American folk guitarists

Question

This piglix contains articles or sub-piglix about American folk guitarists

Answer 1

Paul Clayton (folksinger)

Paul Clayton (born Paul Clayton Worthington; March 3, 1931 – March 30, 1967) was an American folksinger and folklorist who was prominent in the folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s.

A graduate of the University of Virginia, where he earned a master's degree in Folklore, Clayton specialized in traditional music, primarily New England sea shanties and ballads and Appalachian songs. He became interested in the first of these as a youngster and began playing guitar as a teen. While attending college, he expanded his interests to include the music of Virginia and the surrounding states. Within a short time after leaving college, he began recording. His first releases were for a small specialty record company, but in 1956 he joined Folkways Records, the day's leading folk music label. He recorded six solo albums for Folkways from 1956–58, issued albums for a few specialty labels, moved to another prominent folk label, Elektra Records, for two albums in 1958–59, and collaborated with artists such as Jean Ritchie and Dave Van Ronk on other releases. He made his last recording in 1965.

As much a scholar as a musician, Clayton began collecting songs at a young age in his hometown of New Bedford, Massachusetts. At the university, he studied under a professor who was a leading folklorist. Soon he was combing the hills and valleys of Virginia and surrounding states for songs that formed the region's musical heritage. In making field recordings, he "discovered" Etta Baker and Hobart Smith, homespun musicians who have come to be regarded as all-time greats.

Clayton became a prominent figure in the Greenwich Village folk scene in New York City during the early 1960s. He was close with artists such as Dave Van Ronk and Liam Clancy and was also a mentor and friend of Bob Dylan during the first years of Dylan's career. A song Clayton wrote was allegedly "borrowed" by Dylan in 1962 as the basis for one of his most famous tunes, "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right". The resulting lawsuits by their record companies were settled out of court, and the two remained friends for several years afterwards.

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Answer 2

Judy Collins

Judy Collins

Judith Marjorie "Judy" Collins (born May 1, 1939), affectionately known as "Judy Blue Eyes", is an American singer and songwriter known for her eclectic tastes in the material she records (which has included folk music, show tunes, pop music, rock and roll and standards) and for her social activism.

Collins' debut album A Maid of Constant Sorrow was released in 1961, but it was the lead single from her 1967 album Wildflowers, "Both Sides, Now" — written by Joni Mitchell — that gave Collins international prominence. The single hit the Top 10 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart and won Collins her first Grammy Award for Best Folk Performance. She enjoyed further success with her recordings of "Someday Soon", "Chelsea Morning", "Amazing Grace", and "Cook with Honey".

Collins experienced the biggest success of her career with her recording of Stephen Sondheim's "Send in the Clowns" from her best-selling 1975 album Judith. The single charted on the Billboard Pop Singles chart in 1975 and then again in 1977, spending 27 nonconsecutive weeks on the chart and earning Collins a Grammy Award nomination for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female, as well as a Grammy Award for Sondheim for Song of the Year.

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Answer 3

Walt Conley

Walt Conley

Walter Bell Conley (May 20, 1929 – November 16, 2003) was an American folk singer, Hollywood actor, voice actor, and owner of Denver’s folk venue Conley’s Nostalgia. The Rocky Mountain News described Conley as the founding father of Denver's folk scene, which began in the late 1950s and stretched into the mid 1960s. Conley shared stages with, and opened for, Josh White, Cisco Houston, Mama Cass Elliot, Floyd Red Crow Westerman, and Judy Collins among many others. Conley also opened his home to a young and unknown Bob Dylan in the summer of 1960, and introduced Denver to the little known Smothers Brothers that same year. As the owner of Conley’s Nostalgia, Walt brought in big name performers such as John Fahey and Dave Van Ronk. To those who worked with him, knew him, and wrote about him, he is referred to as Denver’s “Grandfather of Folk Music.” Conley remained an entertainer until he died from a massive stroke at the age of 74. At the time of his death Conley was married to Joan Holden. Conley had four children from previous relationships. Conley's resting place is the Fort Logan National Cemetery in Denver, Colorado.

