Life in an out of the way place carries universal import, and people everywhere seem to understand what David Mallett's songs are about. Although they are rooted in place, they speak to the essential things that move us all. If you grow up in a small rural town, as Mallett did, you can't help but learn its stories. He knows about the people who shouldn't have stayed, but did, and those who shouldn't have left, but did
He knows the factory work, the field work, the memories of summer dances, the loves and losses, and the stunning incidents of courage and despair.
Raised in a musical family, by the age of ten he was touring with his older brother Neil, singing at grange halls and county fairs. In his early twenties he started his solo career, writing his own songs and eventually performing them across the US, Canada and Europe. His songs have received international acclaim, and one of them, "Garden Song", has been translated into several languages and is one of America's most popular folk songs. Other singers who have recorded Mallett's songs include Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss, Hal Ketchum, Pete Seeger and even the Muppets. The source of this well-traveled music is life in a small town in rural Maine, where there still is a main street, and you can still find old barns and tall trees.
The songs Mallett writes and sings are filled with passion, evocative imagery, and a sense of the inevitable passage of time. The loss of American towns and rural landscapes is the subject of many of his songs, as are the issues of wilderness preservation and the struggle of the common man. When he is not touring, the place where he makes his songs is in his writing room in an old farmhouse with a view across the field and a tintype of his great-great grandfather on the wall.
"I like to keep reaching out to touch the past," he says, "to connect it with what’s going on now. To me music is one of the few things that is timeless ... human emotion is one continual chain."
In the millenium edition of The Bangor Daily News, in his home state, he was named along with Marshall Dodge, Andrew Wyeth, E.B. White, Stephen King, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and others, one of the most memorable "Mainers" of the twentieth century.
Midnight on the Water" is Mallett's most recent work. The album was recorded live at a series of shows along the Maine coast in the summer of 2005, and it features 17 of the most memorable songs from his 30-year career. It features "the Mallett band", a trio usually only heard in Maine-Mallett on vocals, guitar and harmonica, Mike Burd on bass, and Susan Ramsey on violin and viola. A subtle blending of bass, violin and viola creates an understated compliment to the mature voice of one of America's most unique and consistent singer songwriters.
Mallett's most recent honor comes from the readers of FOLKWAX who voted him 2003 Artist of the Year, and his 2003 album "Artist in Me" 2003 Album of the Year.
Text: Susan Shetterly/Linda Bolton
copyright 2007 David Mallett & North Road Records. All rights reserved.
I Hate To See This Town Go Down... I was thinking about you today, David. The new Super Wal Mart opened, and everyone in town is all "ga-ga" over it. All other department stores are long gone, and it's a matter of time before the last local supermarkets disappear. The locally owned family pizzarias are being rapidly replaced by Pizza Huts and Dominos, and the family sub shops are dropping like flies because of the Subways and Quiznos. The friendly, family-owned hardware stores are mostly gone, replaced by mammoth Home Depots and Loewe's. I ride down Main Street and see only a Ghost Town, full of empty store fronts and long-closed cafe's and saloons. I hate to see this town go down.... hate to see....
Hey David, hope you're doing well! I hope to get down to Syracuse to see you in a few weeks. I know you'll knock 'em dead in the aisles, and am telling anyone who'll listen to get out to see you. You're the best, man, the best! - Joe (WildCat Records, NYC)
