Prologue: Tom Dooley History of a Song 1. We Are the Folk Backgrounds of the Revival 2. The New Minstrelsy Jim Crow and John Henry 3. Ballad for Americans The Search for a People's Opera 4. Ramblin' Round Your City The Almanac Singers 5. Wasn't That a Time Folk Music and the Cold War 6. Smith's Memory Theater The Great Folkways Anthology 7. He Shall Overcome Pete Seeger 8. Happy Campers The Children's Underground 9. Lady and the Tramp Joan Baez and Bob Dylan 10. Nobles, Patrons, Patriots, Reds Democracy and Revivalism Notes Acknowledgments Index
Robert S. Cantwell is Adjunct Professor of American Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is the author of Ethnomimesis: Folklife and the Representation of Culture and the classic Bluegrass Breakdown: The Making of the Old Southern Sound.
In his rich and suggestive, quirky and lyrical…study of the folk
revival of the late 1950s and early 60s, Robert Cantwell…shows that
the history of 20th-century folk music has depended on most
unlikely associations. He argues persuasively that folk music’s
ability to move people, even to change their lives, comes from the
fact that it has already crossed some of the deepest divides in
American culture—race, class and region—and he invites listeners to
do the same. The real strength of When We Were Good lies in the
energy with which Mr. Cantwell, the author of two previous books on
folk music and folk culture, pursues and celebrates this music’s
roots… Mr. Cantwell’s book demonstrates beautifully that the
convenient academic categories we use to slice up American history
and culture are inadequate to grasp a cultural phenomenon like folk
music… This is a rich and rewarding book, driven by evident
passion… In this age of proliferating academic specialization and
popular pride in one’s ‘roots,’ Mr. Cantwell shows us that American
popular music—and by extension much of our culture—is a hopelessly
hybrid creation, descended from accidental couplings, political
conflicts and ironies, blacks and whites. No wonder it has a
haunting melody.
*New York Times Book Review*
The most detailed history of [the American folk music] revival yet
undertaken… As Robert Chantwell charts brilliantly in When We Were
Good, the process by which folk music (however defined) came to
enjoy its brief moment of ascendancy in the late 1950s and early
1960s was more circuitous and complex than most knew or for that
matter cared to know.
*New York Review of Books*
Robert Cantwell’s amazing book analyzes the cultural forces that
culminated in that moment at Newport, when [Bob Dylan and Joan
Baez] sang with Peter, Paul and Mary; Pete Seeger; and the SNCC
Freedom Singers. But his book goes much deeper into American
culture, probing the different ways people have tried to find an
authentic American voice, distinct from high culture and
uncontaminated by the seemingly irresistible forces of the
entertainment industry… If the sixties folk song revival seems a
mild, middle-class enthusiasm for the songs of the downtrodden,
Cantwell shows it inquiring more deeply into the nature of American
democracy itself.
*The Nation*
[Cantwell] effectively traces the theatrical, literary, musical and
political origins of that folk revival, from the minstrels of the
19th century to the politically engaged folk-song movement of the
Depression. The book springs vividly to life when discussing John
Lomax and his son Alan, Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie and above all,
Pete Seeger.
*San Francisco Chronicle*
[Cantwell] rewrites history with music, and vice versa. Diffusing a
perfectly sketched generic, white, middle-class, suburban, postwar
upbringing across the whole spectrum of American legend and
experience, Cantwell pours old wine into a cruet that suddenly
gleams with transparency… As he begins to trace the roles played by
his characters—those figures dancing on the surface of ‘Tom
Dooley,’ or hiding in its grooves—he makes the wine new.
*Artforum*
Cantwell’s account of that…era combines the personal perspective of
an informed participant with theory-laden explanations… [He] writes
with a deep love and passion for his subject, and this book creates
an engaging and often poetic picture of a folk revival that very
few people know about. It is the movement that took place outside
the limelight, growing underground through the McCarthy era,
blossoming when the Kingston Trio’s version of ‘Tom Dooley’ his the
charts in 1957, and ending—not beginning—when Bob Dylan and Joan
Baez appeared like Adam and Eve on the stage of the Newport Folk
Festival together in 1963… Cantwell’s portraits of early folk
heroes are especially memorable… There is a generosity of spirit
running through the book, directed toward those who made the music,
those who revived it for their own ends, and us, his readers… When
We Were Good offers a perspective on the folk revival that could
not be more relevant and timely.
*Boston Book Review*
When We Were Good is a long-overdue account of an all too
frequently ignored period of American popular music, roughly the
seven years between the Kingston Trio’s ‘Tom Dooley’ and Bob
Dylan’s electric debut at the 1965 Newport Folk festival.