Conley (born Billy Robinson) was born in Denver, Colorado. He was raised in Scottsbluff, Nebraska by adoptive parents who gave him the name Walter Bell Conley. After his father died, Walt and his mother moved to Denver where he attended Manual High School and eventually received a football scholarship to Northeastern Junior College in Sterling, Colorado. During summer breaks as a student, Conley worked at a ranch in San Cristobal, New Mexico, owned by Jenny and Craig Vincent. Jenny Vincent was a respected folk-singer who performed with such luminaries as Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, Malvina Reynolds, and Earl Robinson. It was during one of those summers at the ranch that Conley met Pete Seeger and other members of The Weavers, a popular ’50s folk group. It was Pete Seeger who assisted Walt in buying his first guitar, convincing Conley to use his rich baritone to perform as a folk singer. Shortly after college, Conley enlisted in the Navy during the Korean War conflict. After he was discharged, Conley joined a film crew shooting the 1954 film Salt of the Earth. Conley then attended the University of Northern Colorado, then known as the Colorado State College of Education, where he majored in Theater and Physical Education. After graduating Conley had a brief career in teaching until this position clashed with his ambitions as an entertainer.

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Answer 4

Loren Mazzacane Connors

Loren MazzaCane Connors (born October 22, 1949, New Haven, Connecticut) is an American experimental musician who has recorded and performed under several different names: Guitar Roberts, Loren Mazzacane, Loren Mattei, and currently Loren Connors. He is a prolific collaborator who has worked with artists including Alan Licht, Jim O'Rourke, bassist Darin Gray, Thurston Moore, John Fahey, Keiji Haino, Jandek, Suzanne Langille, avant garde poet Steve Dalachinsky, Chan Marshall, Margarida Garcia, Kath Bloom and blues musician Robert Crotty.

An early champion of Connors's music was Dr. William Ferris, noted blues historian who served as head of the National Endowment for the Arts under the Clinton Administration. Connors made contact with him in the late 1970s, while Dr. Ferris was teaching at Yale University. Although Ferris did not know it at the time, Connors was the janitor who cleaned his office. Many years later, Ferris wrote the liner notes for a sweeping compilation CD set of Connors's seven-inch recordings, called "Night Through."

Best known as a composer and improviser on acoustic and electric guitar, Connors has released over 50 albums, on commercial record labels such as Table of the Elements and Father Yod as well as on his own Black Label, St. Joan and Daggett self publishing imprints. They include spare solo and duo blues, ensemble experimental jazz, noise, drones, and folk music. From 1981-1984, Connors released six limited edition albums with singer-guitarist Kath Bloom. In the mid-1980s, Connors took a partial break from music and honed his compositional skills by focusing on the art of haiku. He received the 1987 Lafcadio Hearn Award, and he and life partner Suzanne Langille also co-wrote an article on blues and haiku, "The Dancing Ear," published in the Haiku Society of America's journal. (A book of Connors's work from this period, "Autumn Sun," was re-released by Thurston Moore and Byron Coley a couple decades later.) He wrote under the name Loren Mattei, and a music recording from this period, "Ribbon o' Blues," was also released under that name.

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Answer 5

Ry Cooder

Ry Cooder

Ryland Peter "Ry" Cooder (born March 15, 1947) is an American musician, songwriter, film score composer, and record producer. He is a multi-instrumentalist but is best known for his slide guitar work, his interest in roots music from the United States, and his collaborations with traditional musicians from many countries.

