Jean Ritchie 1922-2015

photo by Evo Bluestein

Musician and folk artist Jean Ritchie passed away recently at the age of 92. Kentucky poet, singer and composer, she popularized the mountain dulcimer and saved it from obscurity almost single handedly. She hailed from the small Eastern Kentucky town of Viper, and was the youngest of fourteen siblings. She trained to be a social worker, but chose instead the life of an artist and performer. She traveled to the British Isles to research the Southern Appalachian songs of her family and incorporated her findings into her repertoire. She composed songs that were later recorded by Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstadt, Emmy Lou Harris and many others including Fresno’s Bluestein Family folk music group.

 

As a professor of American Studies at California State University, Fresno, my father Gene Bluestein, could not resist her creative blend of traditional and original music. He cited her work as an excellent example of what he called “poplore” represented by artists such as Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie, who seamlessly combined contemporary with traditional folk material. Poplore became the title of a book by Gene Bluestein (University of Massachusetts Press, 1994).

 

Ritchie visited the Bluesteins many times over the years, most notably in 1979 for Professor Bluestein’s Folk Artist Residency Program at CSUF. The program offered students a semester of learning from legendary masters of various folk traditions. The guest artists not only taught at CSUF, but also gave community concerts and appeared at elementary schools in the Fresno area. During that time she and her husband, photographer George Pickow, asked the Bluestein family to help her produce her next record album High Hills and Mountains, which was recorded in Fresno with local musicians she called “The Fresno Friends”–Harry Liedstrand, Kenny Hall, Frank Hicks, and Jemmy, Evo and Gene Bluestein. It was a high honor for us. Over the years, she and our family presented numerous concerts to Fresno audiences.

Photo by George Pickow
Fresno  Friends, L to R: Jemmy Bluestein, Harry Liedstrand, Jean Ritchie, Evo Bluestein, Kenny Hall and Gene Bluestein.

 

After my father’s health was in decline, she flew out to appear in the Bluestein Family tribute to Gene at Fresno’s Tower Theater, in 1997, videotaped by Fresno photojournalist Joel Pickford.

 

Before she retired completely we asked her to do one last concert in Fresno–a double bill with famed Armenian oudist Richard Hagopian, also a former resident folk artist in the CSUF program.

 

We cherish the time she spent with us and the legacy she shared.

 

–Evo Bluestein