May 1, 2003

Spring 2003

” If the Blues had Wings” – CD review

Callahan was raised in a loving, progressive family in Boston and both her mother and father enjoyed folk music.  But it wasn’t until she was attending Bowdoin College in Maine that this Philadelphia based social worker got hooked on the blues.

On a superb debut album, Callahan sings with all the authority of Ma Rainey or Janis Joplin to be sure, but it’s her songwriting that sets her apart from the rest of the pack of up and coming blues women.  Her day job as a social worker provides fodder for her songs as does her own real life experiences.  Her originals, some written with co-producer John Dichter blanket this album, and she closes with a Bob Dylan song, the album’s only cover, “Positively 4th Street”

She sings brilliantly and makes her points without overstatement on “Coffee Grind”, “Broken Down Man” and “If your Man Messes Up”.  She breaks new lyrical ground in the blues idiom on this album and already fans are clamoring for a second release with more original songs.