This episode is very brief, considering the number of compositions by Robert Hunter and Jerry Garcia that refer to or build on traditional American music. We've picked only some very simple examples where the influences are obvious.

Blair Jackson's Goin' Down The Road: A Grateful Dead Traveling Companion (Harmony Books, 1992) has an interesting interview with Garcia and Hunter, titled "An Interview About Songwriting and Inspiration," (pp. 205-234, specifically pp. 208-209). They talk about hearing Jean Ritchie's recording of Nottamun Town. She learned the mysterious song as a child in Kentucky, and later discovered its British roots: it was a mummer's song. Every year around Christmas time, some British peasants would run amok for a day and turn all traditions on their heads. They'd disguise themselves, present foolish plays, and sing senseless songs. If the words made any sense to the listener, the magic was lost, and bad luck would follow. (For more commentary on the song, including music and lyrics, see http://www.lizlyle.lofgrens.org/RmOlSngs/RTOS-Nottamun.html). The song freed up Hunter & Garcia, giving them permission to write songs packed with mysterious imagery and ambiguous action.

My recording of Ritchie's Nottamun Town, is in bad shape, so I sang a straightforward version so you can hear the senseless words.

A straightforward composition of a song squarely in the Appalachian tradition: Cumberland Blues, performed by The Grateful Dead, from Workingman's Dead, originally issued as an LP in 1970. Re-released as Warner Brothers / Rhino Records CD R2-74396. Words by Robert Hunter, music by Jerry Garcia. Garcia plays the bluegrass banjo that comes in towards the end. A bluegrass band could perform this song and it would sound completely traditional.

LYLE MEETS THE DIRE WOLVES,
LaBrea Tar Pits, Los Angeles, 1981
Photo by Elizabeth Lofgren.

A song in the supernatural tradition: Dire Wolf, performed by The Grateful Dead, also from Workingman's Dead. In 1981, we visited the La Brea Tar Pits (in Los Angeles), where they have a small museum with a whole wall of Dire Wolf skulls excavated from the pits. According to Stephen Peter's What A Long Strange Trip: The Stories Behind Every Grateful Dead Song, 1965-1995, p. 63 (Thunder's Mouth Press, 1999), Hunter heard something about Dire Wolves. He knew nothing about them (they were actually pack wolves only somewhat larger than timberwolves), but from the name imagined something monstrously evil. The Queen of Spades is the death card, and when all the cards in the deck are the same, you're in the presence of a brilliantly powerful metaphor.

In another masterpiece, Terrapin Station, The Grateful Dead moved one step further from direct representation of traditional music to commentary. Their takeoff point this time was The Lady of Carlisle, sung with guitar by Basil May. Recorded 1937 in Salyersville, Kentucky, by Alan & Elizabeth Lomax, for the Library of Congress Archive of Folk Song, #1587B. It was reissued on Yazoo CD 2014, The Music of Kentucky, Vol. 2.  For commentary on the ballad, along with music and lyrics, see http://www.lizlyle.lofgrens.org/RmOlSngs/RTOS-LadyCarlisle.html. In the Lady With A Fan section (the first part of Terrapin Station), the Grateful Dead describe two important aspects of the art of storytelling: the inspiration to create something meaningful and the emotional effect on the audience of an experience that's realer than real. I regard this homage to the power of traditional story-telling to be one of Robert Hunter's most successful creations. The LP Terrapin Station, was released in 1977, and re-released as Grateful Dead / Rhino CD R2-73279.