Official Release Date: November 22, 2011
I Have My Liberty! Gospel Sounds from Accra, Ghana is an album of sounds and performances recorded live in 2008 in the churches of Ghana's capital city. Produced by Calpin Hoffman-Williamson, this album could be seen as the missing link between American gospel records by artists like Rev. Johnny L. Jones and traditional African artists like those featured on Opika Pende: Africa at 78 RPM.
Amid Accra’s bustling sprawl of swirling dust and exhaust, are countless havens for homegrown musical expression: charismatic and spiritual Christian churches. There, distorted PA systems, anchored by female singers, and ramshackle guitars played by a rotating cast of local men weave in and out of popular melodies bringing congregations to their feet. Singers emote in repeated phrases, lifted by tambourines, claps, and percussion, to unite their voices in praise and worship. I Have My Liberty! Gospel Sounds from Accra, Ghana takes listeners into these churches, where congregations join together to process the anxieties of their West African metropolis.
In shops on November 22nd, this CD is available for purchase now via our Credit Card and Paypal online stores.
Here's a sample of what people have been saying about our latest titles.
Entertainment Weekly:
John Fahey "Your Past Comes Back to Haunt You: The Fonotone Years (1958-1965)"
Grade A: A rich exploration of Appalachian roots, Delta blues, and country, this isn't just a celebration of the grandfather of steel-string guitar fingerpicking, it's a history of American music. - Melissa Maerz
Pitchfork:
John Fahey "Your Past Comes Back to Haunt You: The Fonotone Years (1958-1965)"
Best New Reissue, 9.5/10: This set is not just for Fahey zealots. It's for anyone interested in the story of American music, from its Appalachian string bands and mean-moaning Delta blues singers to the hymns sung from its church pews and the country-rock anthems soon enough crafted by its hippies... A must-have collection of lore, music, and history, it's a unified, brilliant, and often very challenging archive. - Grayson Currin
Boston Globe:
Opika Pende: Africa at 78 RPM
African music in its many splendors comes alive on this vibrant collection of recordings culled from old 78s and heard on CD for the first time. From secular to sacred, from the 1900s to the ’60s, the sheer breadth of material on four discs is astonishing.
New York Times:
Opika Pende: Africa at 78 RPM
A compilation not of a global mini-genre, but of a phenomenon — the 78 r.p.m. record market in the early and middle parts of the 20th century, which took on different shapes all across Africa, and which covered a host of styles, from traditional to religious to pop... It’s clear that there’s communication going on across borders, nations talking to one another through song. As it should be. - Jon Caramanica
All Songs Considered: What are you guys listening to these days? Anything you can't get enough of?
Jeff Tweedy: There's a two-CD collection, it comes as part of a book, called, I think I'm gonna get the title right i listen to the wind that obliterates my traces. It's on Dust-to-Digital records. It's just this incredible collection of photographs from the 1800s and early 1900s of musicians. And then the two CDs that come with it are recordings of 78s. Some of them are even archival, kind of retrievals of sound effects for movies. Like there's this one of wind from the '30s, just really an incredible collection.
John Fahey "Your Past Comes Back to Haunt You: The Fonotone Years (1958-1965)"
Grade A: A rich exploration of Appalachian roots, Delta blues, and country, this isn't just a celebration of the grandfather of steel-string guitar fingerpicking, it's a history of American music. - Melissa Maerz
Pitchfork:
John Fahey "Your Past Comes Back to Haunt You: The Fonotone Years (1958-1965)"
Best New Reissue, 9.5/10: This set is not just for Fahey zealots. It's for anyone interested in the story of American music, from its Appalachian string bands and mean-moaning Delta blues singers to the hymns sung from its church pews and the country-rock anthems soon enough crafted by its hippies... A must-have collection of lore, music, and history, it's a unified, brilliant, and often very challenging archive. - Grayson Currin
Boston Globe:
Opika Pende: Africa at 78 RPM
African music in its many splendors comes alive on this vibrant collection of recordings culled from old 78s and heard on CD for the first time. From secular to sacred, from the 1900s to the ’60s, the sheer breadth of material on four discs is astonishing.
New York Times:
Opika Pende: Africa at 78 RPM
A compilation not of a global mini-genre, but of a phenomenon — the 78 r.p.m. record market in the early and middle parts of the 20th century, which took on different shapes all across Africa, and which covered a host of styles, from traditional to religious to pop... It’s clear that there’s communication going on across borders, nations talking to one another through song. As it should be. - Jon Caramanica
All Songs Considered: What are you guys listening to these days? Anything you can't get enough of?
Jeff Tweedy: There's a two-CD collection, it comes as part of a book, called, I think I'm gonna get the title right i listen to the wind that obliterates my traces. It's on Dust-to-Digital records. It's just this incredible collection of photographs from the 1800s and early 1900s of musicians. And then the two CDs that come with it are recordings of 78s. Some of them are even archival, kind of retrievals of sound effects for movies. Like there's this one of wind from the '30s, just really an incredible collection.
Your Past Comes Back to Haunt You John Fahey's Fonotone Recordings (1958-1965) 
Opika Pende Africa at 78 RPM (100 recordings from 1909 to the mid-'60s available on CD for the very first time) 
I Have My Liberty! Gospel Sounds from Accra, Ghana A CD of sounds and performances recorded live in the churches of Ghana's capital city in 2008 
I Listen to the Wind That Obliterates My Traces Music in Vernacular Photographs (1880-1955) 
Never a Pal Like Mother Songs & Photographs of the One Who's Always True 
Qat, Coffee & Qambus Raw 45s from Yemen 
Goodbye, Babylon Gospel Recordings (1902-1960) 
Where Will You Be Christmas Day? Holiday Music (1917-1959) 
Fonotone Records Frederick, Maryland (1956-1969) 
How Low Can You Go? Anthology of the String Bass (1925-1941) 
Desperate Man Blues Discovering the Roots of American Music 
I Belong to This Band Eighty-five Years of Sacred Harp Recordings 
Art of Field Recording Sampler CD 
Art of Field Recording Vol I 50 Years of Traditional American Music Documented by Art Rosenbaum 
Melodii Tuvi Throat Songs and Folk Tunes from Tuva 
Black Mirror Reflections in Global Musics 
Victrola Favorites Artifacts from Bygone Days 
Art of Field Recording Vol II 50 Years of Traditional American Music Documented by Art Rosenbaum 
Take Me to the Water Immersion Baptism in Vintage Music and Photography (1890-1950) 
Au Clair de la Lune The earliest intelligible recording of the human voice, made in 1860 
Jesus Christ from A to Z Rev. Johnny L. "Hurricane" Jones (Recordings from the Rev's private archive, 1957-2009) 
Excavated Shellac: Strings Guitar, Oud, Tar, Violin and More from the 78rpm era 
Let Your Feet Do the Talkin' Documentary Film about Buckdancer Thomas Maupin 
Ain't No Grave The Life and Legacy of Brother Claude Ely 
Luk Thung Classic & Obscure 78s from the Thai Countryside 
Baby, How Can It Be? Songs of Love, Lust and Contempt from the 1920s and 1930s 
The Hurricane That Hit Atlanta Rev. Johnny L. "Hurricane" Jones 
Ten Thousand Points of Light Twentieth Anniversary DVD 
