Traditions mostly honored

"The Old Songs" begins this way: "O, you may moan with plaintive tone / Your gormless modern tune / But I will roar along the shore / Beneath a blood-red moon."

Having tried for many years to maintain my supply of gorm, I figured I couldn't pass up the Pratie Heads' reunion CD Rag Faire (Skylark SKY 3002), and it might well be due to this bit from a newspaper clipping reproduced on their Web site:

That darned old oral tradition, always shifting things ever so slightly with each repetition; and it's not like you're going to find original performances on some long-buried YeTube clip. And I say this as someone who once bought a bunch of Mozart keyboard pieces played on an oldfangled fortepiano.

Rag Faire is almost named for one of the tracks on the disc. ("The Rag Fair was like a flea market, and took place in the Jewish quarter in 18th century London. We had to put an "e" on Rag Faire for Googling purposes.") Not to worry: it's a silent "e." And more to the point, this is an hour's worth of rollicking good fun, and if it doesn't sound like it was frozen in amber in 1706, it doesn't sound like much of anything else you're likely to hear this year. Minimalistic yet ornate, simple yet devilishly complex, these are songs that, as they used to say of a good breakfast, stick to your ribs. Try to play them early in the morning — and then try to get them out of your head the rest of the day.