PhilPaine.com

While pok­ing around, I came across this epony­mous album of Cana­di­an folk stan­dards by Bon­nie Dob­son. Now for­got­ten, she was promi­nent in the folk scene of the 1960’s, and one song of hers, “Morn­ing Dew”, was cov­ered by Robert Plant, Jeff Beck, Clan­nad, Nazareth, the All­man Broth­ers, and the Grate­ful Dead. I was already famil­iar with “Morn­ing Dew”, which appears on the enter­tain­ing com­pi­la­tion The Music Nev­er Stopped: Roots of the Grate­ful Dead. Dob­son’s sopra­no voice is in a class with Sandy Den­ny, Mad­dy Pri­or, and Rachelle Paiement for that “strong and sweet” com­bi­na­tion that best suits folk tunes. Her inter­pre­ta­tions of Cana­di­an stan­dards are a bit quirky, but very mov­ing. Her ver­sions of “Four Strong Winds” and “Un Cana­di­en errant” are par­tic­u­lar­ly mov­ing. Her gui­tar-play­ing is restrained, always sup­port­ive of the vocals, but very skilled. This is not her most famous album, so I have a feel­ing I have some pleas­ant sur­pris­es ahead if I can find oth­ers. Despite obvi­ous tal­ent, she nev­er made it big, but I have a feel­ing that more suc­cess­ful singers in the folk scene must have respect­ed her work. Now 68, Dob­son long ago retired from the music busi­ness, moved to the U.K., and became the admin­is­tra­tor of the Phi­los­o­phy Depart­ment of the Uni­ver­si­ty of London.