Folk

John Fahey

todayJuly 9, 2025 8

Background
share close

from John Fahey Songs, Albums, Reviews, Bio & More … | AllMusic

 

Born John Aloysius Fahey on Feb 28, 1939 in Takoma Park, MD.  Died Feb 22, 2001 in Salem, OR.

One of acoustic music’s true innovators and eccentrics, John Fahey was a crucial figure in expanding the boundaries of the acoustic guitar over the last few decades. His music was so eclectic that it’s arguable whether he should be defined as a “folk” artist. In a career that saw him issue several dozen albums, he drew from blues, Native American music, Indian ragas, experimental dissonance, and pop. His good friend Dr. Demento has noted that Fahey “was the first to demonstrate that the finger-picking techniques of traditional country and blues steel-string guitar could be used to express a world of non-traditional musical ideas — harmonies and melodies you’d associate with Bartok, Charles Ives, or maybe the music of India.” The more meditative aspects of his work foreshadowed new age music, yet Fahey played with a fierce imagination and versatility that outshone any of the guitarists in that category. His idiosyncrasy may have limited him to a cult following, but it also ensured that his work continues to sound fresh.

Fahey was a colorful figure from the time he became an accomplished guitarist in his teens. Already a collector of rare early blues and country music, he made his first album in 1959, ascribing part of it to the pseudonymous “Blind Joe Death.” Only 95 copies of the LP were pressed, making it a coveted collector’s item today. (In the 1960s, Fahey would re-record the material for wider circulation.) In college, he wrote a thesis on Charley Patton (an exotic subject at the time). Yet Fahey did not perform publicly for money until the mid-’60s, after his third album.

Fahey’s early albums for Takoma in the mid-’60s laid out much of the territory he would explore. His instrumentals, filtering numerous genres of music into his own style, evoked haunting and open spaces. At times they could be soothing and plaintive; at other times they were disquieting, even dissonant. The more experimental aspects of his material even foreshadowed psychedelia in their lengthy improvisations (some cuts lasted as long as 20 minutes), use of Indian modes, unpredictable stylistic shifts, and overall eerie strangeness. His persona as a weirdo of sorts was amplified by his bizarre and lengthy song titles and liner notes. He also employed odd guitar tunings that continue to exert an overlooked influence on contemporary musicians to this day.

Fahey remained consistently popular on a cult level through the mid-’80s. His most commercially successful efforts, oddly, were probably his Christmas albums, which are among the more interesting holiday records of any genre. For a time he ran the Takoma label, where he was instrumental in starting the career of Leo Kottke (who owes much of his stylistic inspiration to Fahey), as well as promoting lesser-known talents like Robbie Basho. He was a catalyst in other subtle ways, helping to form Canned Heat by introducing Al Wilson (who played on a Fahey album in 1965) to Bob Hite, and rediscovering Delta bluesman Bukka White with his friend Ed Denson.

Fahey sold Takoma to Chrysalis in the mid-’70s, but continued to record regularly, and also tour (though his live performances were erratic). In 1986, he contracted Epstein-Barr syndrome, a long-lasting viral infection that, combined with diabetes and other health problems, sapped his energy and resources. Although the Epstein-Barr virus was finally overcome, the mid-’90s found him living in poverty in Oregon, where he paid his rent by pawning his guitar and reselling rare classical records. The appearance of a major career retrospective on Rhino, Return of the Repressed, in 1994 boosted his profile to its highest level in years. In 1997, he returned to active recording with City of Refuge and was planning a Revenant definitive package of Charley Patton‘s work when he died following sextuple-bypass surgery at the age of 61. The Fahey discography is dauntingly large and diverse; the neophyte is advised to start with the two-disc Return of the Repressed, but those who wish to dig deeper will be very pleased with Takoma’s extensive reissues, which started to appear in the late nineties.

1964 Blind Joe Death Takoma
1965 The Dance of Death & Other Plantation Favorites [CD] Takoma
1965 The Transfiguration of Blind Joe Death Takoma
1965 Vol. 3: Dance of Death & Other Plantation Favorites [LP] Takoma
1966 John Fahey Vanguard
1966 Vol. 4: The Great San Bernardino Birthday Party Takoma
1967 Days Have Gone By, Vol. 6 Takoma
1967 Death Chants, Breakdowns and Military Waltzes [1967] Takoma
1967 Requia & Other Compositions for Guitar Solo Vanguard
1967 Vol. 1: Blind Joe Death Takoma
1968 The New Possibility: John Fahey’s Guitar Soli Christmas Album Takoma
1968 Voice of the Turtle Takoma
1969 The Yellow Princess Vanguard
1971 America Takoma
1972 Of Rivers and Religion Reprise
1973 After the Ball Reprise
1974 Fahey, Kelly, Mann, Miller, Seidler Blue Goose
1974 Fare Forward Voyagers (Soldier’s Choice) Shanachie
1975 Christmas With John Fahey, Vol. 2 Takoma
1975 Old Fashioned Love Shanachie
1975 The John Fahey Christmas Album Burnside
1980 Visits Washington DC Takoma
1981 Live in Tasmania Sonet
1982 Christmas Guitar, Vol. 1 [Rounder] Rounder
1983 Railroad Shanachie
1984 Let Go Varrick
1984 Railroads 1 Takoma
1985 Rain Forests Oceans & Other Themes Varrick
1986 Christmas Guitar [Varrick] Varrick
1988 I Remember Blind Joe Death Varrick
1988 Popular Songs of Christmas & New Year’s Varrick
1990 God, Time & Casuality Shanachie
1992 Old Girlfriends & Other Varrick
1992 Singing Bridge of Memphis, Tennessee/March! for Martin Luther King Vanguard
1996 Morning Evening Not Night Perfect
1997 City of Refuge Tim/Kerr
1997 Womblife Table of the Elements
1997 The Epiphany of Glenn Jones Thirsty Ear
1998 Georgia Stomps, Atlanta Struts & Other Dance [live] Table of the Elements
2002 John Fahey Trio, Vol. 1 Jazzoo
2003 Hard Time Empty Bottle Blues Table of the Elements
2003 Red Cross Revenant
2004 Hitomi Important
2004 The Great Santa Barbara Oil Slick [live] Water/Revenant
2005 On Air [live] Tradition & Moderne
2005 Some Summer Day Intergroove
2006 Friends of Fahey Tribute Slackertone

 

 

Written by: madwonko

Rate it

Post comments (0)

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Electro Music Newsletter

Don't miss a beat

Sign up for the latest electronic news and special deals

EMAIL ADDRESS*

    By signing up, you understand and agree that your data will be collected and used subject to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.