Laurie Lewis has been making bluegrass, old-time, and folk music since her early 20s in the 1970s, when she joined the bluegrass scene in northern California. Trees, her latest album, features tunes accented by fiddle, banjo, acoustic guitar and upright bass, not to mention accordion and mandolin. It’s the sound of the ages coupled with themes that have been with us as long. Love and mortality have been part and parcel of song since the dawn of time, after all, as has our affinity of nature. Or, to put it another way, Trees is sure to hit home with folks who enjoy thoughtful treatises on life and living.
The 12-track album features covers of songs by Bill Morrissey, Tom T Hall, John Hartford, Kate MacLeod and Mark Simos alongside Lewis’s own originals. The opening “Just a Little Ways Down the Road” celebrates the joy and escape that nature walks provide her. I’d wager that’s it’s one of few songs inspired by environmental philosopher John Muir (1838-1914)—not that one need know that to enjoy the banjo-fiddle interplay or her lyrics, which turn the nature trek into a reflection on life’s journey: “Where did I come from? Where will I go? Just a little ways down the road.”
“Enough” continues with the ecological theme, with Lewis singing of the wildfires and torrential rain that Northern California has faced in recent years: “Everything I love is disappearing from the land/so I squeeze my eyes shut/for I’ve seen more than I can stand/But then I see the way we used to dance/the fields of flowers and the nights of romance/And I open my eyes again and reach for your hand.” “Texas Wind,” another original, hits home in another way. It’s a love song to a person, time and place.
“Why’d You Have to Break My Heart (for J.P.),” for its part, reflects on the passing of John Prine, which she learned about while making coffee at the start of her day: “Now a song’s just a song and it’s probably not gonna change the world/We’ve rhymed every rhyme and every melodical twist has been curled/But damn, man, you had an art—you could make me laugh and then tear out my heart/I want to give back, so I guess that I’ll start by returning the line you once sent my way/Why’d you have to break my heart so early in the day?”
Her cover of Kate MacLeod’s “The Day Is Mine” is another highpoint, echoing the sentiments of many a bluegrass tune: “Someday I will turn my gaze into a tunnel of light/Until that time when I am swept away, the day is mine.” The album’s closing track, “Rock Your Pain Away,” is a tender vow to help a loved one through a tough time.
The Old Grey Cat 