Mary Travers of the famed folk trio, Peter, Paul and Mary, with her Peter Yarrow (left) and Noel Paul Stookey.
Mary Travers, a striking figure of power and glamour in the early-1960s folk music movement, died Wednesday at Danbury Hospital in Connecticut after suffering from leukemia for several years. She was 72.
She was best known as the blond with the bangs who commanded the middle microphone with Peter, Paul and Mary, a trio that brought folk music from coffeehouses to top-40 radio.
They also gave much of America its first taste of the young Bob Dylan by helping to turn his "Blowin' in the Wind" into a national anthem.
The group reunited several years ago to begin touring, and Travers performed with them until a few months ago, even when she needed assistance on stage.
In tribute to Mary, thought I'd post the following lyrics to the public domain "Woman of Experience" biographical folk song I wrote about her during the 1980s:
ReplyDelete"Women of Experience"
(chorus)
She's a woman of experience
She's a woman who is strong
She's a woman of intelligence
And she likes to sing folk songs.
(verses)
She was born in Old Kentucky
And raised in Bohemia
Her childhood was so lonely
But she found some joy in nature
Her parents taught her well
To always think for herself
And resist the Establishment
And that's why she sang folk. (chorus)
Around her was a crowd of rebels
Writers with words intense
Artists who hoped to change the world
And outfox the government
She rebelled against dumb authority
And refused to ape TV clones
Alienated and abandoned
She sang folk songs at home. (chorus)
She wandered in Washington Square
And sang along in the park
She read her quota of books
And sat in the coffeshops
She sang with a couple of men
And belted out her deep feelings
And fought for a better world
And they called her the "new folk queen." (chorus)
She's been through her family
And she's got some new lessons to share
And she's collected a lot of wisdom
And it's still fun to touch her hair
And she'll give you a passionate hug
And her spirit is still untamed
And she brings some love to the world
And sings folk songs in the middle of rain. (chorus)
My brother had the album where their names are written in chalk on a brick wall behind them, and I played that album a bazillion times.
ReplyDeleteThe song about the young woman who dresses in a man's uniform to join her beloved (I guess it would have been the Civil War?) used to slay me.
Very sad news today...
I have a bit of an ear for music, and it's interesting that just out of the blue, spontaneously, after I had learned to strum chords on a guitar, I played and sung, "If I Had a Hammer," a fun song to sing on a guitar. I guess my favorite of theirs.
ReplyDelete