Weekly broadcasts of the
Best of Bound for Glory
Every week we feature a recording from our archive of live
Bound for Glory shows. Spend Sunday nights with us
on your radio at 93.5 FM or through the Internet.
Click here for ways to listen to the show.
Is there something you would like to hear? Email us here
RESCHEDULED!
On your radio November 17—Bob Bovee
Originally broadcast 10/29/17
“No one handles old-time cowboy and humorous songs better than Bob. His vocals are hauntingly rough. His guitar and harmonica are as good as you will ever hear. Whether performing in concert, playing for a barn dance, or on a recording, Bob….leave(s) you wanting more.” — Don Stevens, All Music Guide
Bob Bovee has traveled the country since 1971, taking old time music to audiences of all ages at festivals, fairs, concerts, dances, schools, libraries, music camps, radio and TV programs. This is rural music as played in homes, at dances and for earlier entertainments such as minstrel shows and country radio.
Along with a repertoire including dance tunes, ballads, cowboy songs, humorous and sentimental numbers, blues and rags, he spices their shows with stories, history and folklore. Bob sings (yodels, too) and plays guitar, harmonica, banjo and autoharp.
Bob is a Nebraska native whose family sang and played the old-time songs. Many of the western and railroad songs he does were learned from his grandmother. He plays banjo and autoharp, sings and yodels, and can drive a dance band with his guitar and harmonica. Bob is well known and loved for his dry and witty stage humor. He has published numerous articles and reviews for The Old-Time Herald and Inside Bluegrass and been an instructor for a course called “The History of Country Music” for the Honors Division at the University of Minnesota.
On your radio November 24—
Pierce Pettis
Originally broadcast 7/8/18
“Pierce Pettis doesn’t write mere songs, he writes literature…End to end the songwriting is brilliant…Pierce Pettis albums are events in my listening. His writing just gets better all the time and his singing is marvelous, wry and warm…”—Sing Out!
Pierce Pettis is one of this generation’s most masterful songwriters. His music is distinguished by his uncanny ability to capture universals in human experience by drawing on the humor and trials in daily life. Pettis’ music can simultaneously pull on our hearts and keep us laughing. The beautiful harmonies, inventive yet subtle percussion, strong guitar, and Pierce’s rich vocals are a constant throughout his body of work.
During his long career Pierce Pettis has been a writer at Muscle Shoals Sound Studios in Alabama, recorded for Fast Folk Musical Magazine in New York, won the prestigious New Folk songwriting competition at the Kerrville Folk Festival in Texas, and was a staff songwriter at Polygram/Universal Music Publishing in Nashville. He has received numerous songwriting awards including a 1999 ASCAP Country Music Award for “You Move Me” recorded by Garth Brooks.
Pettis is presently working on a new album for Compass Records to be released this year.
On your radio December 1—Traonach
Originally broadcast 8/26/18
“Traonoach has a deep knowledge and love of the music and a palpable zest for playing.”—Dirty Linen Magazine
Traonach is a traditional Irish ceili band that grew out of the lively and long-standing Ithaca Irish music scene. Traonach is a fortunate meeting of talented musicians from around the USA who had all, to their own amazement, ended up living in the small city of Ithaca, New York. Over the past two decades they have created a tight, driving sound that has delighted audiences at festivals and concert halls throughout the northeastern states.
Traonach is the Gaelic term for the corncrake, a reclusive bird with a sweet call once common throughout Europe, Central Asia, and Northern Africa, and, of course, Ireland. The bird is described in the sixth-century Book of Kells. Modern farming developments, particularly the increased use of machine harvesters have brought the traonach to the brink of extinction.
The musical manifestation of the traonach is alive and well. The coming and going of players in Traonach reflects the pattern of turnover in the Ithaca Irish session. In a university town people will arrive for graduate school, an academic job, or perhaps be in a transitional stage of their careers, remain for a few years and then move on.Currently, the band includes Mark Bickford on concertina, accordion, banjo; Harry Lawless on banjo, bouzouki; Tim Ball playing fiddle, and Scott Whitham playing bodhran and fiddle. Elder musician, Ed McGowan holds the main fiddle chair.
We’ll include some Thanksgiving music tonight, Including Alice’s Restaurant.
On your radio December 8—
Larry Kaplan
Originally broadcast 10/27/19
Larry Kaplan has been described as a keen and sympathetic observer of the human condition. He cares deeply and writes eloquently about the concerns of others, reflecting his profound respect for the farmers, fishermen, and the other hard working people of New England.
Originally from Boston, Larry spent many of his formative years in Maine. He helped restore, then crewed on the Schooner Bowdoin up there, and worked his way through college and graduate school. He spent some time as a night clerk in a New Orleans hotel and met his wife, Nora, one evening when he was singing in a Providence coffeehouse while doing further graduate work at Brown.
Larry has released four CDs through Folk Legacy Records, “Worth All The Telling,” “Songs For An August Moon,” “Furthermore,” and his newest, “True Enough”. No Depression, the Folk Roots Magazine, has called Larry’s music “some of the most finely crafted songs in folk music today.” He is the recipient of multiple best folk CDs of the year by leading folk radio programs across the US and Europe, and tours regularly in Europe as well as across the US.
Of his album, “Furthermore…”, reviewer Larry Looney said, “There is history and humanity and depth here just waiting to be heard….I think you’ll find yourself returning to it again and again.”
On your radio December 15—Bound for Glory Celebration! Show Highlights
From our live show on 10/20/24
Highlights from the Bound for Glory 50+ Years
Celebration! show that was held on October 20, 2024 at the Hangar Theatre in Ithaca.
On your radio December 22—
Winter Solstice show
The longest night of the year. Winter solstice is probably our oldest holiday, going back much longer than we have had writing. It’s the holiday from which all the others grew.
It’s good to celebrate. It brings us together as a community, more than as a family. And there are a whole lot of songs. Some are about the holiday itself, some are about coming together every year at this special time. And some just seem like a good idea.
There’s no ritual attached to Winter Solstice, no way of celebrating correctly. These songs come at the shortest days from many directions, and we can find our own places as we celebrate together.
On your radio December 29—
Christmas show
Join us for Christmas songs that you won’t hear in the shopping malls.
Some people celebrate Christmas as a religious holiday, some as a gathering of families, some for incredible food. And there are songs to help us all along. Christmas is very powerful, very central to a lot of people, and for hundreds of years we have had songs to help us gather.
We have famous Christmas carols and twentieth century pop songs which you know. But in addition, we have less well-known older songs, and a whole lot of songs written by newer folksingers, each taking a different view of the holiday. Most are serious, but some are just plain funny. Some will make us think.
On your radio January 5, 2025—
New Year’s show
Well, you all know Auld Lang Syne. And it won’t really surprise you that Bound for Glory will play a couple of versions of this, with different tunes.
But there’s so much more for New Year’s. There are songs to make you celebrate, songs to make you laugh, songs to make you think. Some of them are old songs, many of them are new. Some celebrate the change in the calendar, some the changes in our lives. Some will surprise you.
On your radio January 13, 2025—
Twelfth Night show
It’s the end of the holiday season, and we all have to face January in Ithaca. But there are Twelve Days of Christmas, and they cover a lot of territory.
We have songs, many of them ancient, for celebration of this particular holiday. Plus, we have wassail songs, for going door to door, begging for bread and beer, as we’re sure that you all do every year. Don’t you?
There are songs that count to twelve. Most of us know the Twelve Days of Christmas. But it’s not alone. We’ll count to twelve in many different ways.
And there are songs that just seem appropriate for the ending of this season.