80 by Harry Taussig

Released as a short-run private press LP in 1965, Fate Is Only Once has long been a coveted collectible among American Primitive guitar enthusiasts. The album presages the broader movement. Acoustic musicians were still largely stuck in a rigid "folk" mindset in 1965, and there are just not that many other examples of the exploratory guitar sounds found on Fate from this time period. Alternating between haunting originals and jaunty blues-based traditional numbers, the private press LP was reissued by Tompkins Square in 2006. Taussig's only other recorded works appeared on the long out-of-print Takoma compilation Contemporary Guitar Spring '67 alongside John Fahey, Robbie Basho, Max Ochs and Bukka White. Taussig spent years as an educator, published instructional guitar books, and traveled extensively to photograph weird museums.

Taussig returned to music in 2012 with his first album in 47 years, Fate Is Only Twice, and followed with Diamond of Lost Alphabets, Too Late To Die Young, a split album and tour with fellow Takoma pioneer Max Ochs, and a remix album by Kid Millions (Oneida).

Harry Taussig on '80' :

"With a perspective of about 60 years, I finally understand what I’ve been trying to do in my musical compositions over these six decades. I grew up with two musical streams – at home it was European classical music, at college it was American folk music. And I bathed in both streams.

Like several of my contemporary guitarists, I wanted to extend the American folk guitar tradition into previously unexplored territories. Each found their direction: blues, psychedelia, etc. Mine was using the theories of classical musical forms, both traditional and contemporary.

One of the delights of classical music is that the composer will constantly play with the listener, allowing him or her to guess where the music is going and then surprise them by not going there at all, but going to another place unexpected but equally logical. This seems to be the throughline in my musical heroes: Bach, Schoenberg, Glass, and many others. I have adopted many of their structural schemes, rhythmic devices, and harmonic stratagems to counter the comfort and predictability of folk (and popular) music. I delight in the response, “You can’t do that … oh, I guess you can.”


01 – Etude in G Major #7 (take 1)
02 – Etude in D Major #2
03 – Lullaby in D Modal
04 – Etude in G Major #9
05 – Recessional for Banjo in D Major
06 – Etude in D♭ Major (take 1)
07 – Etude in D♭ Major (take 2)
08 – Sugar Babe
09 – Etude in G Major #4
10 – Etude in G Minor #3
11 – Etude in G Major #7 (take 2)

Tompkins Square label, established in 2005, has released acclaimed recordings by artists such as William Tyler, Gwenifer Raymond, Ryley Walker and Michael Chapman as well as reissues of folk, old-timey, gospel and American Primitive Guitar. The label has received 8 Grammy nominations.

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