Cooder's solo work has been eclectic, encompassing many genres. He has collaborated with many musicians, notably including Captain Beefheart, Ali Farka Touré, Eric Clapton, The Rolling Stones, Van Morrison, Neil Young, Randy Newman, David Lindley, The Chieftains, and The Doobie Brothers, Carla Olson & the Textones (both on record and in film). He briefly formed a band named Little Village. He produced the Buena Vista Social Club album (1997), which became a worldwide hit. Wim Wenders directed the documentary film of the same name (1999), which was nominated for an Academy Award in 2000.

Cooder was ranked eighth on Rolling Stone magazine's 2003 list of "The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" (David Fricke's Picks). A 2010 ranking by Gibson placed him at number 32.

Cooder was born in Los Angeles, California, to father Bill Cooder and Italian-American mother Emma Casaroli. He grew up in Santa Monica, California, and graduated from Santa Monica High School in 1964. During the 1960s, he briefly attended Reed College in Portland, Oregon. He began playing the guitar when he was three years old. He has had a glass eye since he was four, when he accidentally stuck a knife in his left eye.

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Answer 6

Amy Cook

Amy Cook

Amy Cook (born January 30, 1979) is an American musician and singer-songwriter living in Austin, Texas.

Amy first made her mark in Los Angeles, where she epitomized the rise of the "indie" artist, self-releasing records and finding success licensing her songs to television and film. Longing for inspiration and a change of scenery, Amy moved to the small West Texas town of Marfa in 2004. It was there on the front porch of an old house that she recorded a collection of lo-fi folk songs that would become "The Bunkhouse Recordings," complete with crickets and coyotes. Soon after, she moved to Austin where she recorded "The Sky Observer's Guide" (a collaboration with Los Angeles artist, Amy Adler) and caught the attention of Alejandro Escovedo, who tapped her for opening duties during his "Real Animal" tour. They followed their traveling act with "Let the Light In," an Escovedo produced record that garnered critical acclaim and featured the song "Hotel Lights," which was spotlighted on many favorites lists in 2010. Patty Griffin sang background vocals on the track. Opening shows for Heartless Bastards, A.A. Bondy, Escovedo, Chris Isaak, Shawn Colvin, Ben Kweller, Tift Merritt, Leo Kottke, Charlie Mars, Ryan Bingham and others followed. Cook is currently on tour with Lucinda Williams (summer 2012).

Cook will release Summer Skin, on August 28, 2012, on Roothouse/Thirty Tigers. Her finest and most cohesive project to date features production by Craig Street and a virtuoso band including Chris Bruce, Meshell Ndegeocello, Jonathan Wilson, and David Garza. Special guests include Robert Plant, Ben Kweller, and Patty Griffin. All songs on the record were written by Amy Cook, with the exception of one co-write with Ben Kweller.

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Answer 7

Michael Cooney

Michael Cooney (born 1943, Carmel, California, United States) is an American folk and blues musician who performed in the 1960s folk revival. He is known for his blues performances as well as for performing at, and organizing, many folk festivals.

Cooney served on the boards of the Newport Folk Festival and also the National Folk Festival. His albums include Mike Cooney and Still Cooney After All These Years.

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Answer 8

Jerry Corbitt

Jerry Corbitt (born Jerry Byron Corbitt; January 7, 1943 – March 8, 2014) was an American guitarist, harmonica player, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He is best known as a founding member and guitarist of the rock band The Youngbloods.

Corbitt was born in Tifton, Georgia. He began his career in Cambridge, Massachusetts at the beginning of the 1960s as a bluegrass musician, then was known as a folk singer. In mid-1960s, Corbitt met Jesse Colin Young, a Queens, New York City-born moderately successful folk singer. In January 1965, the two began touring in Canada as a duo, eventually naming themselves "The Youngbloods". Young played bass, and Corbitt played piano, harmonica and lead guitar. Later on, they were joined by Corbitt's friend, a bluegrass musician Lowell "Banana" Levinger, and drummer Joe Bauer.

In 1967, having signed with RCA Records, they released their first Billboard 200 album, The Youngbloods. Its single "Get Together", did not sell well, and reached #62 on the Billboard Hot 100. Re-released in 1969, it peaked at #5.

