Bound to Go

On Bound to Go, Andrew Calhoun delves into one of the American song bag's most inspirational niches, tunes that were composed in response to the history of slavery in the American South. There are spirituals with their thinly veiled messages of liberation, love songs and lullabies, work songs, prison songs, tunes that show an obvious African influence, and one song collected from the African-American soldiers who fought for the United States in World War I. Calhoun is joined by 14 fervent vocalists and eight musicians who support the singers with their understated power. Some of the album's 35 tracks are well-known, at least to folkies, but most are not, the result of Calhoun's exhaustive research and a determination to present unfamiliar songs telling this timeless story of inspiration and faith in the face of a system of indifferent evil. Most of the tunes are short, but they're all undeniably powerful. There are so many transcendent moments here that it's hard to highlight just a few. As the album unfolds — and this is an album in the old sense, a unified work that holds together as a single work of art — you can feel your spirit unfolding, lifted up by the power that generations of unknown composers and singers have put into these songs. That said, there are still moments that jump out at you: "Turkle Dove," with a tune that echoes through a dozen folk songs, sung in the jubilee gospel style by Casey Calhoun, Andrew Calhoun, and Fred Campeau; "Run to Jesus," a song given to the Fisk Jubilee Singers by Frederick Douglass, the first song he ever heard that made him think of a life beyond slavery, delivered simply by Runako Robinson, Valerie Carter-Brown, Big Llou Johnson, Tony Dale, Fred Campeau, and Katherine Davis; "Them Old Black Gnats," an a cappella song of suffering with a hidden message of resistance marked by Big Llou Johnson's mournful baritone; "Anchor Line," a mournful blues with an implied message of escape on the underground railroad sung by Andrew Calhoun (the tune is also known as "The Crawdad Song"); and "Ol' Egyp'," a chilling song of escape from the bloodhounds of the slave masters. "Hear the Trumpet Sound," a staple from the songbook of the Fisk Jubilee Singers with mournful cello accompaniment, is a song full of resolute faith and somber resignation. ~ j. poet, Rovi