*Record Collector [UK]*
[A] detailed and well constructed history of the U.S. folksong
revival of the fifties and sixties… Cantwell carefully shows how
this folk revival, involving mostly people born in the 1930s and
1940s, began in a state of total commercialization, with the
Kingston Trio and other slick pretenders with crew-cuts, and grew
increasingly more authentic, and more creative, as the public
gained in discrimination.
*Telegraph-Journal [New Brunswick, Canada]*
In his rich and suggestive, quirky and lyrical...study of the folk
revival of the late 1950s and early 60s, Robert Cantwell...shows
that the history of 20th-century folk music has depended on most
unlikely associations. He argues persuasively that folk music's
ability to move people, even to change their lives, comes from the
fact that it has already crossed some of the deepest divides in
American culture-race, class and region-and he invites listeners to
do the same. The real strength of When We Were Good lies in
the energy with which Mr. Cantwell, the author of two previous
books on folk music and folk culture, pursues and celebrates this
music's roots... Mr. Cantwell's book demonstrates beautifully that
the convenient academic categories we use to slice up American
history and culture are inadequate to grasp a cultural phenomenon
like folk music... This is a rich and rewarding book, driven by
evident passion... In this age of proliferating academic
specialization and popular pride in one's 'roots,' Mr. Cantwell
shows us that American popular music-and by extension much of our
culture-is a hopelessly hybrid creation, descended from accidental
couplings, political conflicts and ironies, blacks and whites. No
wonder it has a haunting melody. -- Warren Goldstein * New York
Times Book Review *
The most detailed history of [the American folk music] revival yet
undertaken... As Robert Chantwell charts brilliantly in When We
Were Good, the process by which folk music (however defined)
came to enjoy its brief moment of ascendancy in the late 1950s and
early 1960s was more circuitous and complex than most knew or for
that matter cared to know. -- Geoffrey O'Brien * New York Review of
Books *
Robert Cantwell's amazing book analyzes the cultural forces that
culminated in that moment at Newport, when [Bob Dylan and Joan
Baez] sang with Peter, Paul and Mary; Pete Seeger; and the SNCC
Freedom Singers. But his book goes much deeper into American
culture, probing the different ways people have tried to find an
authentic American voice, distinct from high culture and
uncontaminated by the seemingly irresistible forces of the
entertainment industry... If the sixties folk song revival seems a
mild, middle-class enthusiasm for the songs of the downtrodden,
Cantwell shows it inquiring more deeply into the nature of American
democracy itself. -- Jon Wiener * The Nation *
[Cantwell] effectively traces the theatrical, literary, musical and
political origins of that folk revival, from the minstrels of the
19th century to the politically engaged folk-song movement of the
Depression. The book springs vividly to life when discussing John
Lomax and his son Alan, Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie and above all,
Pete Seeger. -- Robert C. Cottrell * San Francisco Chronicle *
[Cantwell] rewrites history with music, and vice versa. Diffusing a
perfectly sketched generic, white, middle-class, suburban, postwar
upbringing across the whole spectrum of American legend and
experience, Cantwell pours old wine into a cruet that suddenly
gleams with transparency... As he begins to trace the roles played
by his characters-those figures dancing on the surface of 'Tom
Dooley,' or hiding in its grooves-he makes the wine new. -- Greil
Marcus * Artforum *
Cantwell's account of that...era combines the personal perspective
of an informed participant with theory-laden explanations... [He]
writes with a deep love and passion for his subject, and this book
creates an engaging and often poetic picture of a folk revival that
very few people know about. It is the movement that took place
outside the limelight, growing underground through the McCarthy
era, blossoming when the Kingston Trio's version of 'Tom Dooley'
his the charts in 1957, and ending-not beginning-when Bob Dylan and
Joan Baez appeared like Adam and Eve on the stage of the Newport
Folk Festival together in 1963... Cantwell's portraits of early
folk heroes are especially memorable... There is a generosity of
spirit running through the book, directed toward those who made the
music, those who revived it for their own ends, and us, his
readers... When We Were Good offers a perspective on the
folk revival that could not be more relevant and timely. -- Hugh
Blumenfeld * Boston Book Review *
When We Were Good is a long-overdue account of an all too
frequently ignored period of American popular music, roughly the
seven years between the Kingston Trio's 'Tom Dooley' and Bob
Dylan's electric debut at the 1965 Newport Folk festival. * Record
Collector [UK] *
[A] detailed and well constructed history of the U.S. folksong
revival of the fifties and sixties... Cantwell carefully shows how
this folk revival, involving mostly people born in the 1930s and
1940s, began in a state of total commercialization, with the
Kingston Trio and other slick pretenders with crew-cuts, and grew
increasingly more authentic, and more creative, as the public
gained in discrimination. -- Douglas Fetherling * Telegraph-Journal
[New Brunswick, Canada] *
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