Amy,

How I envy you! You are only at the beginning of your great adventure. I wish you many years of health to compound your interest (pun intended) in the musics of your choice.

I first heard a very young barefoot waif named Joan Baez in 1959 (I think) when she was opening the show for a fellow named Bob Gibson at a folk club called the GATE OF HORN in Chicago. Her voice hit us all who were in that audience then just like you said it struck you. ---- Bob Gibson mostly played banjo in those days---but there was one song that he was doing with a big 12-string guitar. That song was "Matty Groves" --- and that is how Joan learned the song. Bob Gibson's dramatic arrangement on guitar was the one Joan used----and the one you mention admiring in your first post.

You won't hear any modern songs that can describe other times and places like the graphic imagery found in the ballads (story songs) put down and remembered for us by all the unknown singers who passed their work to us via the long trail of the oral tradition. It is a real treasure hunt---one that may actually allow you to find your own personal Grail. Go for it, and enjoy!

You have found a real time machine...

Art Thieme