It was cozy and all mine, $15 a month, and it rattled like crazy when the trains thundered by just feet away. “It had two good-sized rooms with beadboard walls and ceilings, and two holes in the roof for a wood cook stove and then a regular wood stove for heat. “My first rental - if you can call it that - when I left home was an old wooden boxcar that sat up on cinderblocks beside the railroad tracks in Lamy, New Mexico,” she recalls. “The Hill Behind This Town” was inspired by her memory of getting her own place for the first time. I got the last verse off of an old ‘Sons of the Pioneers’ recording which just slays me."
Empty road, big sky filled with stars, broken white line, broken heart. I wrote it after a show late one night driving the back roads of Colorado heading to the next gig. “‘Colorado Trail’ is an old western tune I adapted to my own story.
Songs from the River Wind finds Eliza performing old and new originals, select cover songs that fit the theme, and a few adaptations of venerable old cowboy tunes adapted to a female perspective, including “Buffalo Gals Redux” and “The Colorado Trail.” It has been an enlightening adventure for me.”Īs always, Eliza enlists top-notch musicians for the sessions, with cameos from Warren Hood on fiddle, Kym Warner on mandolin, and Michael Hearne on vocals. It’s all part of bringing these disparate parts of myself together and bringing my past into my present as a songwriter and as a whole person. “My dad would have loved them, and to have them sing and play on this record with me is icing on the cake. “The ‘Rifters’ are like the twenty-first century version of the ‘Easy Riders,’” Eliza says. The group shines on Eliza’s version of The Easy Riders’ version of the traditional tune, “Wanderin.’” With a nod to her dad, folksinger Terry Gilkyson and his 1950s folk group “The Easy Riders,” who recorded original and traditional folk songs with a distinctive western flavor, Eliza joined forces with her old friend Don Richmond to produce the record, enlisting Don’s much loved Southwest band “The Rifters” to sing backup harmonies. Inspired by memories of characters and events that birthed her enduring love affair with the West, the songs span 40 years - from originals to vintage classics - and culminates with her recent decision to relocate permanently to Taos, where she is sinking down deep roots at long last. The album will be out Januon Howlin’ Dog Records.įeeling the need to take a little break from the socio-political music that she felt compelled to write for her last six albums, the twice Grammy-nominated artist moved her base from Austin, TX to Taos, NM. It’s composed of snapshots of the people and places, lives and loves lost and found over her years of wandering the West as a musical minstrel, searching for her heart’s home. Her new album, Songs From the River Wind, is what she calls her love letter to the Old West.
Taos, NM: Renowned songwriter Eliza Gilkyson has announced the follow-up to her critically acclaimed political masterpiece, 2020, which topped the folk radio charts and won Eliza the “Best Song of the Year” award from the Folk International Alliance. Please note the artist requires masks for entry to the show, and masks must be kept on for the duration of the performance.