Tom Winslow, 1969 LP: It's The Clear Water - B5: Death Comes Creeping

Tom Winslow
LP: It's The Clear Water
Label: Biograph – BLP-12018
Genre: Blues, Folk, World, & Country
Style: Folk, East Coast Blues

Tom Winslow: Vocals, Guitar, Banjo
Happy Traum: Guitar
Thomasina Winslow : Vocals on "One, Two, Three"
Recorded in New Platz, New York, October 26 1969

Tracklist
A1 Hey Looka Yonder (It's The Clearwater)
A2 When I Get To Glory I'm Gonna Sing, Sing, Sing
A3 Let Us Sing Together
A4 The Preacher And The Slave (Sweet Bye And Bye)
A5 Fayette County
A6 Hide Me In The Bosom
B1 My Dirty Stream
B2 If You Love Your Uncle Sam, Bring Them Home
B3 God's Gonna Cut You Down
B4 My God Is Real
B5 Death Comes Creeping
B6 There's A Bright Side Somewhere
B7 One, Two, Three

Thomasina Winslow grew up in New Baltimore, New York, south of Albany. Something of a child prodigy, she was nicknamed "Tunes" by her brother. She first performed on her father's album Tom Winslow, singing 1-2-3 (One-Two-Three) as a toddler.

Tom Winslow was one of the original Clearwater crew members and Sloop Singers. He died on October 23 at the age of 69 in Albany, NY, due to complications from a stroke.

Tom is known for writing and performing “Hey Looka Yonder (It’s the Clearwater),” a fundraising anthem for the construction of the sloop that appeared on the album “Tom Winslow” in 1969 on Biograph Records. The song is significant as it represents the first environmental song by an African-American song-writer, and predates Marvin Gaye’s “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)” by two full years.
After moving to upstate New York from his native North Carolina in the early 1960s, Tom met Pete Seeger at a concert in Albany. Before the sloop was ever launched, music was the foundation of the organization. Pete Seeger and his supporters raised the first few dollars for the sloop’s construction by performing songs about the river and passing around a banjo to collect donations. “Hey Looka Yonder (Its the Clearwater)” was Peter Seeger’s and Tom Winslow’s major collaboration. Click here to listen to Winslow performing the song.
Tom performed many times with Pete Seeger. He recently performed onstage with his daughter Thomasina Winslow at the 2010 Clearwater Festival and Great Hudson River Revival, and continued to perform in Upstate New York until shortly before his death. He is the father of Gary Winslow, also a notable performing artist.

During the 1960s, Tom traveled the country playing at festivals and clubs and serving as artist in residence at colleges and universities where he conducted workshops in folk and acoustic blues. During that time he quickly changed his musical focus to “human activism,” including civil rights and environmental causes.
Tom Winslow is one of those authentic grassroots folk/blues singers – the kind that summons up images of Rev. Gary Davis, Blind Willie Johnson, the Folkways label and the like. It’s The Clearwater contains thirteen songs featuring Tom on vocals, acoustic guitar and banjo, plus additional guitar from Happy Traum. Natural rough bluesy vocals coupled with skillful guitar work makes this a genuine timeless first-rate folk record. A number of spiritual titles (Hank Williams’ ‘When I Get To Glory I’m Gonna Sing, Sing, Sing’, ‘Hide Me In The Bosom’, ‘God’s Gonna Cut You Down’, ‘Death Comes Creeping’, ‘My God Is Real’, ‘There’s A Bright Side Somewhere’), as well as a few social protest songs (‘Fayette County’, ‘My Dirty Stream’, ‘If You Love Your Uncle Sam, Bring Them Home’, the latter two written by Pete Seeger). Says on the back that he devoted himself to his church and singing after a near-fatal auto accident in 1968. He also made numerous appearances with Pete Seeger at colleges and towns along the Hudson River in the late ‘60s. The title song was written by Tom about a ship called the Clearwater that sailed the Hudson on an anti-pollution campaign in 1969. (Ken Scott - Archivist)
Winslow's great enduring fame comes from penning and performing the now-classic ballad, "Hey Looka Yonder", which is known also as "It's the Clearwater" and "It's the Clear Water". This song, recorded by Biograph Records in 1969, is about the fundraising for the sloop Clearwater, and in particular how "black and white" got together to create a floating environmental education school. Its mission was to clean up the water of then-polluted Hudson River.
This song is significant and historic in several ways: It was the first environmental song by an African-american song-writer, predating "Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)" by two full years.
It was Peter Seeger's and Tom Winslow's major collaboration. It was first recording by The Winslows - which included Tom Winslow's entire family, including toddler Thomasina Winslow, now a blues singer in her own right, singing and playing instruments in the background. A huge hit for a musical tradition outside of the popular music mainstream, the album and single of "It's the Clearwater" are coveted still by collectors of old-time folk music.