The music on this cassette is the product of over two years of face-to-face recordings I collected from various regions of the country. About one-third of the artists here represent the Pacific Northwest, where I have been living over the past five years or so. I chose the Carter Family as the focus of the project mostly because their music is the foundation of American songwriting. The songs say so much, and in such a direct way. And while the Carters did not actually write a great deal of these songs from their reperotoire, A.P. Carter traveled to great lengths to learn as many songs as he could from the people he met, and eventually he cannonized them in the Carter Family catalog. I tried to keep that idea present by collecting all of these songs firsthand on my various consumer-grade cassette recorders, not accepting any remote submissions. I’ve written a brief summary of each recording session to document the adventure that this project was and all the wonderful folks I met along the way. Thank you very much for listening to this project that has been so dear to me over the past couple of years! A portion of the proceeds from this album will benefit Rita Forrester and the Carter Family Fold in Virginia. -Markly Morrison
released 13 May 2011
All songs recorded on portable cassette recorders by Markly Morrison except #8. Individual artist credits are found in the link to each track.
The cover art was designed and drawn by David Lasky, and colored by Frank Young. Check out their blog for updates on their upcoming Carter Family graphic novel, "Don't Forget This Song" by visiting
carterfamilycomix.blogspot.com