Roger McGuinn, a legendary founder of the folk rock band the Byrds, will bring a mix of sounds from both his mile-high career with the Byrds and his extensive solo career to the Hoboken Music and Arts fair on May 5.
McGuinn will play songs from his entire career and include anecdotes about them and about the eras in which he first performed them. But McGuinn is also a man with a mission, someone who, with his new CD "Treasures from the Folk Den," seeks to preserve an important piece of musical history.
McGuinn is seen as one of the superstars of music. He was the lead singer and lead guitarist for numerous Byrds hits. The Byrds – strongly influenced by the Beatles – defined the genres of folk rock and county rock during the 1960s. In the 1970s, McGuinn embarked on a solo cares that has brought him back to his roots in music. McGuinn was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991 for his innovative work with The Byrds. In the 1970s, he toured with Bob Dylan’s all-star Rolling Thunder Review. He has done collaborations with Tom Petty and Elvis Costello.
Getting here from there
McGuinn was born in Chicago in 1942. His parents were professional writers, and as a child, he toured with them as they promoted their best selling book: Parents Can’t Win.
McGuinn said he grew up in arts supportive environment, with numerous creative people coming to his house. The book tour allowed him to get a glimpse of the "show biz" world and made him decide to become a musician.
"I got into music when I was 14," he said.
McGuinn found himself drawn to folk music and remembered being struck in particular by Bob Gibson and Pete Seeger.
"They were the best," McGuinn said last week. "Bob Gibson did some intricate picking of the five-string banjo, and his stories and melodies blew me away."
Although folk music had political and social connotations, McGuinn said he liked the genre despite its politics.
In the 1950s, he came back to Chicago to study music at the Old Town School of Folk Music, and he became a fixture as a folk singer on the local musical scene there.
Shortly after graduating from high school, McGuinn took up work with the Limeliters and is featured as an accompanist on their album Tonight in Person. Later, he also played on Chad Mitchell Trio albums including Live at the Bitter End.
Later, he recorded with singer Judy Collins and toured with singer Bobby Darin, then moved to New York City where he worked as a songwriter. Part of McGuinn’s musical life in Greenwich Village was the subject of a song by the Mamas and Papas, "Creeque Alley."
He also worked with Hoyt Axton, Simon and Garfunkel (when still known as Tom and Jerry), and others
In 1964, he heard the Beatles, and this altered his direction. He began performing folk music with a rock beat.
The Byrds formed in 1964. McGuinn was doing a solo act at the Troubadour folk club in L.A. Gene Clark, who had just left the New Christy Minstrels, was intrigued by the mix of folk and rock McGuinn played. That night at the club, they wrote some tunes. They played them at the Troubadour the next day, and David Crosby walked in and started singing harmony.
The name of the band came over Thanksgiving dinner.
The Byrds came to use 12-string guitars – in particular, the Rickenbacker electric used by the Beatles – pushed through a condenser. The McGuinn model Rickenbacker comes with a condenser built in.
With the help of Miles Davis, a legendary jazz performer, Columbia Records agreed to allow the Byrds to record a single. If that had failed, they would not have taken them on.
They decided to do a version of Dylan’s "Mr. Tambourine Man," changing the timing and cutting some of the verses. On June 26, 1965, the song became number one on the sales charts.
John Lennon of the Beatles later called the Byrds his favorite American band.
The Byrds went onto the record numerous other hits, including "Turn, Turn, Turn" written by Pete Seeger, and "Eight Miles High."
"Eight Miles High," like many songs in the 1960s, was mistakenly taken to be a drug song. "That’s because it had the word ‘high’ in it," McGuinn said. He said the song was about an airplane flight.
During this period, McGuinn, whose birth name was James, changed his name to Roger at the recommendation of an Indian holy man. Later, McGuinn became deeply religious, but he said there has always been an aspect of spiritually in his music.
"Some of my songs and performances were spiritually motivated," he said. "I always considered music a spiritual language. I sang ‘Mr. Tambourine Man’ as a prayer to God."
But the song satisfied him most was "Turn,Turn,Turn" because it had "a wonderful melody and timeless lyrics," he said.
McGuinn said that what he missed most and least about that period were "the screaming girls."
Making it as a solo act
The band lasted from 1964 to 1973, when McGuinn started on a solo career. In 1981 – inspired by Jack Keroauc’s book On the Road, he went on the road with an acoustic guitar – a tour that took him, as he put it, "everywhere, man."
In 1990, he released the album Back from Rio and the single King of the Hill co-written with his friend, Tom Petty. The song reached number one on the sales charts.
The CD was recorded on a portable computer, and was part of an effort to bring folk music to a modern audience. McGuinn traveled up and down the East Coast from his home in Orlando, Fla., to seek out people with whom he as worked in the past and people he saw as influential to folk music. He had previously recorded the old songs and distributed them free on his web site. He felt that people would forget those songs if not preserved.
McGuinn sees his new CD and the CD he is currently working on as an effort similar to one made by John Avery Lomax. In the 1930s, Lomax made an arrangement with the Library of Congress to travel the country to record folk songs rapidly vanishing from popular culture. Lomax used cutting tape recording technology, and McGuinn is using cutting edge computer technology for the same purpose.
McGuinn’s free solo performance at the Hoboken Spring Festival Sunday is scheduled for 2:30 p.m. on the First Street stage. q