Pete Seeger
serves as recording supervisor for an album of country dance music played by a five-piece "washboard band" consisting of himself on five-string banjo,
Sonny Terry
on harmonica,
Brownie McGhee
on guitar,
Frank Robertson
on bass guitar, and
William Edward Cook
on washboard.
McGhee
,
Robertson
, and
Cook
constitute the rhythm section, over which
Seeger
and
Terry
play melodies and take solos. The selections are familiar ones from the repertoires of
and of the team of
, the differences being that this time there are no vocals and the focus is on the lively tempos. The players listen to each other, but this is not a strictly rehearsed ensemble, by any means. The recording is more of a picking session at which the performers take off and continue playing until they run out of steam. That may make the music appropriate for dancers who want to stay on their feet until they can't go on anymore. ~ William Ruhlmann