3 Folk Sing

Taking their inspiration from Edward Steichen's "Family of Man" and from Carl Sandburg's poetry, four attractive young people have produced a program of folk music that is different, refreshing, and exceedingly enjoyable. They sing, play guitars and banjos, pantomine, and experiment with lighting; and last Sunday's Boston audience, while small (only about 100), gave them an enthusiastic response.

Although the show itself is skillfully and professionally executed, the youthfulness of the performers gives 3 Folk Sing a fresh and natural touch. Its organizer is Brooks Jones, Princeton '56, a former president of the Triangle Club Show. A tall, lanky blond, Jones might pass for a song leader at a summer work camp; and yet, a touch of the Princetonian ivy still seems to cling to him. (On their record cover the three singers are posed on a tiger rug.)

The other male singer is Walt Winter, Swarthmore '56, a medical student with a West Indian background. As a singer, Winter is somewhat more impressive than Jones, but none of the three can be said to have an exceptionally outstanding voice. The charm of the show is rather in the overall composition than in the quality of singing itself.

Molly Scott, a very pretty blond Smithie (class of '59), has a pleasant and natural voice, but more striking is her versatility of dramatic expression. In one scene, she coos sweetly over the new-born babe as the group sings "Virgin Mary Had a Little Baby," and in a subsequent number, she brandishes a mean pen-knife in a rowdy rendition of "Union Maid." Although 3 Folk Sing is nominally a trio, there is also a fourth, Paul Prestopino, a talented instrumentalist who accompanies the others. With his black beard and black-rimmed glasses, he provides added flavoring to the "Family of Man" atmosphere.

The musical interpretation of Steichen's pictorial essay begins and ends with a recitation of the theme: "All man is but one man." With a rapid-moving and never-tiring tempo, the show moves through the various phases of man's life: work and praise, sorrow, prayer, complaint, and love. Between each number the theatre is blackened and the performers take their positions for the next of the songs--some interpreted as still pictures, others with lively action. In the "complaint category," for example, "Talking Union" and "Union Maid" are done with audience participation, including community singing on the chorus of the latter. The cast distributes union handbills reading "Oust Boss Gunch" and "If yer gonna split Atoms you can't split Ranks." (Jones had the handbills printed from old union woodcuts he found in the Princeton archives.)

For a folk singing concert, it is almost a curiosity that all of the selections are in English. When asked why the group did not sing foreign songs, Jones remarked, "I guess we don't know any." A better explanation might be gleaned from the group's parody of esoteric folk singing. Explaining that some Greenwich Villagers had criticized their repertoire as lacking in "real folk songs," they proceeded to sing "a real field song--Field Holler" ("We found it in a field," Jones said) and "a real mountain song--"Bring Me Back My Brown-Eyed Girl" ("We found it on a mountain.")

The record jacket for 3 Folk Sing states that "folk songs should be sung for the same reason they've always been sung, because they're fun." This philosophy comes across well in the concert. It shows originality, ingenuity, spontaneity. And it is fun.