Rhonda Vincent – Yesterday And Today: 30 Years Of Music

Neophytes could be forgiven if, after comparing this album’s cover photo to its subtitle, they concluded that Rhonda Vincent is remarkably well-preserved. After all, there aren’t many folks around who can lay claim to that amount of experience while still years shy of a 40th birthday. What sits inside the CD’s jewel case, though, is the evidence that Vincent has, indeed, been making music — increasingly great music, at that — from a very tender age.

Born in 1962 in Kirksville, Missouri, to musician parents, she made her first record — a duet with her mother on Jimmie Davis and Floyd Tillman’s “How Far Is Heaven?” — in 1967, and had her first solo cuts, “Muleskinner Blues” and Martha Carson’s “Satisfied”, on a DIY single in 1971 (all three are included on the album). While many of her more urban peers were immersed in pop and rock music, Rhonda was working a busy schedule as a member of her family’s gospel-oriented bluegrass/country band, the Sally Mountain Show, cutting a series of increasingly polished and well-arranged albums to sell at their frequent appearances around the Midwest.

Selections from seven such albums make up the bulk of Yesterday And Today, documenting the musical development of a young woman with a rich, powerful voice and growing skills on the mandolin and fiddle. While there are several original instrumentals and a couple of secular numbers (including the Osborne Brothers’ gorgeous “Bluegrass Melodies” and her own “The One Who Cares About You”), the focus is on positive gospel songs, which Rhonda delivered with conviction, enthusiasm and breathtaking beauty. Listening to these cuts, it’s easy to see why Alison Krauss has cited Vincent as one of her most significant models.

From 1985, when the Sally Mountain Show made its last self-released album (they recorded one for Rebel in 1991), Yesterday And Today skips to 1997, bypassing Vincent’s three solo albums for Rebel and her two mainstream country releases on Giant. (The story of her Nashville travails belongs elsewhere; suffice it to say that it’s among the more horrible of country music horror stories.). The collection concludes with five new tracks, including “I Sang Dixie”, her contribution to the Dwight Yoakam tribute album that appeared earlier this year. “Dixie” and “Ghost Of A Chance” are pure country, while “Just When I Needed You Most” and “Leona’s Song”, the latter an original song, offer a more restrained and contemplative accompaniment to her soaring voice. The album concludes fittingly with a remake of “How Far Is Heaven?”, with Rhonda and her mother trading off verses, and Rhonda’s daughters singing the part she herself did back in 1967.

Characterizing Vincent as “a natural singer” can be misleading, as the phrase can be taken to imply a lack of craft, or discipline, or self-awareness — all of which Vincent has in abundance. Still, the fact that even cuts from her early teen years are anything but simple juvenilia makes the case that she has been blessed with an innate ability to touch the hearts of her listeners. If there’s anything more pleasurable than listening to Yesterday And Today, it is contemplating the many years of her art that are yet to come.