free buffet in the interval.

Only one song floorspots on a guest night. One Quid to get in, if you're a singer.

Surely the most distinctive voice ever to come out of Derbyshire, and a fabulous songwriting talent.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: redsnapper
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 09:47 AM

That's setting the poor man a high target WLD!

RS

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Midchuck
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 10:06 AM

No.1: Josh White, Sr., in the Middlebury College Chapel, late fall '59 (my freshman year). Yes, 48 1/2 years ago, and I still think it was the best.

No. 2: a tie:

Doc Watson, solo, at the old Club 47 (what is now Passim, in Harvard Square, Cambridge, MA), sometime in the mid-sixties. I got a seat where I was, almost literally, at risk of an eye injury if he had broken a string. (But he didn't.)

Tom Russell, October 2001, at a pub/hotel in Castleford, UK. Full of noisy drunks - but they were British noisy drunks. So they sang along with all the songs, rather than ignoring the performer and talking loudly among themselves, as American noisy drunks would.

Peter.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: GUEST,jeff
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 10:32 AM

"...but they were BRITISH noisy drunks. So, they sang along w/all the songs rather than ignoring the performer and talking loudly among themselves, as American noisy drunks would."

A more perfect statement reflecting the performance experiences I've had in the UK vs USA. The difference betweeen a culture of cultivation as opposed to consumption. Thank you, Peter.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: irishenglish
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 10:43 AM

Waterson:Carthy at the Turning Point in Piermont, NY some years back, my first time seeing any of them. Johnnie Johnson at the same place, Fairport Convention at the Worcester Centrum in November, 1987, Great Big Sea at the Bowery Ballroom in NYC. I'm sure I could go on, but that Waterson:Carthy still gives me chills thinking about years on, it was that damn good!

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: GUEST,Bob Ryszkiewicz
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 11:22 AM

Grab: It's all music to me. I prefer to let categorizers do the categorizing. But truthfully, I wrote it up late at night and only saw "RE: Best live performance of a musician" in the thread subject header, and I just went nuts...
It was only after the fact that I read the poster's request that it was about "Folk"...And wouldn't it be fun to put an acoustic guitar in Malmsteen's, or Vai's or Satriani's hands and have them sing a Folk song? Would be pretty interesting. And you know what, I think if you asked each one, what Folk song influenced you? You'd get some informative answers...And an incredible performance if they each played that Folk song...

<:0) bob

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: The Mole Catcher's Apprentice (inactive)
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 11:28 AM

I too prefer not to pigeon hole, I'll leave that to the pigeon holers *LOL*
For sheer raw emotion, there were (maybe they're still there) a couple of very early pieces of film from either Oh Boy or 6.5 Special, of Cliff Richard and The Drifters (later The Shadows),on You Tube. I'd always thought of Cliff Richard as he was and is later in his career, but this early British rock n' roll was a real eye opener for me.
I note that the thread title is "best live performance of a musician (genre-free)
For actual live, right there is person. Billy Bragg in Victoria BC a couple of years ago

Charlotte (the view from Ma and Pa's piano stool)

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 11:34 AM

Right! There couldn't be just one. In addition to John Stewart, the following also made a deep impression:

    Jesse "Lone Cat" Fuller doing his one-man-band thing at   
            the "Renaissance" in Fresno, CA in 1959
    Bud & Travis at the "Purple Onion," San Francisco
    The original Kingston Trio at the "Hungry i" in SF
    Sam Hinton at the "Ash Grove" in LA and in a friend's living room
            in San Diego around 1972
    Travis Edmonson (solo) at "The End" in Tacoma, WA in 1962
    The Limeliters in an early concert in LA, circa 1963
    Harry Chapin - for sheer fun and energy on stage - great story
            songs, too long for radio
    Josh White. I never was able to see him in his prime, but film
            I have seen shows a powerful energy and prodigious
            musical ability that had audiences mesmerized. His
            impact has been seen as mixed. Some purists think he
            became too "polished." His take was that he wanted
            people - all people - to understand the words and meaning
            of the songs. He worked on his diction and phrasing to
            that end and popularized music that might otherwise have
            stayed in the rural south. He also almost paid the
            ultimate price during the McCarthy era.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: Amos
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 11:48 AM

HEy, TJ -- I tried to send you a PM but you probably don't use your log-in very often, choosing instead to log in as a GUest.

Would you switch over to your formal log in so we can exchange a couple of messages? Thanks,

A

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: PoppaGator
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 02:43 PM

The couple of times I saw Pete Seeger live ~ both at Newport, way back in the mid-60s ~ were very memorable. Pete's unique ability to engage an entire large crowd and get everyone singing together was an experience like no other.

I've witnessed about 10-12 Bob Dylan shows over the years, and they included some of the best and some of the worst indvidual live perfomances I've witnessed, at least to my taste.

The first time was a good one, at Rutgers University fieldhouse shortly before the release of "Bringing It All Back Home"; this was part of Bob's final tour as a solo act, and he performed some unexpecedly strange new songs ("Gates of Eden," "Mr. Tamborine Man," "It's All Right Ma," etc.) without backing musicians. The recordings of most of these new pieces would soon be released with studio accompaniment (i.e., at least Bruce Langhorne on 2d guitar, if not with full bands), and would always be performed with groups ever afterwards.

The last time I saw Bob was pretty damn good, too. Although I understand that there are many folks out there who just don't "get" Bob's singing, many of us do, and most of us seem to agree that he has finally, after many years, become consistently good at what he does.

My other favorite live-music experiences have included many Grateful Dead shows. I don't expect very many Mudcatters to have shared this experience, but I'm sure some of you reading this know, as I do, that there is nothing like a Grateful Dead show. Er, make that "was," not "is." R.I.P., Jerry, it'll never be the same without you.

Subject: RE: Best live performance of a musician
From: topical tom
Date: 07 Mar 08 - 05:37 PM

Undoubtedly, there have been several, but I would first have to mention Pete Seeger in his performances at Salle Wilfrid Pelletier in Montreal during the 70's and 80's. He can get everyone singing and in harmony!
During the 70's at Mike Regenstrief's Golem coffee house Tom Paxton moved the audience to laughter and to tears within minutes.And we were always invited to sing along, which is, to me, a crowning touch in a folksinger.
Eric Bogle at the Golem did the same, moving the audience to laughter and to tears in turn.True folk legends, all!