1000 Years Of Popular Music

Performer: Richard Thompson
Producer: Simon Tassano; Wes Dorman
Distributor: E1 Distribution (USA)

Notes: Personnel: Richard Thompson (vocals, acoustic guitar); Judith Owen (vocals); Debra Dobkin (percussion). An ambitious and thoroughly charming undertaking, the two-CD/one-DVD 1000 YEARS OF POPULAR MUSIC finds lauded British folk-rock singer/guitarist Richard Thompson live in San Francisco, performing songs that date from 1260 up to the early 21st century. Aided by keyboardist/vocalist Judith Owen and drummer/vocalist Debra Dobkin, Thompson revisits medieval England with the joyous "Summer Is Icumen In" and the lilting "King Henry," working his way to Gilbert & Sullivan by the end of the first disc with the jaunty "There Is Beauty in the Bellow of the Blast" from THE MIKADO. The second disc features a spare take on Cole Porter's "Night and Day," and brings things into the early 2000s with, oddly enough, a surprisingly straight-faced acoustic takes on Britney Spear's "Oops!...I Did It Again" and Bowling for Soup's "1985." Simultaneously lighthearted and reverent, this adventurous outing reinforces Thompson's status as a dynamic and unpredictable artist.

Richard Thompson started his career in the late 1960s as Fairport Convention's precocious guitar whiz. His subsequent solo career bears echoes of Fairport's folk-rock sound, but with a much darker, more deliciously twisted sensibility. Thompson is equally skilled as composer and guitarist, as borne out by his much-lauded recordings both with his then-wife Linda and on his own.

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