Doc Watson has such a large catalog of material that it is hard to pick out just one or two when you come across them in a store.\u00a0 But my love for bluegrass gospel drew me to On Praying Ground<\/i>. It is a collection of sacred songs, most of which are old classic tunes that Doc pours his love and soul into.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
For nearly every song on the album, Doc\u2019s signature guitar style is clearly evident.\u00a0 What makes it even better is that Doc used a backing band that included Jerry Douglas on dobro, Sam Bush on mandolin, and Jack Lawrence on guitar.\u00a0 A stellar cast!\u00a0 Yet while his group certainly augments Doc\u2019s always incredible guitar picking, they never overshadow him.\u00a0 The blind guitar virtuoso gives each song his own flourish, from the bright upbeats songs like \u201cYou Must Come in at the Door,\u201d \u201cI\u2019ll Live On,\u201d and a lovely version of \u201cUncloudy Day,\u201d to more down tempo tunes like \u201cPrecious Lord\u201d and \u201cFarther Along.\u201d<\/p>\n
Watson also resurrects some positively antique songs for this disc.\u00a0 \u201cBeautiful Golden Somewhere\u201d is a late 19th<\/sup> century tune that Doc chooses to sing alone with his harmonica.\u00a0 His baritone, sometimes wavering with his age, is a striking lead for this song.\u00a0 Another is labeled as “Christmas Lullaby” in the track listing, but is also found in old hymn books as \u201cHush My Babe\u201d and various other titles; it was written by Isaac Watts around 1715.\u00a0 Similarly, the a cappella quartet song, \u201cDid Christ O\u2019er Sinners Weep,\u201d dates back to the 1700s.\u00a0 It is great to hear artists like Watson breathe new life into songs that could well have been forgotten with time.\u00a0 The only downside to \u201cWeep\u201d is the recitation of the 3rd<\/sup> Chapter of St. John played over a repeat of the first verse.\u00a0 I am not big on recitations, and would have much preferred to hear the original third and\/or fourth verse in its place, but it is a good track nonetheless. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n On Praying Ground<\/i> is a simply produced window into the front porch style gospel singing that is a common cultural staple of the mountains in western North Carolina where Doc was born.\u00a0 Even with a knockout cast of backing musicians, Doc keeps the focus on the lyrics to these songs, which in sacred songs, are arguably the most important feature.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88,"featured_media":31114,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6943],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-42800","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-doc-watson","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42800","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/88"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42800"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42800"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}