John Coburn Stewart was an American songwriter and singer. He is known for his contributions to the American folk music movement of the 1960s while with the Kingston Trio (1961–1967) and as a popular music songwriter of the Monkees' No. 1 hit "Daydream Believer" and his own No. 5 hit "Gold" during a solo career spanning 40 years that included almost four dozen albums and more than 600 recorded songs.
The Kingston Trio is an American folk and pop music group that helped launch the folk revival of the late 1950s to the late 1960s. The group started as a San Francisco Bay Area nightclub act with an original lineup of Dave Guard, Bob Shane, and Nick Reynolds. It rose to international popularity fueled by unprecedented sales of LP records and helped alter the direction of popular music in the U.S.
Alex Hassilev was an American folk musician who was one of the founding members of the group The Limeliters. Educated at Harvard and the University of Chicago, he was also an actor with a number of film and television appearances to his credit. As a musician he played the guitar and the banjo and was fluent in several languages. After retiring from the Limeliters, Hassilev remained active in the field of record production.
The New Christy Minstrels are an American large-ensemble folk music group founded by Randy Sparks in 1961. The group has recorded more than 20 albums and scored several hits, including "Green, Green", "Saturday Night", "Today", "Denver" and "This Land Is Your Land". The group's 1962 debut album, Presenting the New Christy Minstrels, won a Grammy Award and remained on the Billboard 200 albums chart for two years.
The Limeliters are an American folk music group, formed in July 1959 by Lou Gottlieb, Alex Hassilev (banjo/baritone), and Glenn Yarbrough (guitar/tenor). The group was active from 1959 until 1965, and then after a hiatus of sixteen years, Yarbrough, Hassilev, and Gottlieb reunited and began performing again as The Limeliters in reunion tours. On a regular basis a continuation of The Limeliters group is still active and performing. Gottlieb died in 1996, Yarbrough died in 2016, and Hassilev died in 2024, the last founding member, who had remained active in the group, retired in 2006, leaving the group to carry on without any of the original members.
Hootenanny was an American musical variety television show broadcast on ABC from April 1963 to September 1964. The program was hosted by Jack Linkletter. It primarily featured pop-oriented folk music acts, including The Journeymen, The Limeliters, the Chad Mitchell Trio, The New Christy Minstrels, The Brothers Four, Ian & Sylvia, The Big 3, Hoyt Axton, Judy Collins, Johnny Cash, The Carter Family, Flatt & Scruggs and the Foggy Mountain Boys, The Tarriers, Bud & Travis, and the Smothers Brothers. Although both popular and influential, the program is primarily remembered today for the controversy created when the producers blacklisted certain folk music acts, which then led to a boycott by others.
Donald David Guard was an American folk singer, songwriter, arranger and recording artist. Along with Nick Reynolds and Bob Shane, he was one of the founding members of The Kingston Trio.
Pete Zorn was an American multi-instrumentalist who was a longstanding member of Richard Thompson's backing band. He was also a member of Steeleye Span, The Albion Band, and Driver 67.
Robert Castle Schoen, known professionally as Bob Shane, was an American singer and guitarist who was a founding member of The Kingston Trio. In that capacity, Shane became a seminal figure in the revival of folk and other acoustic music as a popular art form in the United States in the late 1950s through the mid-1960s.
Nicholas Wells Reynolds was an American folk musician and recording artist. Reynolds was one of the founding members of The Kingston Trio, whose folk and folk-style material captured international attention during the late Fifties and early Sixties.
The American folk music revival began during the 1940s and peaked in popularity in the mid-1960s. Its roots went earlier, and performers like Josh White, Burl Ives, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Big Bill Broonzy, Richard Dyer-Bennet, Oscar Brand, Jean Ritchie, John Jacob Niles, Susan Reed, Paul Robeson, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and Cisco Houston had enjoyed a limited general popularity in the 1930s and 1940s. The revival brought forward styles of American folk music that had in earlier times contributed to the development of country and western, blues, jazz, and rock and roll music.
The Whiskeyhill Singers were an American folk revival group formed in early 1961 by Dave Guard after he left The Kingston Trio. Guard formed the Singers as an attempt to return to the Trio's earlier roots in folk music. The Singers lasted about six months before disbanding. During that short period the group released one album, Dave Guard & The Whiskeyhill Singers, and recorded a number of songs for the soundtrack of How the West Was Won, but only four of these were used in the movie.
The Kingston Trio At Large is the American folk music group the Kingston Trio's fourth album, released in 1959. It was the Trio's first stereo studio album and one of the four they would simultaneously have on Billboard's Top 10 albums during that year. It spent fifteen weeks at #1. The single "M. T. A." b/w "All My Sorrows" spent eleven weeks on the singles charts and peaked at number 15. The Trio's second single that same year, "The Tijuana Jail" b/w "Oh Cindy", was recorded during The Kingston Trio At Large sessions. It peaked at number 12.
Paul Downes is an English folk guitarist, singer and composer. He has appeared on eight albums with bands, three solo albums and has over 150 session credits. He has toured every concert venue, theatre and festival in Britain, plus many tours in the USA and Europe, as well as appearing in cabaret in the West Indies and newsreading on US radio.
College Concert is the twelfth album by the American folk music group the Kingston Trio, released in 1962. It was the group's third live release and the first live release with new member John Stewart. College Concert peaked at number three on the Billboard charts and was the largest-selling release by the Stewart-years Trio.
Sunny Side! is an album by the American folk music group the Kingston Trio, released in 1963. It reached number 7 on the Billboard Pop Albums chart. The lead-off single was "Desert Pete" b/w "Ballad of the Thresher". The single was the last Top 40 single for the group. Members of the Western Writers of America chose it as one of the Top 100 Western songs of all time.
The Lost Masters 1969–1972 is an album by the New Kingston Trio, recorded in 1969 to 1972 and released in 1997.
The World Needs a Melody is an album by The New Kingston Trio, released in 1973.
Presenting the New Christy Minstrels, also known as Exciting New Folk Chorus, is the debut studio album by the acoustic American folk music group the New Christy Minstrels. It was recorded in mid-April 1962 and released by Columbia Records in October 1962.
"Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream" is a song written by American folk singer-songwriter Ed McCurdy in 1950. Due to McCurdy's connection with fellow musicians, it was common in repertoires within the folk music community. The song had its first album release when Pete Seeger recorded it as "Strangest Dream" for his 1956 album Love Songs For Friends & Foes. Seeger would later re-visit the song for his 1967 album Waist Deep in the Big Muddy and other Love Songs. The strong anti-war theme of the song led it to be recorded by multiple other artists, including The Weavers (1960), Joan Baez (1962), The Kingston Trio (1963), Simon & Garfunkel (1964), and Johnny Cash who released two versions of the song during the 2000s.
