1977 Portable Folk Festival

General Note/Comment

• Three reel to reels. Johnny Shines was a blues singer-guitarist who once traveled with famed blues singer Robert Johnson. He was re-discovered in the 1960s during the folk revival boom, and played festivals throughout the 1960s and 1970s. His sound was very similar to Robert Johnson's, and here he played several Johnson songs. Bluegrass and Kentucky mountain music singer Phyllis Boyens (who later appeared in the film Cola Miner's Daughter as Loretta Lynn's mother) and Nimrod Workman (who also had a bit part in the same film) released the album Passing Through the Garden in 1976, and they were promoting that album at this performance. Workman was a former coal miner and union organizer in Kentucky. Bessie Jones, born in inland Georgia, promoted Georgia Sea Island songs, and later in the 1960s formed the Georgia Sea Island Singers. She died in Brunswick Georgia in 1984. The Red Clay Ramblers was a part of the "New-Grass" movement of the 1970s, forming in 1972. The Chapel Hill, North Carolina-based group featured Tommy Thompson (1937-2003) (banjo), Jim Watson (guitar/mandolin), Jack Herrick (guitar), Mike Craver (piano), and Bill Hicks (fiddle). Conway was a scholar at Appalachian State University and filmmaker of Appalachian culture, and an associate of the Red Clay Ramblers. She introduced Shines and the Red Clay Ramblers at the concert.