This Week from The Flood Jam Sessions

This week's freebie from The 1937 Flood jam session features our revisiting of a Leadbelly tune.

Our weekly jam sessions often let us get reacquainted with old friends. And sometimes the old friends are old tunes. We hadn't played that great old Leadbelly standard "Midnight Special" for five or six years, but one autumn evening recently it just sort of felt like the right song for the right night. Oh, it took us a minute or two to remember how we used to do it, but after a chorus or two, it drop right back into the groove. Click here for the audio.

By the way, tunes from the jam sessions make up our weekly Flood podcasts. You can subscribe for free and get the music automatically delivered to your computer each Thursday. For details on that, click here.

From This Week's Flood Jam Session

This week's freebie from The 1937 Flood jam session features a special guest, classic bluegrass fiddler Ron Eldridge on two tunes, in two different styles.

It's always interesting when dye-in-the-wool bluegrassers wander into one of our jam sessions. There's usually one of two possible reactions when they get a whiff of The Flood's thick jumbo of blues, swing and jugband music. They either about-face and head back to the door or they grin and grab a seat at the table. (The good ones even bring their own spoon.)

You'd be hard-pressed to find a better bluegrass player today than Ron Eldridge. Ronnie grew in our area, started playing his daddy's fiddle in the late 1960s and by the mid-'70s was playing with the locally legendary Sweeney Brothers band. In the 1980s, Eldridge struck out for Nashville and has been there ever since, a solid citizen in that famed music scene and a frequent performer on The Grand Ole Opry.

But last night it was The Flood's turn and Ron showed us he could put the BLUE(S) in bluegrass. Ron was such a good sport to sample our music and in the end gave us a treat. Flying back into more familiar territory, he capped the evening with a few choruses of Bob Wills' classic, "Maiden's Prayer." Thanks, Ronnie! Click here for the audio.

By the way, tunes from the jam sessions make up our weekly Flood podcasts. You can subscribe for free and get the music automatically delivered to your computer each Thursday. For details on that, click here.

From This Week's Flood Jam Session

This week's freebie from The 1937 Flood jam session features Joe Dobbs and a gorgeous Welch melody.

Last weekend, Joe and Charlie traveled to Cincinnati to play in the wedding of Charlie's cousin, Andy Dronberger. Andy and his new bride, Melissa, wanted something different than the usual wedding music fare for their big day, so for the bride's entrance at the ceremony, we played a traditional melody, "The Ash Grove."

That haunting, beautiful old tune was still very much on our minds at last night's regular Flood jam session, when Joe shared it with the guys. Click here for the audio.

By the way, tunes from the jam sessions make up our weekly Flood podcasts. You can subscribe for free and get the music automatically delivered to your computer each Thursday. For details on that, click here.

This Week from The Flood Jam Session

This week's freebie from The 1937 Flood jam session features a classic from the annals of kazoory.

The first time we ever heard the kazoo played on the radio was in the mid-'60s when Peter, Paul and Mary took a kazoo break on "San Francisco Bay Blues." And it turns out the kazoo is generally associated with this great old tune. One-man band Jesse Fuller, who wrote the song, took a kazoo solo on his original 1962 recording of it. And then, 30 years later, super-cool Eric Clapton even took a kazoo break when he recorded it.

Of course, in The Flood, it's Brother Dave Peyton who's our hoodoo kazoo guru, and last night he spun a little of that old kazoo magic on the tune when it popped up at the jam session. Click here for the audio.

By the way, tunes from the jam sessions make up our weekly Flood podcasts. You can subscribe for free and get the music automatically delivered to your computer each Thursday. For details on that, click here.

This Week from The Flood Jam Session

This week's freebie from The 1937 Flood jam session features a rollicking rendition of a great old tune from the 1930s.

Our good friend Richard Cobb says our weekly jam session reminds him of an old-fashioned "happening." Every week, the music that happens is solely determined by who walks through the door that night.

And last night was a good example. About a third of The Flood couldn't make the session, but those of us who did were joined by buddies who came just to sit in for the evening, good folks like Jim Rumbaugh on harmonica and Randy Brown on guitar. All that music got stirred up and the next thing you know, we were whipping up a new batch of "Somebody Stole My Girl." Click here for the audio.

By the way, tunes from the jam sessions make up our weekly Flood podcasts. You can subscribe for free and get the music automatically delivered to your computer each Thursday. For details on that, click here.

This Week from The Flood Jam Session

This week's freebie from The 1937 Flood jam session features a great old riverboating tune by our fine Missouri friends Cathy Barton and Dave Para.

It was on the good old steamboat Delta Queen that we first met Dave and Cathy. Most recently, they shared the stage with us at a concert in Fairmont, W.Va. (In case you missed it, we recently posted a pair of videos from that show -- check here for that).

Anyway, a couple of weeks later, on the way home to Boonville, Mo., from Virginia, Cathy and Dave stopped to spend the evening with us and shared a few tunes at the Wednesday night jam session. The two know a passel of riverboat songs. Here's a sweet one called "The Bayou Sara" from Mary Wheeler's 1944 collection of roustabout songs, "Steamboatin' Days."Click here for the audio.

By the way, tunes from the jam sessions make up our weekly Flood podcasts. You can subscribe for free and get the music automatically delivered to your computer each Thursday. For details on that, click here.

Hear The Flood Nov. 18 -- and Help a Good Cause

The Flood comes to the Renaissance Arts Center (the old Huntington High), 900 8th Street, Huntington, WV, on Wednesday evening, Nov. 18, to help off-set a tragedy that has befallen the family of our very good friend Dale Jones, who is, of course, the heart and soul of the joyous annual Coon Sanders Nighthawks Reunion Fan Bash here.

Dale's daughter Kathy, recently had to have her left arm amputated because of complications from a blood clot. As if that were not horrible enough, this misfortune has resulted in serious financial difficulties for Kathy and her family because of the hospital bills.

Now Dale's musical family is coming together to try to assist. The Nov. 18 concert -- which will feature four local groups, including The Flood -- will be FREE, but donations will be gratefully accepted throughout the event to help with Kathy's considerable medical expenses.

Here are the groups and the schedule for the benefit concert:
 
-- The Shims, 7 - 7:30 p.m.

-- The 1937 Flood, 7:35 - 8:30 p.m.

-- The Huntington Federal Band, 8:35 - 9 p.m.

-- The Backyard Dixie Jazz Stompers, 9:05 - 10 p.m.

Please mark your calendar and come join us for a fun and important event. And, if you can, forward this message to others you think would like to attend.