I am standing on a cliffside, somewhere deep within the blue-hued, ice covered rock of the Catskill Mountains. My friend ‘Billy Scribbles,’ a fantastic banjo player and American legend-hunter, is my guide. He has been showing me the places where Rip Van Winkle is purported to have lived, trying to escape the nagging of his fanatical wife, and succumbing at last to his 20-year-long nap. After teaching me a rather questionable drinking song about the Dutch, and showing me places on the cliff floor where folks have carved their initials in for well over a century or two, we fall into silence, simply staring out over the quiet New York countryside.

“You still thinkin’ yer going to Boston tomorrow?” asks Billy.

“Far as I know,” I reply.

“Do you know Tim Eriksen?”

“I don’t think so…but the name sounds awfully familiar. Why?”

“He’s a pretty big folk guy. Really involved in the Sacred Harp stuff, all over New England. I think you should interview him–heck, I wanna meet him. I’ve gone to a couple sessions but I keep missin’ him.”

“Sacred Harp…that’s related to Shape Note Singing, right?”

“Something like that. Anyway, I don’t know if he’s there now, but I think he lives up in Amherst–not too much further North. You might reach out to him. I think you’d really like his stuff and he seems like an approachable guy.”

Now, I must preface this with stating bluntly that I have the happy misfortune of being absolutely abominable with names. Faces I almost always remember (although the sheer amount of people I have met while traveling over the last five years has done little to help with that, either). Names, though…let’s just say I once called a girl in school ‘Jamie’ for three years straight, because no matter how many times it was said, I could never remember her actual name, but she looked vaguely like Helen Hunt’s character in Mad About You. I have mis-introduced good friends in public situations. I have even, on occasion, momentarily blanked on my own name–I kid you not. In any case, while this has proved troublesome in every other area of my life, it has, for the most part, strangely worked in my favor within the world of folk music. If I actually remembered the names of half the phenomenal musicians whose work I greatly admire, and whom I have inadvertently stumbled into on my travels, I would never have had the courage to speak to any of them and then there would be no podcast. So it was on the train the next day, while listening to a couple of Tim’s songs, that I couldn’t shake the feeling I had heard his voice before. And then suddenly, it clicks.

Three years prior, I had decided to challenge myself to learn one new song every week, creating an arrangement to perform at a weekly gig I hosted. I was house-sitting at the time and, after pressing skip for hours on end on every folk playlist imaginable, I had gotten distracted and just let the Spotify algorithm run it’s course. I don’t remember what I was doing–playing with the puppy, cleaning the kitchen, staring out the window–whatever it was, I just stopped. A quiet voice fills the room. The arrangement is simple. There are no fancy vocal adornments. But the sound is full of the kind of listless melancholy that one only acquires after years of struggle. In short, the song is mesmerizing.

Down by deep water where sweet linden stand
I saw pretty Polly wringing her hands
The song that she sung made the whole grove to ring
My Billy has left me to fight for a king
And I wish the wars were all over

I rush to the computer immediately, buy the song and proceed to listen to it on repeat every day for nearly two months. I even tried to cover it myself, but sometimes you just hear a rendition of a song and it is so perfect that you have to just appreciate it and let it go. (I would come to find out later that Eriksen was actually the one who took these lyrics and set it to this tune, so the other versions I had heard were, in fact, merely copies of his work). Back on the train to Massachusetts, I am awestruck, realizing that this is the same artist. Before I can lose courage, I find Tim Eriksen’s Facebook page and shoot him a message, nervous but thinking that there’s no way on earth this guy is gonna write back.

Hey, Tim.

I am a folk musician, traveling around the world, performing and collecting folk songs. I also run a small podcast about folk music. I am currently on the train to Boston. If you happen to be in MA over the next week or two, I would love to buy you coffee and do a short interview for the podcast. Maybe even play a bit of music, if you have patience for a beginner.

Either way, thanks a bunch and happy winter!
~ Genevieve

To my shock and amazement, he replies almost immediately.

Hey Genevieve!


Lovely to meet you. Sure, let’s find a time to talk.

I should preface this next bit by saying that I grew up in the world of theater and film. I have met more than a handful of big-name actors throughout my life, and perhaps it’s because of this that fame has never been something to color my interactions with people. I honestly could care less how famous a person is—whereas talent, passion, kindness, honesty, integrity (in life and art), these are things that stoke my admiration and inevitably make me shy when meeting an artist whose work I truly admire. However, I am still unlikely to approach a world-famous performer and ask for their time, without an introduction. Thank goodness it was only after our exchange that I thought to do some research into Tim’s history as a performer…and nearly died of embarrassment.

Do you remember the 2004 movie Cold Mountain, starring Nicole Kidman, Jude Law and a host of other big-name movie stars? Well, much of the unmistakable singing in that film was Tim Eriksen. For those who live and breathe UK folk/trad (which, if you are reading this, I am assuming you probably do), surely you are familiar with Eliza Carthy? Well, she and Tim Eriksen, I discovered, made one hell of an album together. He has shared the stage with everyone from Doc Watson to Kurt Cobain. His own punk band, Cordelia’s Dad, has been turning folk music on it’s head since the 90’s and, as Billy said, he is massively well-known throughout Sacred Harp communities all over the country. Beyond that, Eriksen’s own compositions have been featured in films like the Billy Bob Thornton vehicle, Chrystal, and David Conover’s documentary, Behold the Earth. His work with Afro-Cuban, world-jazz pianist Omar Sosa, Across The Divide, was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2010. He has performed everywhere from the stage of Prairie Home Companion, to the Academy Awards, to Carnegie Hall and the Blue Note Jazz Club. He is one of the members of Bosnian folk-pop group, Žabe i Babe, is formally trained in Carnatic (South Indian) music, and holds an MA in ethnomusicology from Wesleyan University. In the studio, Tim has worked with legendary producers and engineers Joe Boyd, T-Bone Burnett and Steve Albini, and in 2019, he released a duet with the late Esma Redžepova, known as the ‘queen of Romani music and dance.’ Oh, and remember that song I was obsessed with? Apparently I Wish The Wars Were All Over was chosen by Joan Baez to be her last recorded musical statement.

