Doc Watson - Live At Club 47 [2xLP]

Release Date: 3/21/2025

Recorded live February 10, 1963 at Club 47 in Cambridge, MA, today known as Club Passim, this never-before-heard album features four previously unreleased songs from Doc’s early repertoire, in addition to performances of Doc’s favorite songs of the Carter Family, Frank Hutchison, Charlie Poole, and Merle Travis. Doc is accompanied by John Herald and Ralph Rinzler of The Greenbrier Boys on five of the album’s tracks.

“This recording documents a pivotal moment in virtuoso Doc Watson’s early solo career,” notes Steven Weiss, director of the Southern Folklife Collection. “This is Doc, paying his dues and playing his heart out, performing two sets of classic, old-time country songs he learned as a child from his family and from old 78 RPM records.”

Following the success of the Club 47 show, Doc was booked at the 1963 Newport Folk Festival and released his debut solo album on Vanguard Records in 1964. He went on to become America’s premier folk guitarist earning seven Grammy Awards, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences, and in 1997 was presented with the National Medal of Arts at the White House by then-President Bill Clinton, who introduced him saying, “There may not be a serious, committed baby boomer alive who didn’t spend at least some of his or her youth trying to learn to pick guitar like Doc Watson.”

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Tracklist

1. Wabash Cannonball
2. The House Carpenter
3. I Wish I Was Single Again
4. Little Darling Pal of Mine
5. Train That Carried My Girl from Town
6. Worried Bluez
7. Old Dan Tucker
8. Sweet Heaven When I Die
9. Doc’s Talkin’ Blues
10. Little Margaret
11. Sitting On Top of the World
12. Don’t Let Your Deal Go Down
13. Blue Smoke
14. Deep River Blues
15. Way Downtown
16. Somebody Touched Me
17. Billy in the Low Ground
18. Boil Them Cabbage Down
19. Everyday Dirt
20. I Am a Pilgrim
21. No Telephone in Heaven
22. Hop High Ladies the Cake’s All Dough
23. Little Sadie
24. Black Mountain Rag
25. Blackberry Rag
26. Days of My Childhood Plays