John Fahey

Live In Sausalito, September 9, 1973

The finger-picking guitarist and blues enthusiast John Fahey enjoyed a long, influential and distinguished career. Born in Washington DC in 1939 and raised in Takoma Park, Maryland, he lauched his own Takoma label to issue self-produced work in the late 1950s and then delivered his master's theses on the blues of Charlie Patton at UCLA. Then, while based in the radical town of Berkeley, California in the San Francisco Bay area, began issuing filed recordings of forgotten blues legends such as Bukka White. With his own work, Fahey began borrowing from eastern elements such as Indonesian gamelan and Tibetan vocal chanting, reflecting his interest in esoteric eastern religion, as well as birdsong, animal calls and other naturalistic elements. This beautiful 1973 performance, delivered in the sleepy town of Sausalito, California, comprises most of Fahey’s Fare Forward Voyagers LP, as well as earlier material, including “Dance of the Inhabitants of the Palace of King Philip XIV of Spain,” from his 1964 release, Death Chants, Breakdowns and Military Waltzes.