In the introduction to the accompanying booklet, King and Archie describe the compilation thus: "If humans are by nature social animals, then what makes us unnatural is our inexplicable mulishness in seeking out relationships that we know will ultimately both enrich us and devastate us, more often at the same time: the irresistible yearning that is love. This collection of songs and tunes attempts to encompass this unique contradiction that lives within us, that is simultaneously so absurd and yet so necessary for our humanity. It is the “Sunshine and Shadows” that makes us truly, and forgivably, human and this humble selection of music contains the range of these contrasts."

Joe & Cleoma Falcon
"Aimer et Perdre (To Love and To Lose)"
Recorded April 1929
Joe and Cleoma were the first authentic Cajun musicians from South-West Louisiana to record commercially. They performed and recorded, rather prolifically, until Cleoma was involved in an accident which compromised her health and precipitated her untimely death soon thereafter. Joe and many other Cajuns mourned her passing.

Józef Brangel I Wiejska Orkiestra
"Oberek Z Migroda (Oberek From Migroda)"
Recorded December 1928
What a strange and beautiful place Migroda, Poland must have been. This curious dance of courtship likely features five fiddlers and a bowed bass. Brangel plays the lead melody with two others, providing at some times dissonant yet compelling harmonies and two others playing the rhythmic chords.

Dennis McGee & Sady Courville
"Madame Young, Donnez-Moi Votre Plus Jolie Blonde (Madam Young, Give Me Your Sweetest Blonde)"
Recorded March 1929
The irresistible charmer Dennis McGee played this song for Madame Ulysses Young, his first wife’s mother, in order to gain the hand of young Marie. McGee was one of the rare artists that could produce a pleading agony and a desperate longing from both his fiddle and his singing.

Douglas Bellard & Kirby Riley
"La Valse De La Prison (The Prison Waltz)"
Recorded October 1929
Bellard and Riley were the first to record the earthy, raw music of the black Creoles. This stark masterpiece of fiddle, accordion and vocal emphasizes the rhythm and beat while understating the melodic line. Douglas Bellard played with Amede Ardoin and taught this tune to a younger Canray Fontenot who popularized the song as "Barres De La Prison". Outside of Geeshie Wiley’s "Last Kind Word Blues", it is hard to imagine a more dark, moody, and backwoodsy performance from this time period.

Ukrainska Orchestra Michala Thomasa
"Hutzulka W Semerczyni (Hutzulka From Semerczyni)"
Recorded October 1929
The fiddle, especially in the hands of the masterful Ukrainian fiddler Thomasa, can produce a remarkably expressive tone, a timbre that sounds almost bitter and aggressive to my ears. His sophisticated bowing approach propels the fiddle to its expressive limits, strengthening the notion that the fiddle is the most vocal of all instruments, in the right hands.

Richard 'Rabbit' Brown
"Never Let The Same Bee Sting You Twice"
Recorded March 1927
Few American songsters can claim the concise wit and wisdom contained within Richard 'Rabbit' Brown’s slim opus. Even fewer artists were more of a cipher than Brown who recorded six sides in New Orleans and then was swallowed back up by eternity. The diction and tone of his voice suggest an older man who was well versed in the music of the medicine shows.