Like a Flowing River & Soundtrack Album (Mountain Redbird, 2022)

Born in Kentucky, James Reams came of age in Wisconsin and matured as a bluegrass band leader in Brooklyn. Based in Arizona, Reams' voice and approach to bluegrass is individual.

While Reams records the songs of others, he places significant emphasis on original material. These songs are lyrically substantial, communicating realities of poverty, rural experiences, mining and associated lives.

"Like a Flowing River & Soundtrack Album" summarizes 30 years of bluegrass, culling tracks from nine albums of old-time and bluegrass music, including with The Barnstormers and banjo pioneer Walter Hensley. This two-disc set features previously unreleased recordings including live performances and documents Reams' bluegrass journey with songs representative of his finest.

James Reams is mountain as rock. His voice fluctuates between a rumbling tenor and a dense baritone, formidable as granite. He imparts fragility when singing a familiar number ("Freight Train Blues," for example, represented by a previously unreleased live recording) and delivers crushing acceptance of the coalminer's eventuality within "Coal Dust in My Soul": "I'm digging my tomb." As such, one encounters both the rambunctious, honky tonk side of 'grass and more reflective, substantial elements.

Reams has an individual and easily identifiable voice. As telling is the manner in which he interprets country songs and makes them bluegrass. He has always ensured that his band achieves a hard-driving bluegrass sound.

One expects this thoughtful revisiting of a powerful catalogue allows increased acknowledgement of Reams' singing, masterful phrasing, keen writing and the Barnstormers' instrumental skills. Reams' approach to vocal harmony arrangement is also interesting.

The unreleased numbers provide incentive to completists, as does the inclusion of "Silvery Colorado" from the early, out-of-print "Kentucky Songbird" album.

Reams' vision of bluegrass may be rough around the edges, but it is solid to the soul. He is one of bluegrass music's unconventional stalwarts, an independent and evocative visionary.