ALBUM REVIEW: Martha Spencer Makes Traditional-Tinted Magic on ‘Wonderland’

Wonderland, Martha Spencer’s second solo album, is aptly titled; it carries us through a magical musical landscape via old-time Appalachian tunes, Django jazz, bluegrass, country, American songbook-style tunes, and ambling blues. Spencer’s high mountain vocals dip and swerve, providing the thread around which harmonies and instruments wrap themselves.

The album opens as Spencer playfully yips in the opening measures of the title track; her scatting yodel blooms into a Blossom Dearie-meets-Iris DeMent vocal that winds its way over a meandering Django jazz courtesy of Joel Savoy’s Stéphane Grappelli-like violin and Kyle Dean Smith’s guitar.

On the sparse old-time ballad “Rags to Riches,” Spencer’s pure, crystalline vocals float over her cascading banjo rolls with a haunting beauty, while the moving and tender bluegrass ballad “On the Banks of New River” evokes the feelings of loneliness and regret two lovers harbor for a love lost. Smith lends harmony vocals to the song and trades lead vocals with Spencer, animating a dreamy, imagined conversation between the two lovers.

Alice Gerrard adds harmonies to the sprightly reel “Come Home, Virginia Rose,” while the melancholy waltz “Yodelady” showcases Spencer’s vocal ingenuity and stylings. The Legendary Ingramettes turn the traditional “Walking in Jerusalem” into a run-around-the-pews gospel scorcher; Almeta Ingram-Miller’s lead vocal and gospel shouts carry the song into the stratosphere. “Hesitation Blues” is a little East St. Louis toodle-loo blues, while Spencer vamps on “Enchantress,” another smoky Django jazz number.

There is not a note out of place on Wonderland, and the music evolves organically. The 16 songs on the album — a combination of originals and covers of traditional songs and songs by others — are little masterpieces of vocal and instrumental genius.

Wonderland is out Sept. 2.