Larry Sparks - Blue Sparks

(Rebel REB-1618) 1983.

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Recorded at Riverside Recording Studio, Ashland, Kentucky this is another fine album including the stand-out Imitation Of The Blues.

Several tracks are versions of old bluegrass/country songs, with renditions of Flatt & Scruggs - Come Back, Darling & (I'm) Lonesome And Blue; the Lonesome Pine Fiddlers/Paul Williams' Brown-Eyed Darling; Eddy Arnold's Mommy, Please Stay Home With Me; Jimmie Skinner's Doin' My Time; Wiley Walker & Gene Sullivan's When My Blue Moon Turns To Gold Again; and George Jones' Shoe Goes On The Other Foot.

One of the album's less successful numbers is a version of the Carter Family's On The Old Plantation, aka No More The Moon Shines On Lorena / Lorena / Lorena The Slave.

Imitation Of The Blues, which for me is the stand-out cut, was written by Patrick Brayer and has a fab soulful vocal by Larry.

Other originals include Larry's I Ain't Holding On Any Longer with jazzy fiddle work by Gene Elders; and the instrumental Lonesome Ride.

Featured musicians on the album include Jim Heffernan and John Masters who had played on the 1982 session for The Testing Times, and Larry's son Larry D. Sparks joining on bass.

• Larry Sparks: guitar, lead vocal
• Terry Barnes: mandolin, tenor vocal
• Gene Elders: fiddle
• Jim Heffernan: dobro
• John Masters: banjo, baritone vocal
• Larry D. Sparks: bass

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