steel drivin' man

[ironymaiden]

a week or two ago, we went to happy hour at People's Pub, and were surprised to hear John Henry playing. the vocalist seemed familiar, but we couldn't quite place it. C tracked it down: Bruce Springsteen recorded an album of Pete Seeger tunes.

i never liked Springsteen much (overexposure to Born in the USA as a sprout) but most of these songs are ones my father sang to me or part of my early schooling. i loved the John Henry story as a child, and today i found a tear in my eye as i listened to the ballad.

i wonder what will become folk songs in fifty years, or if our reliance on recordings will have entirely erased this part of American culture.

Comments

[ivy]

I loved John Henry too. (And to my amusement, found myself singing it the other day when doing my hammer exercise. Apparently I want to be a steel driving woman. [grin]) We learned the song in elementary school, so there's another venue that might not go away.

[ironymaiden]

true. i wonder if we will continue teaching and singing them while they become mostly nonsense words like Yankee Doodle.

[ivy]

I only recently found out what that meant. [grin] So, probably.

[pixxelpuss.livejournal.com]

Folk singer/songwriters are still alive and kicking to my mind, although I'm not sure that new folk songs about historical events are common. Folk singer-songwriter Stephen Fearing wrote a song about the 2000 election, though.

[ironymaiden]

sure, but we don't sing them. when i think about what has penetrated the popular consciousness, i get things like Baby Got Back.

[pixxelpuss.livejournal.com]

Fair enough. Folk has essentially become just another genre rather than sort of the defacto genre of the people (although, is it possible to have anything be defacto of the people with such a heterogenous society?).

I think sailors still sing sea shanties, but I could just be deluding myself.

[buhrger]

i wonder what will become folk songs in fifty years, or if our reliance on recordings will have entirely erased this part of American culture.
the existence (and, by this point the proliferation) of recorded music has changed (is changing) the ways that people interact with music in HUGE ways, many of them deletirious

[ironymaiden]

the other thing that caught my attention today is that there's a commercial for Rhapsody right now that is mostly an interview with Eric Clapton. he talks about how he and his friends would sit and listen to entire albums. no talking, no doing other stuff. a rarity now. of course, not many folks listening to LPs anyway.

Legitimate Pharmaceuticals. Leprous Perjurers. Long Protrubances.

[buhrger]

indeed. i still own two or three vinyl platters, but (a) i have no idea where they are and (b) i lack proper playback technology. (and (c), they're crappy stuff i bought when i was 13, and i wouldn't want to listen to them now.)

Re: Legitimate Pharmaceuticals. Leprous Perjurers. Long Protrubances.

[ironymaiden]

i have a nice turntable, but the cover is all dusty from lack of use. i have a variety of mostly curiosities, like my brother's copy of In Through the Out Door where he let preschool me do the paint-with-water inner jacket.

[jfrog78.livejournal.com]

God I love that old stuff. I have quite a bit of it on my computer. Its songs like that make me warm inside. Especially songs sang to me as a child. The big one for me though is Danny Boy. My grandmother used to sing that to me right before bed. I have a lp that has john henry on it back at my mothers house it was a album of old folk songs by some guy on a street corner. It was awesome I need to have her send my albums to me.