Ann Savoy – Another Heart
This is an impressive CD with a 50-page stitched insert of liner notes, color images & lyrics. It’s like the good old days. That said, the set starts with a raw guitar blend that slides into sprightly fiddles, Cajun French & descriptive English lyrics & a full-tilt stab performance on “Cajun Love Song,” that just rollicks along with frivolity. I like this…a lot.
Vocally, Ann Savoy (guitar/harmonies) has a warm inclination toward folk singer Ferron & early Cris Williamson & when she tackles Richard Thompson’s “A Heart Needs a Home,” her poignancy is pure, delicate & original. This was always the kind of songwriting I admired. But when someone like Ann can cover another artist’s composition & add ingredients to age it & refine it, it becomes a near-classic, a traditional entity & this is why Richard Thompson’s also a treasure. Ann Savoy takes his work & knows exactly how to put new clothes on it & adds a faithful ballad intimacy.
One surprise that surfaces vividly on Another Heart (Drops April 19/Smithsonian Folkways/45:00) is the now classic yet at first, obscure Kinks song by leader Ray Davies “Waterloo Sunset.” It’s one of the most beautiful melodies ever written & Ann adds her distinctive tone & an old English rock song becomes an Appalachian-oriented treasure. Yeah, miracles happen.
The producer Dirk Powell along with Ann helped make this happen. It’s serendipity. Many who don’t understand music tossed off Elvis Presley since he didn’t write his songs. But what’s not realized is that being an interpretive singer takes skill (Sinatra, Crosby, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole & Johnny Mathis – all interpretive singers). Ann has a rich voice too, a skill to interpret & ultimately make a song she did not write — her own, decisively.
More traditionally Savoy’s original “Gable’s New Year’s Lament,” with an undercurrent of Iris DeMent rural sensibility captures the essence, the misty mountains, the rushing trout streams & chimney smoke.
The CD includes generous renditions of Bruce Springsteen, Donovan & Sandy Denny. It’s a well-thought-out nostalgic step back in a McGarrigle Sisters manner with “Time Goes On, My Love” as Ann Savoy’s vocal precision allows something old to be new again. On Joni Mitchell’s “Tin Angel,” she drifts with poignancy similar to the airy vocal tonality of the late Judee Sill (“The Kiss”).
Highlights – “Cajun Love Song,” “A Heart Needs a Home,” “Waterloo Sunset,” “Gable’s New Year’s Lament,” “Stolen Car,” “Triste Samedi (A Sad Saturday/A Hurricane Song),” “Time Goes On, My Love,” “Tin Angel” & “Who Knows Where The Time Goes?”
Musicians – Joel Savoy (electric lead guitar/swamp blues & feedback guitar/fiddles), Chad Viator (lead guitar), Sonny Landreth (slide guitar), Dave Hanson (bass), Mike Burch & Danny Devillier (drums), Kelli Jones (harmony) & Daniel Gale (strings) & Dirk Powell (harmony/fiddle/mandolin/accordions/banjo/bass/flute/baritone guitar/high gut string guitar/mellotron/sounds/percussion/drone/shruti box).
Color image courtesy of Gabrielle Savoy. CD @ Bandcamp & Amazon + https://folkways.si.edu/news-and-press/another-heart & https://www.annsavoy.com/
