The heyday of American baroque pop or chamber pop – ran from 1966 to the turn of the seventies. It used string quartets, harpsichords and woodwinds to create a summer-into-autumn melancholy that was quite new, and quite far removed from rocknroll as Eddie Cochran would have known it. Baroque pops musicians often came from a folk background, with an affinity for acoustic instrumentation. Linda Ronstadt’s first band the Stone Poneys had introduced the autoharp to their line-up in 1965, while the likes of Bonnie Dobson and Nico experimented with string quartets, searching for different, post-electric Dylan directions.

You can trace it back to the Left Banke – who created a sound that was soft but insistently sad – where were the guitars! Their guitarist Rick Brand claimed their lyrics “were written as rather self-consciously beautiful musical whimsy, as you find in the latter 18th-century Romantic music, pre-Beethoven“. They had a huge hit with Walk Away Renee and effectively invented a genre before combusting after just one album. Splinter group Montage produced a very rare album and singer Steve Martin Caro an equally rare single – both are represented on American Baroque.

Tracklist:

1. You’re A Very Lovely Woman – The Merry-go-round
2. I Shall Call Her Mary – The Montage
3. Raggedy Ann – John Randolph Marr
4. Tulu Rogers – Appaloosa
5. Turnaway – The Pleasure Fair
6. Different Drum The Stone Poneys Featuring Linda Ronstadt
7. Emily’s Illness – Nora Guthrie
8. Barefoot Gentleman – The Association
9. Land Of Sensations & Delights – J.k. & Co
10. Blue Jack Of Diamonds – H.p. Lovecraft
11. Time – Bonnie Dobson
12. Satin Slipper – The Blades Of Grass
13. My Silent Symphony – Chris & Peter Allen
14. Mr Webster – The Monkees
15. Again Again – Eternity’s Children
16. My Plan – Russ Giguere
17. The Fairest Of The Seasons – Nico
18. Other Times – Tom Northcott
19. You Lied – The Neon Philharmonic
20. Close To Carmel – The Fun & Games
21. Home Before Dark – Nora Guthrie
22. I Have Been Alone – The Common People
23. Two By Two (I’m Losing You) – Steve Martin
24. Lorelei Rosebud