Live At Oberlin College 1965
Mississippi John Hurt
Live At Oberlin College 1965 documents Mississippi John Hurt’s April 1965 performance at Oberlin College in Ohio, recorded at the height of the American folk revival and released in full decades later in remastered form on CD and vinyl. The set finds Hurt—newly “rediscovered” after years away from recording—playing solo with just voice and guitar, offering a warm, conversational overview of his repertoire to an attentive student audience. Across more than 70 minutes, he moves through pieces like “Candy Man,” “My Creole Belle,” “Make Me a Pallet on Your Floor,” “Casey Jones,” “Nobody’s Dirty Business,” and “Lonesome Blues,” mixing gentle humor, spoken introductions, and stories from his life with intricately picked country‑blues melodies.
Reviewers emphasize both the astonishing clarity of the tape—often described as sounding like it was recorded “yesterday”—and the way it captures Hurt’s unhurried, intimate style, where his soft vocals and rolling, syncopated fingerpicking seem to make a large room feel like a front‑porch gathering. His playing here is often cited as a textbook example of the Piedmont/country‑blues approach that later influenced artists from Jerry Garcia and Doc Watson to Taj Mahal and Bonnie Raitt. Issued in recent years as a deluxe, fully remastered 2‑LP and CD edition with notes from his estate, Live At Oberlin College 1965 is widely treated as both a historical document of a key night in the blues revival and one of the most satisfying ways to hear Mississippi John Hurt in his late‑career prime.
Live At Oberlin College 1965
Mississippi John Hurt
Live At Oberlin College 1965 documents Mississippi John Hurt’s April 1965 performance at Oberlin College in Ohio, recorded at the height of the American folk revival and released in full decades later in remastered form on CD and vinyl. The set finds Hurt—newly “rediscovered” after years away from recording—playing solo with just voice and guitar, offering a warm, conversational overview of his repertoire to an attentive student audience. Across more than 70 minutes, he moves through pieces like “Candy Man,” “My Creole Belle,” “Make Me a Pallet on Your Floor,” “Casey Jones,” “Nobody’s Dirty Business,” and “Lonesome Blues,” mixing gentle humor, spoken introductions, and stories from his life with intricately picked country‑blues melodies.
Reviewers emphasize both the astonishing clarity of the tape—often described as sounding like it was recorded “yesterday”—and the way it captures Hurt’s unhurried, intimate style, where his soft vocals and rolling, syncopated fingerpicking seem to make a large room feel like a front‑porch gathering. His playing here is often cited as a textbook example of the Piedmont/country‑blues approach that later influenced artists from Jerry Garcia and Doc Watson to Taj Mahal and Bonnie Raitt. Issued in recent years as a deluxe, fully remastered 2‑LP and CD edition with notes from his estate, Live At Oberlin College 1965 is widely treated as both a historical document of a key night in the blues revival and one of the most satisfying ways to hear Mississippi John Hurt in his late‑career prime.