Boston to Berkeley: American Musical Protests Quiz

Answer: A Boston public transit fare increase

Although satire as a defined genre can be traced to first century Rome, the use of humor as the candy coating that allows us to swallow the bitter pill of social and political criticism dates at least to the Old Comedy of Athens in the 5th century BC. Older examples could doubtless be found. In the United States, the Kingston Trio played a critical role in the popularization of folk music, which would become the principal vehicle for social criticism in song. Lighthearted and seemingly concerned with a truly trivial social injustice, the Trio's chronicle of the woes that the MTA fare increase wrought on the hapless Charlie brought a folk-protest song into the mainstream of popular music.

This popular song might seem innocent enough, but the Kingston Trio was obliged to change the lyrics because of the song's controversial history. Bess Lomax Hawes and Jacqueline Steiner wrote the song in 1949 in order to support the candidacy of one Walter F. O'Brien, a communist Boston mayoral candidate. When Will Holt recorded the song and released it in the mid 1950s, Bostonians raised such an outcry over the lionization of a known communist that the record company withdrew the record. Because of this, when the Kingston Trio recorded the record, they changed the name Walter O'Brien to George O'Brien.

Answer: Flowers

Pete Seeger's 1956 recording of "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" was not a commercial success. Verses were added to the song and the rhythm changed prior to the Kingston Trio's recording of it. Other noteworthy artists to record the song include Peter Paul and Mary and Joan Baez.

Pete Seeger combined folk music and political activism throughout his career. Leaving Harvard as a sophomore, he traveled collecting folk songs, performing for whoever would listen and supporting himself selling watercolor paintings. During his travels he met Woody Guthrie. The Almanac Singers, who recorded that initial version of "MTA", included both Seeger and Guthrie. Guthrie once claimed that the Almanac Singers were "the only group that rehearsed on stage".

Answer: The John Birch Society

Three Gonzaga University students founded the Chad Mitchell Trio in 1958, the same year that RCA introduced its stereo long-playing albums. The group included or was backed by a number of performers who had success apart from the trio. On the "The Chad Mitchell Trio at The Bitter End" album cover, standing behind the three seated members of the trio, a guitarist can be seen - Jim McGuinn, who would gain fame as a guitarist for and co-founder of the Byrds. A second guitarist, Fred Hellerman, had played in Pete Seeger's group, the Weavers. The bass player for that evening, Bill Lee, also played with such notable folk artists as Judy Collins, Gordon Lightfoot, Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan.

In the early 60s, a young man who would have ample Top 40 success as a solo artist idolized the Chad Mitchell Trio. When Chad Mitchell bowed out in 1965, this young man replaced him. A songwriter, the new member of the Trio wrote "Leaving On A Jet Plane", which Peter Paul and Mary took to #12 on the Billboard top 100 for 1969. In 1969, John Denver left the Chad Mitchell Trio to pursue his solo career.

In 1963 singer-guitarist Michael Johnson earned an 11 cent royalty check for his first single, which sold 23 copies. Joining the Chad Mitchell Trio in 1967, Johnson stayed one year. Johnson and Denver co-authored a song "Circus" that was recorded by Mary Travers of Peter Paul and Mary. In 1978 Michael Johnson ultimately resumed a solo career, recording "Bluer Than Blue", which became a Billboard #1 song.

In 1962, the Chad Mitchell Trio's recording company scuttled a significant opportunity for the group to achieve true commercial success. Their manager came into possession of a demo tape by a little known songwriter named Bob Dylan. On hearing the song, the three wished to record it as a single or at least as a track on their next album, but Kapp records was adamantly opposed. Instead, the song passed to Peter Paul and Mary who made a #2 hit out of "Blowin' In The Wind".

Answer: Peter Paul and Mary

The program for the March on Washington on August 28, 1963, vividly demonstrated the alliance between folk music and social activism. The program began with Joan Baez singing "Oh Freedom" and leading those assembled in singing "We Shall Overcome". Bob Dylan sang a tribute to Medgar Evers. Other singers and many speeches followed, the last being given by the 39 year old Martin Luther King Jr. He concluded:

"When we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

In 1961, Peter Paul and Mary first appeared together at the same Greenwich Village coffee house in which The Chad Mitchell Trio recorded "The John Birch Society." Peter, the Cornell graduate with a degree in psychology, Paul, the standup comedian, and Mary, the aspiring Broadway actress, succeeded in impressing Bob Dylan's manager, Albert Grossman, who became their manager.

