Tom Rush and I go back a way. (OK, surely the first sentence ever in which he and Jerry Clark have shared space.) For some unclear reason I recall the first time I heard of him, which was, um, not last month. A college friend mentioned that she'd recently purchased the new Tom Rush album. A folk novice in those days, I replied, "You mean Tom Paxton, don't you?" No, she insisted; she had the guy's name right. So I decided to check him out, and I've been a fan since.

To remove any suspense from what follows, Voices is Tom Rush in splendid form. If you know Rush's music -- preserved in a whole lot of studio and live albums since the early 1960s, all but a handful (notably his latter Columbia discs in the 1970s, when somebody got the bright idea that Rush ought to be produced as if a rock singer) of enduring quality -- I don't have to tell you they are wondrous creations. They stand up under as many listenings as you care to subject them over years and decades. Which are many, in my experience.

Rush's 1968 The Circle Game, which championed songs by James Taylor, Joni Mitchell and (a teenaged and sounding like it) Jackson Browne, is known for ushering in the singer-songwriter era which would occupy the same acoustic room in popular music that folk had held during the earlier part of the decade. On the other hand, Rush himself has penned relatively few songs. Some of those few are pretty spectacular, for example the coldly lovely "No Regrets" (on Circle) and the death-haunted, tradition-inspired "Merrimac County" (Wrong End of the Rainbow).

As he prepared for Voices, Rush surprised himself by conjuring up a batch of originals. Till then, he'd recorded no more than about 20 such, which means that the 10 that appear here comprise fully one-third of those with Rush bylines. The songs range from wry observation on life and love to sober meditation on the diminishing miles ahead. "Cold River" has the feeling of a 19th-century murder ballad. But it's the title song that may end up being as sturdily encased in memory as "Regrets" and "Merrimac." Each cut, however, is carefully crafted and finely sung in Rush's rich, warm voice, which has lost little of its expressive power over time.

Unlike some others of his generation, Rush has always felt at ease in his folksinger skin. He's been a distinctive interpreter of traditional music from the first. Happily, Voices features two oldtime African-American songs, "Elder Green" (associated with Lead Belly) and "Corina, Corina" (Mississippi Sheiks), and that makes me very happy. They showcase everything I have liked in the decades I have lived in Rush's aural company.

If you don't know the guy, Voices is as good as any place to get acquainted. Afterwards, you don't have to thank me. Just treat yourself to more from his admirable body of work, and then rejoice that the man is still among us.