let us make a record

The song was alive. It had travelled harsh seas and long roads. From the highlands of Scotland, it voyaged on rickety ships to the fog engulfed mountains of Appalachia. It was strummed on a handmade guitar, before it made its way down the mountain, into some parlor room where a quartet of well-to-dos sang it slow and mournfully. From time to time, it may have stood at the precipice of life and death, reflecting on its mortality. It had witnessed its brothers and sisters fade into the mountain fog. It saw pieces of itself—lyrics, melodies, a chorus—fade with them.   But somehow, miraculously, it endured. It found new lyrics, new melodies…a new voice to carry it down more roads. It found itself in a Cleveland, Ohio recording studio, bouncing hither and yon through the old guitar of a bespectacled young singer named Amanda Egerer. Egerer had always been drawn to the lost, hard-travelled tunes…the obscure ones, the prodigals. She didn’t come from the Scottish highlands, or the mountain hollers, or the parlor rooms, but her powerful voice reaches a kind of middle ground where those histories meet. She befriends the lonely song. She ushers it onto the next leg of its journey, like any great folk artist does.

You can listen to and purchase Amanda Egerer’s new album, Folk Songs of Many People, on itunes or at https://amandaegerer.bandcamp.com/album/folk-songs-of-many-people