Releases of "Lemon Tree", "If I Had a Hammer", "Blowin' in the Wind" and "Puff the Magic Dragon" were all commercially successful. "Blowin' in the Wind" reached #2 on Billboard's chart at the time of the March on Washington. (And what was then #1? That honor would go to Martha and the Vandellas' "Heat Wave".)

Throughout their career, Peter Paul and Mary continued to blend activism with their musical performances. In 1965, they were on the courthouse steps of Montgomery, Alabama with Martin Luther King (and Joan Baez) at the end of the march from Selma to Montgomery. On November 15, 1969, Peter Yarrow was a co-organizer of another march on Washington that was to become the largest anti-war protest of the Vietnam era. After the group had disbanded to pursue separate careers, Peter's invitation to Paul and Mary to join him onstage at an antinuclear protest brought the trio back together in 1978.

Answer: Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel

In high school, in 1957, Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel formed a group and released a song that reached #49 on the Billboard charts. When subsequent efforts were much less successful, they split up, each attending a different college. By 1964, Simon had written a number of folk songs, which he showed to Garfunkel. One was "He Was My Brother", the song dedicated to Andrew Goodman, who had also been a friend of Art Garfunkel. The two of them recorded "Wednesday Morning 3 am", an album that included "The Sound of Silence", and promptly split up again. Requests began to come into radio stations for "The Sound of Silence". In 1965, their producer dubbed drums and electric guitar into the song and released it as a single. Within months "The Sound of Silence" reached #1. Simon and Garfunkel renewed their partnership and produced the album "Sounds of Silence", which was composed of songs performed in a folk rock style similar to that of the single version of "The Sound of Silence".

The death of the civil rights workers became the basis for the film "Mississippi Burning". The federal government successfully prosecuted the sheriff and clan members for violating the civil rights of the slain young men. No murder conviction was obtained; however, as of January 7, 2005, murder charges have again been filed against one of the Klansmen.

Answer: Joan Baez

Joan Baez's political involvement always coexisted with her music. Her music company, Vanguard Records, was known for artists with limited commercial appeal; and the company released only a small number of single records, concentrating instead on sales of long playing albums. Baez received a Grammy nomination for an album in 1963. In the same year, she led a boycott of the popular television folk music show "Hootenany" because the show had declined to feature Pete Seeger because of Seeger's activism. Also in that same year she sang "We Shall Overcome" for 250,000 civil right's demonstrators in Washington D.C. In 1965, the year of her release of "There But For Fortune", Joan marched for civil rights in Alabama and demonstrated in Washington D.C. against the Vietnam War. In 1967, when the DAR prevented Joan from performing in Constitution Hall, Joan responded with a free concert at the Washington Monument. Later in 1967 she was arrested twice for being part of demonstrations blocking an army induction center. In, perhaps, her most significant political act, she was credited with persuading then President Carter to send the 7th fleet to aid of the Boat People in 1979.

Baez's previous romantic relationship with Bob Dylan during the 1960s became the topic of her title song for her 1975 album "Diamonds and Rust". It included this remarkable description of the young Bob Dylan.

"Well you burst on the scene
Already a legend
The unwashed phenomenon
The original vagabond."

Answer: He began playing an electric guitar.

Bob Dylan's folk career might be said to have begun in New York at the hospital bedside of Woody Guthrie. Politically and socially charged songs and activism characterized his early career. With time, his topics became more personal and introspective.

At the Newport Folk Festival of 1965 Paul Butterfield and his predominately white, Southside Chicago blues band created a sensation with their electrified instruments. At the time of their performance, a wrestling match erupted between Alan Lomax (brother of Bess Lomax who wrote "MTA"), an opponent of amplified music and innovation and the Paul Butterfield Band's promoter, Albert Grossman. On July 25, 1965, at the Newport Folk festival, Bob Dylan went electric. Dylan chose members of Paul Butterfield's band (Mike Bloomfield, Jerome Arnold and Sam Lay) to back him up because they were the only band at the Newport Folk festival in 1965 to have electric instruments. Barry Goldberg, son of then US Supreme Court justice Arthur Goldberg, joined them on electric organ and Al Kooper played piano. While Dylan played, an enraged Pete Seeger threatened to unplug the speaker system.

