Folk Music's Great Poets
Monday April 14, 2008
April is National Poetry Month, which means it's as good a time as any to take a look at the great poets of American folk music. From its inception, folk music wasn't really about flowery poetry. But, over the past century, poetry in song lyrics has become an art that is not lost on the contemporary American folk singer.
To celebrate National Poetry Month, I've made a Top 10 List of the Best Songs by Folk Music Poets, with a brief explanation, an excerpt from the lyric, and a link to download the song from Amazon, if you so desire. Enjoy! And if you don't see your favorite folk music poet on the list, drop me a comment and give them a shout out.
Comments
Hi. We’re working on a presentation for a client and are looking to purchase in any format a recording of a Pete Seeger song during which he recites the folk tale, “The Blind Men and the Elephant,” but don’t know the song title and can’t find any references. Can you help? The imbedded recitation is recalled by a colleage as follows:
The king received a message that a sea captain had landed on the coast with a strange
animal called an elephant. So he called his wise men and said: “Oh wise men, go
down to the seaport and report to me what manner of beast this elephant is.” The wise
men got into the king’s carriages, clip-clop, clip-clop, clip-clop, and they went to the
ship. But they’d been reading books so damn long they were blind as bats. When
they got there, one felt the legs of the elephant. He said, “hmm.” Another one felt the
side. He said, “hmmm.” Another one felt the ear, “hmmmm.” Another one felt the tusk,
another one felt the trunk, another one pulled the tail - bad luck for him.
Well, they all got into the carriages and went back to the palace. They bowed low and
one said, “Your Majesty, this elephant is very much like the trunk of a tree.” Another
one said, “Why, you’re very much mistaken. I felt it myself. It’s like the side of a
building.” The third started screaming, “Why you’re both crazy! I felt it - it’s like
a large leaf of a plant.” The next one said, “No, it’s like a smooth spear,” another
one said, “No, it’s like a huge snake!” Now they were all shouting, and the last one
screamed at the top of his lungs, “No, it’s like a rope that hangs down from heaven,
and when you pull on it, the heavens open up with waste.”
Thank you for any help you can provide.