Bill Frisell: The Best of Bill Frisell: Vol. 1 - Folk Songs

In his liner notes to The Best of Bill Frisell: Vol. 1 - Folk Songs, the singer (and occasional song writing collaborator with Frisell), Elvis Costello writes: "We now live in a time where I believe we all hear very well beyond the old stop-signs and signposts of 'jazz' and 'folk.'" Beyond the circle of listeners likely to enjoy this particular compilation by guitarist Frisell—in some bottle-throwing redneck music bar in Texas, for instance, late on a Friday night—Costello is being overly optimistic. But times have certainly changed, and if you are still reading this review, you'll probably agree with him, up to a point.

The development is, of course, to be welcomed. For in the right hands, like Frisell's, country music takes on a new life, one that is irony-free and respectful of the genre's rich guitar playing and song writing traditions.

The Best of Bill Frisell: Vol. 1 - Folk Songs chronicles Frisell's deepening love of country music—old time, bluegrass, blues and other Americana—over eight albums recorded for Nonesuch between 1990 and 2002. Only six of the 15 tracks are treatments of existing country songs, the others having been written by Frisell as acts of loving homage to the genre. And less than half of them feature country colorings by banjo, dobro or pedal steel guitar (there's no mandolin at all), the emphasis remaining pretty firmly on Frisell's guitars throughout. But all the source material is definitively "country," and Frisell's improvisations are as much country as they are jazz. His airy and atmospheric playing is beautiful beyond category, an eloquent denial of stereotypes. Ultimately, as the bandleader and composer Duke Ellington famously said: "It's all just music."

Among the treasures is the traditional song "Shenandoah," which Frisell has dedicated to the guitarist Johnny Smith, creator of one of the most gorgeous electric guitar albums ever—Moonlight In Vermont (Roulette), a collection of singles made with saxophonist Stan Getz in 1952—but who is still generally uncelebrated. (Even the rhapsodic Swiss guitarist Wolfgang Muthspiel, when spoken to by AAJ in 2005, professed never to have heard of him).

Maybe The Best of Bill Frisell: Vol. 1 - Folk Songs will do something to lift Smith's contribution out of obscurity. But even if it doesn't, it's a thing of rare joy and beauty.

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