American Roots Legend Peter Rowan Announces New Album on Rebel Records

Rebel Records is proud to announce a new album from pioneering American roots musician Peter Rowan. Rowan's second album for Rebel, Calling You From My Mountain features star turns from Shawn Camp, Billy Strings, Molly Tuttle, Lindsay Lou, and more, and original and traditional songs from Rowan and his band.

Today, Rebel is releasing the first single off the new album, "The Song That Made Hank Williams Dance" featuring Shawn Camp. Rowan had this to say about the single, "This chorus appeared to me in a dream one glorious April at my tin-roofed Texas casita. Singer, songwriter, guitar picker Shawn Camp hails from Alabama as did Hank Williams. Shawn, he's a natural for this song. And a big inspiration! We had some fun!"

"Peter Rowan is a true roots original," says Mark Freeman, Rebel Records' owner. "While his musical curiosity has taken him on many fun and fascinating adventures across many different genres, bluegrass is the foundation and starting point for those trips. Building on the momentum of his previous bluegrass release, Carter Stanley's Eyes, we at Rebel are thrilled to be working with Peter again as he delivers another collection of powerful material, both new and old!"

For over six decades, GRAMMY-award winning artist Peter Rowan has been at the forefront of acoustic American music, inspiring generations of new musicians and working creatively with the roots of bluegrass, newgrass, Americana, country rock, jazz, even reggae, Hawaiian, and Tejano music.

A relentlessly curious, brilliant songwriter, Rowan's had the kind of career that would give him ample opportunity to kick back and rest on his laurels now, but his new album, Calling You From My Mountain (coming June 24 on Rebel Records), shows that Rowan's voice is as vital as ever, fueled by the history of our great traditions and excited for their future.

Guest spots on the album from friends like Billy Strings, Shawn Camp, Molly Tuttle, Lindsay Lou, and Mark Howard, not to mention Rowan's multi-generational band, show that Rowan's inspiration transcends age. For these past sixty+ years, Rowan's been a musical sponge, soaking up ideas and influences from his many travels and his roving search for new traditions, using these sounds to create new songs and new musical genres at will.

Though the genesis for Rowan's new album came from Hank Williams' Luke the Drifter personality and Rowan's idea of writing new songs for this character, he quickly spun in other connections, like his longtime interest in Tibetan music and his Buddhist beliefs and practices, or his love of other American roots legends like Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Lightnin' Hopkins, Guy Clark, Bill Monroe, and Tex Logan (all of whom Rowan's played and performed with).

Throughout, the music sounds like Rowan himself, a modern day California dharma bum, a man as nourished by a metaphysical interest in the mysteries of the physical universe as he is by the intricacies of handcrafted music making.

Calling You From My Mountain began as a tribute album or homage to Peter Rowan's favorite Hank Williams LP. "When I left Nashville in 1990," Rowan explains, "the only country music album I had, besides one Ernest Tubb record, was Hank Williams Sings Luke the Drifter. So, I listened to that all the time on my little turntable, and I just loved that Hank had an alternate ego who was himself but the sentimental-songs-with-a-message side."

Rowan wrote an entire album of songs inspired by Luke the Drifter, but before he could travel to Nashville to record it, the pandemic hit and plans changed. Instead, Rowan stayed at home, looking out over the California coastal landscape and canyons around him, just playing and trying out old favorite songs. As singing the old songs brought forth ideas for new songs, Rowan built the groundwork for his new album and managed to keep some of Luke the Drifter's spirit alive. "I included one of the songs I wrote from the Luke the Drifter album, "Dream of Heaven."

By doing that, I started to find my own voice again as to what I really wanted to say on this record. The companion song to that is "The Red, the White and the Blue", where I wrote "I remember, I remember, I remember you / The red, the white and the blue" which to me is like a Carter Family type of approach with Molly Tuttle singing the harmony and playing banjo and Shawn Camp on guitar. With Rowan's characteristic thoughtfulness, he transforms a patriotic refrain into a subtle and heartfelt anti-war statement.

Listen to the new single here:

To post a comment, you must register and login.