As I said, I don’t fan-girl often, especially not merely because of fame, but this was a completely different world. I was utterly embarrassed that I had reached out, let alone offered to play music together, and increasingly nervous about our meeting. However, my fears that I had over-stepped some invisible line in the world of folk music hierarchy turned out to be largely unfounded. Tim was completely down-to-earth, unbelievably generous with his time, his words and his hospitality, and genuinely welcoming and kind.

When I eventually stepped off the bus from Boston to Amherst, I was met by a tall, lissome man, clad all in black. His hands and neck were lightly decorated with silver and turquoise jewelry, and he wore a matching, black cowboy hat and boots. Iconic. He looks exactly like his pictures, I thought. I marveled at how clean his clothes were. (Whenever I wear black, it always seems to become a nightmare of fuzz and cat hair—and I don’t even own a cat). Later on, when we were chatting before the interview, he confessed to me that he has five or six copies of this same outfit.

“When you know what you like,” he says, “you know. Besides, it’s nice to have something familiar when you are on the road.”

Yes. A good pair of boots can feel like home, I think. When you become a musician one must needs often become a traveler as well, and it is good to have something to wear that puts you at ease but is still presentable, when you often find yourself in uncharted waters and might be asked to perform at a moment’s notice. I hadn’t eaten all day, so we stop by his favorite burrito place and head back to his house for the interview.

It is in a quiet neighborhood with the smell of conifers and wood smoke in the air. The stillness is amplified by the cold weather, with the East Coast being in the midst of one of the largest winter storms it has seen in years. The house is old and lovely, with wood floors and an array of instruments and books scattered about in the sitting room. For the first few minutes we eat and awkwardly make small talk, which I am fairly certain neither of us is good at. I realize, then, that he must be as nervous as I am–having invited a stranger into his home to ask him questions about his music career. No matter how long you are a performer, I think, it can never be a simple thing to talk about oneself. I realize also, then, that he looks like a man who has been going without rest, day in and day out, for a very long time.

After we finish our food, the conversation turns to music which, as it often does, seems to put us both at ease. I ask what his favorite song to sing is, these days, and he responds by singing it for me. With the first note, this quiet man becomes every inch the performer, but there is nothing showy about it. I am astounded at the way his voice completely fills the room, regardless of volume. Some musicians (as a friend once said) simply ‘breathe and bleed music.’ He is one of these. When he rejoices, it is with every fiber; when he laments, it is an ocean of despair and his music encompasses all of it—not someone, I think, who does anything half-way. He asks if I will sing him the song that is most in my mind, these days, in return. If I was nervous before, I am a thousand times more so, now. However, I have recently returned from Croatia, so I sing him a song that comes from the region of Koprivnica.

“I don’t speak Croatian,” he says, “but I understood most of what you said.”

This surprises me, but it turns out that his late wife, Mirjana Lausevic, was Bosnian-born and he has much extended family throughout the Balkans. One of the many groups I mentioned earlier, Žabe i Babe, was apparently project they formed in the 90’s, recording an album of Bosnian folk and pop music in response to the ethnic cleansing and war among the Serbs, Croats, and Bosnian Muslims that had been going on throughout the region. He goes on to say that, in fact, he has just returned from Kragujevac, having created and performed music for the play REFUGEE, by Milan Dragicevich.

We spend the next several hours discussing life and music and what it is like to travel and find golden threads in music from many cultures, linking all of us. I ask him what the throughline is that links all of his many musical tastes.

“I don’t know,” he says. “Honesty, I guess. Something big–bigger than all of us–and raw and just….something that’s right there. You know? Honest.”

He tells me about ‘growing up on salt water,’ as he puts it—where, at any moment, treasures and trinkets from anywhere in the world and any time or place could suddenly wash up onto the shore and how this small fact profoundly shaped his childhood and love of different cultures and history. He recounts the strange birthing of the Josh Billings Voyage album and the fictional New England village, known as Pumpkintown. He talks about what it’s like to be a father and how music is all he’s ever done so, even when it’s hard, he couldn’t stop now, even if he wanted to. I ask why music is so important.

“It’s a gift,” he says. “It’s a gift I can give to anyone at any time, and that includes myself. It’s something we can all do and all share.”

When we finally get to the actual interview, it is late at night and I fear we are all talked-out. But, if there is one thing I have learned about Tim Eriksen, it is that he is full of infinite surprises.

This month’s Folking episode is comprised of two interviews I conducted with Tim Eriksen, pre- and post-pandemic. As a reader of the FolkWorks blog, you are welcome to watch the video version of our second interview. Likewise, the podcast episode will be available through Apple Podcast, Stitcher and Spotify (January 4th, 2022). To hear last month’s episode, go here or head to your podcasting platform of choice. In order to never miss an episode and to help other’s find the podcast, please consider subscribing and sharing these episodes or rating and leaving a review.