Artist	Song
Schoolhouse Rock	50 Nifty Unites States
Doc Watson	Alabama Bound
Johnny Horton	North to Alaska
Arizona, Arizona	Truck Stop
Big Bill Broonzy	Going Back to Arkansas
Bobby Womack	California Dreaming
Stephen Stills	Colorado
Bing Crosby & Judy Garland	Connecticut
Perry Como	Delaware
Muddy Waters	Deep Down in Florida
Louis Armstrong	Georgia on My Mind
Teenage Head	Let's Go to Hawaii
Adriano Celentano	Idaho
Alvin Youngblood Hart	Illinois Blues
Jackson 5	I'm Going Back to Indiana
Greg Brown	The Iowa Waltz
Charlie Waller	Somewhere in Kansas
Bill Monroe	I'm Going Back to Old Kentucky
Muddy Waters	Louisiana Blues
The Mountain Goats	Going to Maine
Tennessee Ernie Ford	Maryland, My Maryland
Freddie McGregor	Massachusetts
Devendra Banhart	Michigan State
Charlie Maguire	I'm From Minnesota
Leon Redbone	Mississippi Delta Blues
Gene Autry	Missouri, I'm Calling
Monty Python and the Holy Grail	Intermission Music

Comment:

50 States Vol. 1

In the words of Jesus, "It is finished." It's taken me almost two months and cost most of what sanity I had left, but here is the finished product of my 50 States musical project. There are a few of these mixes on AOTM and elsewhere, but I limited myself to some strict rules with this project that made it tougher (and I think better). I tried to stay away from completely obvious choices, and also keep it relatively uptempo. The rules:

1- No instrumentals (Arkansas Traveler).
2- No using the state as an adjective (Oregon Girl).
3- No using a city from the state (Kansas City).
4- The state must be in the title.
5- Nothing slow as molasses.

The easiest states: Louisiana, Texas, Georgia

The hardest: Washington(!), Kansas, New York, Iowa

In the end, I think this is one of the better mix cds I've compiled because the limited number of songs for each state meant that I had no choice in modifying the arrangement or mood or tone or even the order. This creates a wild sort of randomness that is only held together by the fact that there is an overall theme. I mean, where else would you find Bing Crosby, Devendra Banhart and The Jackson 5 on the same mix?

Nowhere, that's where.

Go make your own,
Ben Fortenberry

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