In 1969, Corbitt left the Youngbloods for a solo career, before the band recorded the album Elephant Mountain. In 1971, Jerry Corbitt and former Youngbloods producer Charlie Daniels formed the duo Corbitt & Daniels.

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Answer 9

Frankie Cosmos

Frankie Cosmos

Greta Kline (born March 21, 1994), better known by her stage name Frankie Cosmos, is an American musician and singer-songwriter. She is known for her independent releases, inspired by Frank O'Hara's poetry, DIY ethics of K Records and the early-2000s New York City's anti-folk scene. Kline is also the former bass guitarist of the band Porches. She is the daughter of actors Kevin Kline and Phoebe Cates.

Greta Kline was born in New York City, New York, the daughter of Academy Award-winning actor Kevin Kline and actress Phoebe Cates. Her father is of German-Jewish and Irish descent and her mother has Russian-Jewish and Chinese-Filipino ancestry.

Kline was introduced to music by her family. She settled on guitar as her primary instrument of choice at seventh grade, after playing the piano and briefly the drums. Home-schooled for most of high school, she spent time by attending underground rock shows in New York and getting involved in the Westchester music scene.

Kline appeared in the films The Anniversary Party (2001) and The Squid and the Whale (2005), alongside her brother, Owen Kline. She began attending New York University in 2012 to study poetry.

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Answer 10

Elizabeth Cotten

Elizabeth Cotten

Elizabeth "Libba" Cotten (née Nevills) (January 5, 1893 – June 29, 1987) was an American blues and folk musician, singer, and songwriter.

A self-taught left-handed guitarist, Cotten developed her own original style. She played a guitar strung for a right-handed player, but played it upside down, as she was left handed. This position required her to play the bass lines with her fingers and the melody with her thumb. Her signature alternating bass style has become known as "Cotten picking."

Nevills was born in 1893 in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, to a musical family. Her parents were George Nevill (also spelled Nevills) and Louisa (or Louise) Price Nevill. Elizabeth was the youngest of five children. At age seven, she began to play her older brother's banjo. By the age of eight, she was playing songs. At the age of 11, after scraping together some money as a domestic helper, she bought her own guitar. The guitar, a Sears and Roebuck brand instrument, cost $3.75. Although self-taught, she became proficient at playing the instrument. By her early teens she was writing her own songs, one of which, "Freight Train", became one of her most recognized. She wrote the song in remembrance of a nearby train that she could hear from her childhood home. The 1956 UK recording of the song by Chas. McDevitt and Nancy Whiskey was a major hit and is credited as one of the main influences on the rise of Skiffle in the UK.

Around the age of 13, Cotten began working as a maid along with her mother. On November 7, 1910, at the age of 17, she married Frank Cotten. The couple had a daughter, Lillie, and soon after Elizabeth gave up guitar playing for family and church. Elizabeth, Frank and their daughter Lillie moved around the eastern United States for a number of years, between North Carolina, New York City, and Washington, D.C., finally settling in the D.C. area. When Lillie married, Elizabeth divorced Frank and moved in with her daughter and her family.

Cotten retired from playing the guitar for 25 years, except for occasional church performances. She did not begin performing publicly and recording until she was in her 60s. She was discovered by the folk-singing Seeger family while she was working for them as a housekeeper.

While working briefly in a department store, Cotten helped a child wandering through the aisles find her mother. The child was Penny Seeger, and the mother was the composer Ruth Crawford Seeger. Soon after this, Cotten again began working as a maid for Ruth Crawford Seeger and Charles Seeger and caring for their children, Mike, Peggy, Barbara, and Penny. While working with the Seegers (a voraciously musical family that included Pete Seeger, a son of Charles from a previous marriage) she remembered her own guitar playing from 40 years prior and picked up the instrument again and relearned to play it, almost from scratch.

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