Folk Legends Jim Kweskin & Happy Traum at the Mainstay, Nov. 15

Folk Legends Jim Kweskin and Happy Traum will perform in concert at the Mainstay in Rock Hall, MD at 8:00 p.m. on Saturday November 15. Admission is $20.

Singer and bandleader, Jim Kweskin (The Jim Kweskin Jug Band) created one of the core guitar styles of the 60s folk revival, adapting ragtime-blues fingerpicking to the more complex chords of pop and jazz. His lifelong devotion to American folk styles continues to produce stellar recordings and live shows, both solo and in collaboration with various artists.

Happy Traum is a folklorist, performer, writer, and teacher who is best known for his duo work with his late brother Artie and with the Woodstock Mountain Revue, but he also has played and recorded with Bob Dylan, Chris Smither, Maria Muldaur, Eric Andersen, Rory Block, Jerry Jeff Walker, Allen Ginsberg, Levon Helm, Rick Danko, Richard Manuel and innumerable others. He is the founder of the instructional company Homespun Tapes and is the author of more than a dozen best-selling guitar instruction books and articles in numerous national publications. He continues to add to his vast repertoire of traditional folk, blues and country songs.

The two performers will play solo and collaborate on each other’s material. On his website, Traum says, “I’m very excited to be doing quite a lot of playing this fall, including a tour around the Northeast with the great Jim Kweskin. This legendary fingerpicking guitarist and singer has a wealth of great songs and is a wonderful entertainer. We’ll be playing both separately and together, and it is sure to be a fun show.”

Jim Kweskin is best known as the founder of the Jim Kweskin Jug Band in Boston in the 1960s. Maria D’Amato, known after her marriage to Geoff Muldaur as Maria Muldaur, formerly with the Even Dozen Jug Band, joined the band in 1963. During the five years they were together, the Jug Band successfully modernized the sounds of pre-World War II rural American music.

Kweskin is also known as a singer and for his guitar stylings, adapting the ragtime-blues fingerpicking of artists like Blind Boy Fuller and Mississippi John Hurt while incorporating more sophisticated jazz and blues stylings into the mix.

The Jim Kweskin Jug Band released six albums and two greatest hits compilations on Vanguard Records between 1963 and 1970. During this time, they appeared on national TV programs like the Steve Allen Show, The Roger Miller Show and the Al Hirt Show and have been credited with influencing acts such The Lovin’ Spoonful, The Grateful Dead and The Band.

Following the break-up of the Jug Band, Kweskin recorded “Jim Kweskin’s America” on Reprise Records in 1971; and four albums on Mountain Railroad Records between 1978 and 1987. By 2003 he was leading the Jim Kweskin Band (featuring vocalist Samoa Wilson) on the album “Now and Again,” and recorded a solo album “Enjoy Yourself [It’s Later Than You Think],” also including Wilson, in 2009, both released by the Blix Street label.

In 2013 the Jim Kweskin Jug Band held a reunion tour that included Jim Kweskin, Maria Muldaur, Geoff Muldaur, Richard Greene, Bill Keith, Cindy Cashdollar & Sam Bevan, most of whom were amongst its original members.
Happy Traum was smitten by American folk music as a teenager and began playing guitar and 5-string banjo. He was an active participant of the legendary Washington Square/Greenwich Village folk scene of the 1950s and ‘60s, and studied guitar with the famed blues master, Brownie McGhee.

His first appearance in a recording studio was at a historic session in 1963 when a group of young folk musicians, including Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger, Peter LaFarge and The Freedom Singers gathered in Folkways Records’ studio for an album called “Broadsides.” Traum with his group, the New World Singers, cut the first recorded version of “Blowin’ In The Wind,” and Happy sang a duet with Dylan on his anti-war song “Let Me Die in My Footsteps.” These tracks were re-released in August, 2000 by Smithsonian/Folkways Recordings as part of a boxed set, “The Best of Broadsides 1962 – 1988: Anthems from the American Underground”. The New World Singers also released the first recorded version of “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right.”

In 1965, Traum wrote his best-selling “Fingerpicking Styles for Guitar,” the first of more than a dozen important instruction books which documented the playing of the great traditional guitarists. Traum also started writing for Sing Out! The Folksong Magazine and, in 1967, he became the magazine’s editor, a position which he held for three years. He has also written articles and instructional columns for Rolling Stone, Acoustic Guitar, Guitar Player and other music publications.

In 1967, Traum and his family moved to Woodstock, NY, and Happy and his late brother, Artie Traum, formed a duet that, according to Rolling Stone, “defined the Northeast folk music style.” Their performances at the 1968 and 1969 Newport Folk Festivals helped to gain them an avid following and a contract with famed manager Albert Grossman. This strong musical partnership lasted until Artie’s untimely death in July, 2008. In 1970, Happy and Artie recorded their first album for Capitol Records, Happy and Artie Traum, which The New York Times called “One of the best records in any field of pop music.”

In 1971 Traum again joined Bob Dylan in the studio, playing guitar, banjo, bass, and singing harmony on three songs (“You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere,” “Down In the Flood,” and “I Shall Be Released,”) which appeared on Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits, Vol. 2. Later that year, Dylan invited him to participate in a famous session with poet Allen Ginsberg, which resulted in the box set, “Holy Soul Jelly Roll.” The legendary John Hammond produced the session, which also included Dylan, David Amram, Jon Scholl, