Top of the World
Jimmy Sturr
Arlo Guthrie, Rhonda Vincent, The Jordanaires
Engineer: Tom Pick, Jeremy Welch
Rounder Select, 2002
1 CD
Catalogue #: 6104
EAN: 0682161610429
UPC: 682161610429
You save: 25%
Additional personnel includes: Frank Urbanovitch (vocals, fiddle);
Rhonda Vincent, Arlo Guthrie, Johnny Karas (vocals).
Producers: Tom Pick, Ken Irwin, Jimmy Sturr.
Recorded at Clinton Studios, New York, New York; Merit, Nashvillle, Tennessee; Derek Studios, Dalton, Massachusetts. Includes liner notes by David Royko.
TOP OF THE WORLD won the 2003 Grammy Award for Best Polka Album.
Jimmy Sturr, who's won more Grammys than you can shake a stick at, is known as the great popularizer of polka, doing his best to bring it into the mainstream. Even so, nothing could prepare the unwitting listener for the delightfully bizarre experience of TOP OF THE WORLD. Not content to merely introduce elements of pop into his sound, Sturr takes pop tunes and redoes them from top to bottom in grand polka style, with accordion and horns a-blazin'. Truly, one has not lived until one has heard Arlo Guthrie wholeheartedly deliver the classic "City of New Orleans" over a romping polka arrangement. Similarly, most Carpenters fans probably never expected such a treatment to be applied to that group's massive pop hit which gives this album its title. For some reason, Charlie Daniel's country-rock charmer "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" sounds completely at home in this context--go figure.
Tracklist
Arlo Guthrie
With the legendary folk singer and activist Woody Guthrie for a father, Arlo Guthrie had some big shoes to fill. It is a testament to the younger Guthrie's talent and charisma that he made a name for himself as a beloved folk singer in his own right and will most likely be remembered as a generational spokesperson for years to come. His 1967 anti-Vietnam song "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" became radio fodder, and was even made into a cult film. Guthrie performed at Woodstock, and had a top-20 hit in 1972 with Steve Goodman's poignant "City of New Orleans." Guthrie has continued to perform and release albums regularly, but is also known as a spokesperson in the fight against Huntington's Disease, the ailment that killed his father.
Rhonda Vincent
Vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Rhonda Vincent was a bluegrass child prodigy, already playing semi-professionally with a family band by the time she was in kindergarten. After recording several straight bluegrass albums on Rebel Records, Vincent switched to major label Giant and made a go of it as a new traditionalist-style country singer, then returned once again to bluegrass. Back in her element, she flourished, further developing her pop-influenced style (often with her band The Rage), which made good use of her yearning, emotion-filled vocals and precise mandolin and fiddle playing.
Related links:
Jimmy SturrArlo Guthrie
Rhonda Vincent
The Jordanaires
Polka
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