LIVE: Ramblin Jug Stompers & Jill Hughes @ Crandall Library Folklife Center, 10/29/15

Photographs by Andrzej Pilarczyk
Additional full-band photograph by Glenn Kaplowitz

On paper, it might have seemed like a bit of an odd-couple pairing. But on stage in front of a capacity-plus crowd at the Crandall Public Library’s Folklife Center in Glens Falls, the musical melding of the vintage Americana quartet Ramblin Jug Stompers with the Local 518’s premier jazz/blues/soul diva Jill Hughes worked like a charm.

Bowtie, Cousin Clyde, Mister Eck and Wild Bill played half the 90-minute concert on their own, but the real fireworks took place once Hughes joined them and together they romped through a sweet selection of nuggets from the songbags of Ray Charles (“Busted”), Peggy Lee (“I’m a Woman”), Ella Fitzgerald (“Lady Be Good”), blues great Sippy Wallace (“Woman Be Wise”) and others.

The concert collaboration was a one-off match-up, but hopefully the Stompers and Hughes will find the time to do it again… soon. In the meantime, Ramblin Jug Stompers play the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall at 12noon on Tuesday (November 10), as part of the Hall’s free Music @ Noon concert series. And Jill Hughes rolls into Troy, too, playing a free show with the High Rollers at Dinosaur Bar-B-Que at 9pm on Wednesday, November 25.