This a a compilation album with several different genres. It opens with Rockin' the Blues which is blues-based hard rock, including tributes to to Chuck Berry and Ray Charles. The second song is called Baghdad, Baghdad about soldiers in Iraq. The fifth piece is a tribute to Chicago called The Windy City Rag. Then the title song of the cd, Hawaii, in honor of the 50 year statehood. There is a double tribute to Jim Morrison, one of which is a descriptive account of his death in Paris and the second is a song in his style called Living In The USA. Next is a ballad about the seige and battle at Waco, and this section concludes with a memorial to Pat Tillman, Army Ranger, who was killed in action in Afghanistan 4/23/04. This ends with an actual recording of an Apache funeral dance for a fallen warrior. The second section of the cd is called Deadwood and recounts the history of this gold-mining area in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Most of the background music is provided by folk genius Steve Rosen and there is a reading about Calamity Jane by actress Flora Haynes. This section concludes with a tent revival classic Are You Washed In The Blood featuring John Wright. The third section is 7 old time tunes and has a wonderful version of The Missouri Waltz with new updated lyrics. The section ends with Acie's classic Dear Mother about her advice when he was leaving home at age 17. And the fourth section is by the Rust Belt Rounders, one of America's finest old-timey bands. It features Paul Kaye on guitar, Dave Dalessandro on fiddle, Tyler Wilson on bass and Acie playing the old-time drop thumb banjo. This is a cdr reprint and is selling for $9.95 Biography Acie Cargill was born into a musical family. His grandmother was Hattie Mae Tyler Cargill, a noted Kentucky singer of traditional ballads. She was the last of the Tylers, a family noted for being strict preservationists of the musical traditions passed along for many generations from Northern England /Southern Scotland. The tunes that they sung all used primitive scales. They were unique in their area in that they played instruments along with the ballads and the instruments all used special tunings that allowed the ancient tunes to be played without adding obstrusive notes to the performance. Acie knows all those scales and tunings and has been recorded for the Library of Congress, singing some of the old songs he knows and playing the 5 string banjo in the Tyler drop-thumb style. He is considered the living master of this style. The family lived in very secluded areas without electricity and they were not exposed to the newer types of music that swept through the US that featured the piano or the guitar using the 6 string guitar chords that are so prevalent today. In the Tyler music, there are no 3-note chords, just moving modal melodies. Some of this can be heard on Songs and Ballads of Hattie Mae Tyler Cargill, In The Willow Garden, Family Gathering (which featured some of the older Tyler musicians and the remants of the Cargill Brothers’ String Band and Acie playing the banjo as a young boy). His grandfather was Acie Cargill, a fiddler who came to Chicago to play as a fill in musician with the WLS Barn Dance radio show. Many of the old tunes Acie plays were from the elder Acie via his Grandmother Hattie. Acie’s father was an associate of Woody Guthrie and played harmonica in their jam sessions. Acie said his fondest memories were sneaking out of bed and hiding to hear the music they played late into the night when Woody visited. Acie’s mother was a church organist for 65 years and her instructions to him can be heard in the song Dear Mother ( for example, don’t you ever play gospel music in a tavern). It was the exposure to Woody (and also his mother’s playing) that led Acie into learning the chorded guitar styles that he usually plays today in his performances. In public Acie plays folk music, bluegrass, old-time standards, traditional country music, progressive country rock, early rock and roll, old-timey, gospel, and he even played bass for contemporary jazz giants Max Brown and Johnny Frigo. Acie's cousin, the late Henson Cargill, was a national star with his hit song Skip A Rope. And through one of the Tyler women, Acie is related to country giant Willie Nelson. He also is a prolific songwriter and has recorded over 400 of his songs available on the internet. His music has been heard in almost every country in the world and three times he has been put up for grammy nominations for folk music and his albums have been among the most played music on college and public radio folk music programs.