Program Notes

American Folk Song Suite

Arthur Frackenpohl, composer

This delightful and charming suite based on four American folk songs that use "blue notes" (flatted third, sixth, and seventh degrees of the major scale). Each folk song is unique. "He’s Gone Away" lyrically tells a tale of loneliness while "John Henry" is jazzily powerful and ironic. "Go Away from My Window" is a slow, love lament, a folk song from the Ozarks, while "Mama Don’t Allow" is a fast swinging "bass slappin’" dance. This is light-hearted music with jazz and American spiritual idioms—a tasty bit of American folklore.

—WGM

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