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One of the many new “authentic” folk groups.Banjos And Guitars:The Folk ElementBv Paul SherwinThe air hangs heavily and a' spirit of sorrow pervades the atmosphere of a small Greenwich Village coffee house. From out of the darkness emerges a short,aged Negro singer with guitar in hand. As he sits himself upon a small wooden stool, the only object on the stage except for the microphone which he moves close to his lips, a blue light is directed at his solitary figure. The deep lines which have been irrevocably etched on his face seem to soften and a smile quietly plays on his lips as he begins to sing “Candy Man. The man is Mississippi John Hurt and he is a folk-blues singer. The irrepressible quality of his performance is characterized by spontaneity, humour, and a deep concern for living. By the end of the evening, everyone in the audience has understood JohnHurt and his view of life. Through the rhythmic moan of the blues, he has told his story — what kind of women he likes, what he thinks of the white man, and what he likes to drink.On the “Boom in Folk MusicThe recent boom in folk music has enabled a number of outstanding new performers to continue in the tradition of the great exponents of this simple and honest form of expression. It is unfortunate, however, that most people are unfamiliar with the true music of the folk. Great ^ crowds of screaming and giggling singers such as the New Crunchy Monsters and The Insipidy Singers and groups like The Kingston Trio, The Chad Mitchell Trio, The Brothers Four, etc., are merely popular singers who have prostituted and stolen from this deeply personal and moving art. Amid this swarm of mediocrity have appeared a few exciting and talentedindividuals who are carrying on inthe tradition of “soul singing.mmmMusic Corner:Jazz Noteswmss*By Thomas KrehbielUnfortunately not all musicians, jazz or otherwise, have Duke Ellington’s equanimity in the face of adverse criticism: “Well if I worried about people who don’t understand . . It is even more unfortunate that so very many critics, especially in the jazz world,do not understand.Magazines FailThe Genius of DylanNone of these emergent singers of folk songs has had the impact of Bob Dylan. Dylan is only 23 years old, but already has an uncanny perceptiveness into the plight of the modern man in our over-mechanized and over-commercialized society. An extremely gifted writer and singer, Dylan’s songs are sometimes reminiscent of the blues, sometimes beautiful and eloquent, and sometimes bitter and caustic.Perhaps the most desperate and saddest of all folk music is the country blues. The solitary feeling of the exploited southern Negro which found expression through this medium has been adopted by the youth of many large northern cities who find themselves spiritually disinherited by society. One member of this rebellious generation of “eity-billies is John Hammond. Greatly influenced by the traditional blues and the rock ip roll era, Hammond has evolved a deeply t personal style that is capable of capturing the spirit of the street singers of the early twentieth century who laid their souls bare before an unfriendly world. A list of outstanding artists who have participated in the recent revival of folk music should include names like Joan Baez, Dave Van Honk, The Greenbriar Boys, Ian and Sylvia, Buffy Saint-Marie, and many others.Some Experienced SingersThose with an interest in folk music can readily become acquainted with the great number of men and women, some living, others not, who got kicked around for years and could only express their experiences and thoughts with their singing and instrumentation, through records and personal appearances. We owe a great deal to these roving American minstrels who have added soIn the past few years, two of three major jazz oriented magazines went out of publication. Metronome flopped because it was too much like Down Beat, but without the more well known critics writing for it. The Jazz Review was totally different from the other two. Ostensibly, it catered to the more well informed, more “serious listeners. This proved to be its downfall.The urobTem was not, however, that there were not enough of these well educated people, but that in most cases they probably were better educated than the critics who proposed to further that education.Lack of UnderstandingRecently excerpts from the Jazz Review have been collected andpublished in a book edited by Martin Williams which is^ called The Jazz Panorama. Almost without exception the articles in ths book show a remarkable lack of understanding and (I dread this word) sensitivity on the part of the critics who wrote them. In the cases of the contributions by musicians this was not as true, of course, but there was still a good deal left to be desired in many instances.*As a particularly bad example of the pomposity and shallowness of these articles, Gunther Schuller’s piece on Sonny Rollins stands alone. In this effort Schuller dissects Rollins’ performance of “Blue Seven, one of Rollins’ own compositions, and after cutting it up in a great number of pieces, Schuller states that it was a masterful improvisation and leaves it for dead.To be sure, “Blue Seven is one of Rollins’ finest recorded performances, but one does not prove it by writing it out and pointing out which notes of which bars are related thematically to the opening melody, especially when one does it incorrectly as Schuller does. Schuller, by the way has established himself not as a critic, but as a practicing musician in both the jazz and classical fields. Perhaps he should do a little more practicing.Incorrect AnalysisLeonard Feather, another eritie-musician, is little better. In the introduction to his Encyclopedia of Jazz he speaks of the improvisations of Ornette Coleman and Cecil Taylor as not being based on previously established harmonic patterns and proceeds to label this “atonal. This is as far from atonality as one can get. The most ancient forms of music known were not harmonic in nature, but were strongly tonal. As far as I know, there has been NO atonal jazz played or composed to date, and I doubt there will be.One could go down a list of the major jazz critics and find examples of such foolishness from all of them. An “almost should be inserted in the above sentence. We still have Martin Williams and Ira Gitler. These two men are unbiased and have good musical minds. Neither of them has had a great amount of musical training but they have a good intuitive grasp of what makes music. Both write for Down Beat at the present time and Williams also contributes to the Saturday Review and the Evergreen Review. There are others who are not really bad, but I can think of no others who are really good. May God protect us from the Wilsons, the Hentoffs, and the Joneses.amuch to our culture and to our own lives. Leadbelly (Huddie Ledbetter), the master of the twelve-string guitar, who spent a great part of his life in jail, was discovered by John Lomax and was the first folk singer to tour the country giving concerts. He was a dark-skinned Negro with a troubled soul who created some of the best music that has appeared in the United States. Woodie Guthrie, singer, ballad-maker and poet is presently hospitalized in New Jersey with Parkinson’s Disease. Woodie has had a tremendous influence on modem folk singers, especially Bob Dylan, and can be heard on many records. The religious intensity, driving rhythms and amazing guitar playing of Blind Gary Davis, the marvelous flat-picking and sincere voice of Doc Watson, the tremendously honest and moving blues of men like Big Bill Broonzy, Light-nin’, Hopkins, Brownie McGee, and Sonny Terry as well as the music of so many other great folk-sing-ers has become quite meaningful for those acquainted with them.It is impossible to do sufficient justice to such a vast topic in a single article. Folk music is not only an important and creative means of expression. It is the voice of a way of life. It is the music of those who feel strongly about life and are caught in the inhuman grip of the machine age.Illinois Wesleyan University recently announced the following revised Independent Study Summer Program: All students registered for the Independent Study Program must attend a one week intensive program held on the campus and must, during this , time, room and board on the campus.TTTTTTTTT T T TVT T T ▼ TTTTT Y Y T T T T T V T T T T TT-T-TTTTTTT,,r
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Schenectady Concordiensis
Schenectady, New York, US
Fri, Apr 24, 1964
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