Sally Soren’s Folk Minute-With Harry Smith’s Anthology Of American Folk Music In Mind

CD Review

By Zack James 

Harry Smith’s Anthology Of American Folk Music, 3 CD set, Smithstonian/Folkway, 1988  

 

No question Sally Soren, Sal to her coming of age friends in Gloversville out in the wilds of Massachusetts, meaning outside of fifty miles of Boston and so a little late in most trends as they spread out to the radius had a voice that would make the angels weep for their inadequacies once she hit that high white note that every singer and every instrumentalist dreams of hitting. Hitting that big fat note and then have it drift unto the bay or the seas to head to far off lands to let them too weep like their brethren angels. Sal had dreamed of a career in music, maybe in opera, maybe in some chorus or choir doing the big finish solos, maybe on Broadway if things worked out. Of course that desire was tempered by the reality that her parents, Phil and Nancy, were devout members of the Brethren of the Common Life, an off-shoot about a hundred years before from the Mennonites out in Ohio. A schism of some sort which left both sides not on speaking terms since both sides saw the other as “infidels” and heathens when the heaven deal went down.   

Now all of this schism business, all the religious factionalism wouldn’t ordinarily stop any young musical talent from sweeping the angels aside with their voices. Wouldn’t have stopped Sal if she had grown up in another family from taking a shot at opera, Broadway, whatever but these Brethren folk, Sal’s folks did not believe that the human voice should be used for any other purpose that to sing praises to the Lord, to God and certainly not be used to make those disgruntled angels weep. So one Sal Soren was forced to hide her light under a basket, had to sing, officially sing anyway, only come the weekly gatherings at church on Thursday night and Sunday morning. She was destined to not show her stuff.

Maybe the Brethren could have imposed their strict dicta a lot better when they were out in an isolated community in rural Ohio in the late 19^th century. But Sal lived in the quick start 1960s, had come of age when things were jumping and although she might have been behind the curve where social trends were concerned she was not living in a bubble. So she came in contact with the wicked old world when she began Gloversville High after her family had moved there when her father’s company had moved to be nearer the high technology industries that were booming along Route 128 in the ring around Boston. Moreover beside that lovely voice Sal was a beauty, had long brownish blonde hair worn straight in the Brethren manner, had a slender figure, great well-turned legs and a winning natural smile and despite her somewhat social backwardness had a winning personality to match. Pretty smart too. In other words a target for every high school boy with blood in his veins to take a run at.             

At first Sal dismissed every “hit” out of hand not knowing exactly what to do under the circumstances except she knew that her parents would not approve of her speaking to boys, especially non-Brethren boys of which there were virtually none in Massachusetts. Those that did live in the state were out in the Berkshires someplace. So Sal lived a life of what some long ago poet of quiet desperation. But go back to that time frame in which Sal came of age-the early 1960s in America. Put that together with the fierce determination of one Bradley Fox to get past step one with Sal, get way past step one that even an ignorant Brethren boy would understand.      

One day as he was walking past the Soren homestead he heard Sal sitting on her front porch singing something he thought sounded like the old redemption hymn Amazing Grace although the words were different from what he had heard when it was sung by the choir at his church. That was his “hook.” That night he was almost feverish thinking up lines to use to break the ice with Sal, to get her to not dismiss him out of hand like she had half of his friends (the other half had given up before they even started based on that mass of previous strike-outs). The next day as he passed Sal at her locker he started humming the melody to Amazing Grace and out of the blue she asked him whether that song he was humming was Amazing Grace. Bingo. Bradley told her that was his favorite hymn at his church, that he really liked church music and so much other blather. Sal said she thought that was ironic since she was preparing to sing that hymn, or the Brethren version of that song at the next Sunday gathering. Naturally Brad asked what other hymns she knew and would she sing them to him. Sal gave him a bright smile and said she would not ordinarily do so but since it was church music she would meet him at Rockland Park after school and sing him some of the hymns that she knew if he was interested.   

That afternoon started the education of Sal Soren in the modern world, the teenage world of Gloversville after she performed for Bradley. Of course Bradley asked her out and got a big blank from her. When he asked why she told him of her religious beliefs, really her parents’ which precluded going on any date with a non-Brethren boy.

Here though is where Bradley knew a thing or two about how to win over parents, or at least these parents. See Bradley was all hopped up on the folk scene in Cambridge where there had been an explosion of people singing roots music, searching for some kind authentic America that they didn’t see around them just then. So everybody was familiar with Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music and familiar too that old crazy like a fox Harry had put a big helping of hymnal music from the folk, black and white, down South in the eighty or so songs that made up his anthology. Bradley told Sal that he wished to meet her parents to ask them for permission to take her on a date. Although he did not call it a date, said he was taking her to a place where they sang hymns that he loved and that he hoped she would too. To round out his plan he gave them a few hymns like Great God Jehovah and Higher Love that he thought would be played there. Told them that he and Sal would be going to a social (he didn’t say church social although he had that as a back-up if they balked he was that ready to tempt hell to get at Sal). Of course all he was really doing was trying to snow Sal parents since what he was going to do was take her to a folk club, a coffeehouse in Cambridge.             

Somehow they bought his story, allowed Sal to go with him (except not on Saturday night since they had their gathering the next morning early). They had a great time after Sal got over the fact that Bradley wasn’t completely truthful to her parents, or to her for that matter. She liked the music played (not one hymn) and peppered him with questions about who was singing and where the songs came from. Sal and Bradley would go together all through the rest of high school and the first couple of years he was in college before Sal decided that she had to move to New York, to Greenwich Village, to see if she could make a go of it as a folk singer (she did, but not under the name Sal Soren). By then Bradley Fox knew every hymn in old Harry Smith’s anthology (and a few more) to get Sal out of the house. Knew them cold. What do you think about that my friends. For the rest of what Harry had gathered in his travels check this three CD compilation out.