Come Sit By My Side is a classic. It is roots music. The title comes from the hauntingly beautiful song, "Red River Valley," a lonesome cowboy song. Other songs from the U.S. are "My Mule Sal," a work song from the Erie Canal; "Dark as a Dungeon," about the perils of coal mining; "Banks of the Ohio," a dark song about lost love and murder; "Lonesome Valley," a gospel song; "John Hardy," a song from West Virginia; and the "Old Maid's Song," also recorded by the Limeliters.

The music is drawn from rich traditions that reach back to our roots in this country as well as Australia with "Waltzing Matilda" and the mountains of Peru with "Suspiros del Chancamayo," an Elizabethan art song, "Come Again," and a sprightly English sea chanty, "Capitol Ship."

A tremolo in Glenn Yarbrough's voice makes the songs memorable. He has a voice that could make dough rise, wrens tap their toes, roses open and hummingbirds hum. The album was released on vinyl in 1957. I was delighted to find the music re-released on a CD.

I first heard Yarbrough's celestial voice when he was the lead singer with the Limeliters, a trio popular in the 1950s and early 1960s that jump-started a folk music revival. His expressive voice is the one I remember best. He started singing at Grace Church in lower New York City at the age of 9, and 18 years later he made the record Come Sit By My Side.

Yarbrough is a veteran of the Korean War and later toured with soldier shows to Japan, Korea, the Philippines and Okinawa. He has recorded over 75 albums. This CD will touch the hearts of those who love roots music sung in the way it should be.

by Barbara Spring
Rambles.NET
13 January 2007