Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams | Live at Levon's!
(Royal Potato Family)
The Hudson Valley's first couple of roots music offer an eclectic celebration of Americana on this collection of a dozen tunes recorded before a live audience at Levon Helm Studios in Woodstock, where multi-instrumentalist Larry Campbell led the Midnight Ramble Band for a decade or so in support of the venue's namesake. Joined by his singer-guitarist wife and musical partner Teresa Williams and backed by stellar regional talents including drummer Justin Guip, bassist Jesse Murphy, and Brian Mitchell on keyboards, accordion, and mouth harp, Campbell takes the crowd on a genre-hopping journey through jump blues, jazz, blues rock, bluegrass, and soul, on original compositions and numbers by the likes of Rev. Gary Davis, John Sebastian, Bill Monroe, Johnny Cash, and Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs.
Louis Prima's "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah" is a perfect showcase for Williams's acrobatic, colorful vocals and features great interplay between Campbell's guitar and Mitchell's accordion. "Angel of Darkness," a Campbell-Jorma Kaukonen cowrite, highlights Campbell's Mark Knopfler-like guitar countermelody dancing around Williams's sensual voice. Campbell draws upon the full panoply of stringed instruments, including mandolin, fiddle, and pedal steel guitar, making it all sound easy as he dazzles with his fleet, eloquent playing. This is showcased in a psychedelic version of Duke Ellington's classic "Caravan" in which he displays a mastery of guitar styles from swing to rockabilly to zydeco with even a taste of surf guitar. More than the sum of its parts, however, the album celebrates the couple's love.
