Lonesome Traveler: The Life of Lee Hays

Rating:
Summary: From Out of the Black(list)
Review: This is a fine biography of a significant socio-politic-musical figure who was subsumed in the anti-Communist hysteria of the American 1940's and 50's. With Pete Seeger, Hays was a co-founder of two musical groups that were effectively blacklisted: the Almanac Singers (eventually joined by Woody Guthrie), and of the seminal folk-pop group The Weavers, whose hit recording of "Goodnight Irene" forever changed the relationship between folk music and popular culture. Hays himself is revealed as a complex and colorful man, of considerable musical and literary talent, personal flaws, and a blazing social conscience that propelled all his work and regularly made him a target of established political hierarchies. With ample excerpts of Hays' writing, photos from the period, and first-hand narrative (Hays roomed with the author's family, and performed with him as part of the "Babysitter's Quartet", which included then-folksinger-now-actor Alan Arkin) this book gives an entertaining and easy-to-appreciate portrait of a remarkable man. It also offers a fascinating glimpse into a period of important, still-difficult American history.

Rating:
Summary: From Out of the Black(list)
Review: This is a fine biography of a significant socio-politic-musical figure who was subsumed in the anti-Communist hysteria of the American 1940's and 50's. With Pete Seeger, Hays was a co-founder of two musical groups that were effectively blacklisted: the Almanac Singers (eventually joined by Woody Guthrie), and of the seminal folk-pop group The Weavers, whose hit recording of "Goodnight Irene" forever changed the relationship between folk music and popular culture. Hays himself is revealed as a complex and colorful man, of considerable musical and literary talent, personal flaws, and a blazing social conscience that propelled all his work and regularly made him a target of established political hierarchies. With ample excerpts of Hays' writing, photos from the period, and first-hand narrative (Hays roomed with the author's family, and performed with him as part of the "Babysitter's Quartet", which included then-folksinger-now-actor Alan Arkin) this book gives an entertaining and easy-to-appreciate portrait of a remarkable man. It also offers a fascinating glimpse into a period of important, still-difficult American history.