It is reported that the audience booed Dylan during his first "electric" performance, although that is disputed. ("http://buffaloreport.com/020826dylan.html") It is not disputed that fans booed him at concerts later that year or that many expressed dismay at his change to folk rock. However, many were pleased with the change. The founder of Electra records, Jac Holzman, remembered Newport 1965 this way: "This was electricity married to content. We were hearing music with lyrics that had meaning, with a rock beat, drums and electric guitars, Mike Bloomfield keening as if squeezing out his final note on this planet. Absolutely stunning. All the parallel strains of music over the years coalesced for me in that moment. It was like a sunrise after a storm, when all is clean . . . all is known."

Answer: I Ain't Marching Anymore

In the early 60s, Bob Dylan opined, "`I just can't keep up with Phil. And he's getting better and better and better." Later Dylan would tell his friend, "you're not a folk-singer; you're just a journalist". Phil Ochs was a product of Middle America.

At the time he entered Ohio State University he considered himself apolitical; but after reading Karl Marx, Ochs became radical and activist in his thinking. Leaving college, he went to Greenwich Village where he moved in leftist political circles while composing and performing his music. During the 1968 democratic convention and the student riots that ensued in the years following, Ochs became deeply involved in political action and his music was accepted and applauded as it had never been before.

However, in the aftermath of these turbulent times, Ochs became depressed. He attempted an album of 50s songs in the early 70s that his fans received poorly. He hanged himself in 1976 and was said to have suffered from both alcoholism and schizophrenia.

Answer: Barry McGuire

Barry McGuire was the lead singer for Randy Spark's New Christy Minstrel, collaborating on the writing of the group's hit song "Green Green". Barry McGuire shared a Greenwich apartment in the early 1960s with Jim McGuinn. Both were also familiar at that time with John Phillips, subsequently a member of the Mamas and Papas. Phillip's song "Creeque Alley" contains references to "McGuinn and McGuire ...gettin' higher in L.A.".

In the 1970s, McGuire turned to Christian music, a genre with which he has stayed since that time. In the latter half of the 1980s, McGuire interrupted his musical career to work with the Christian relief organization World Vision.

Kenny Rogers joined the New Christy Minstrels in 1966, ultimately leaving with other members of the band to form The First Edition. Michael Johnson's career is outlined in the Chad Mitchell Trio's information section.

Answer: Country Joe and the Fish

Raised in Southern California, Joe Macdonald arrived in Berkeley during the heady days of the Free Speech Movement. Initially playing jug band music, Joe teamed with Barry Melton and some other friends to from what would become a rock band, Country Joe and the Fish. In their early years, the Fish played at a stunning variety of venues including political rallies, the Finnish Brotherhood Hall in Berkeley, the Fillmore Auditorium and even a junior prom for a high school in a wealthy suburb.

Joe Macdonald edited the magazine "Rag Baby". Strapped for material, Joe conceived the idea of a "talking" edition, which led to the first recording of the "I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die Rag". The band's popularity increased. In an odd twist - given Vanguard Records propensity to record controversial artists, when the time came to record the Fish's first commercial album, the president of Vanguard records successfully argued that the "I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die Rag" be left out because the controversial lyrics might poison the album's commercial potential. The song appeared on their next album. "I Feel Like I'm Fixin' To Die Rag" was performed most famously at Woodstock.

The intensely sarcastic and bitter lyrics of the song poignantly capture one aspect of what came to be termed "the generation gap". Sons shamed and alienated their parents by claiming conscientious objector status or simply fleeing to Canada to avoid serving in what was widely perceived as an "unjust war". These same young men were horrified and bitter that their parents were so adamant about seeing them sent to Vietnam. The refrain underscores the fatalistic attitude that could result from these irreconcilable differences:

"And it's one, two, three, what are we fighting for?
Don't ask me I don't give a damn; next stop is Viet Nam.
And it's five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates.
Ain't no time to wonder why, whoopee we're all gonna die."