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focus on songwriting: Anndrena
Belcher and This Hillbilly Highway
Anndrena's performance celebrates a life lived in what
she calls the "...crux of contradiction." A child of the 1950s Eastern
Kentucky to inner city Uptown, Chicago "migration", she takes her life
to Stories, paintings, clothes ; the stories to Songs. Her Hog on Ice
Productions CD "What About My Heart? songs from a life lived in the crux
of contradiction, exemplifies both her coalfield roots, ("I sing like my
Mamaw and my Granny "), and her takes on "Ridin' Route 23/75"! Part
Holler girl, part inner city Uptown, the music lives where the two
worlds slam in to each other and are forced to share the most intimate
space. 100 year old dresses one day, her Daddy's work Britches the next.
Part Mountain Plaintive song teller, part Honky Tonk "Hillbilly
Cleopatra", says one audience member at the Summitt City in Whitesburg,
Kentucky. Spoken words hang " a little edgy, like gold dust in the
middle of an old,dark room". She beats out rhythmn on a big, black
guitar, and continues the experiment by picking the brightest and best
in musicians to help her interpret her songs! Always traditional, always
improvisational., always tellin’ the Story! These spoken words and songs
are sure to take you towards home down that crooked old Hillbilly
Highway, no matter where you come from.
"Quirky and Primitive", said someone at the. Bluebird Cafe. "A little
bit honky- tonky", said someone else. "Pure Mountain", said another.
Maybe author and oral historian Studs Terkel summed it up. "Anndrena is
one of our secret national treasures. More than ever is her gift as a
storyteller needed today. We may have lost our tribal memory, at least
for a moment. It is an artist like Anndrena Belcher who can help us
recapture it."
" When I first started letting people know I was writing songs, says
Anndrena, Studs asked me what my new work was. I told him I had been
writing a lot of songs. He said, 'come on the show, kid, and bring your
guitar and sing for me, and we'll talk about it.' "So I did!”
Ridin’ Route 23/75 is the written and performance “word album” of
Anndrena’s migration story which emphasizes the spoken versions of her
stories and poems, with a little singing as what laces it all together.
This Hillbilly Highway is a performance of the stories, but, with a
heavier emphasis on the songs. As fellow musician Phil Leonard so aptly
put it, “It’s like leafing through a book, and stopping to look at the
illustrations. Anndrena’s songs are the illustrations for her stories!”
The songs are the focus of this night. The music might make you want to
space out and listen, might make you want to dance. “Her songs and art
are bittersweet, like a picnic in a thunderstorm”! Amelia, over at
Whitesburg, Ky., says, “The songs in that second set, Whew! brutal!
Beautiful, but brutal.”
Anndrena is “proud as punch” to have Phil Leonard, (percussionist) and
Roger Rasnake, (Guitarist, Dobro Player) join her in performance! She
calls them, The Wildboys!
Anndrena Belcher and The Wildboys share an eve with Songwriter Tony
Feathers at Down Home in Johnson City, Tn. October 10th. Call:
423-929-9822 for info www.downhome.com
Oh, and …. Anndrena always brings her "Old Timey, High-Fashioned, Hiney-Binder
Bustle Jumper" along for show and sale. (It’s an Overall Dress she
created by modifying LC King Manufacturing’s “Low Backed” overalls,
turning the garment into an adjustable waisted/hipped jumper with the
option of a “Hiney- Binder” plain and/or with ruffles!!! Hah! She
produced 144 of these garments. Signs and dates each one.
www.anndrena.com (This is NOT a sweatshop product!) |
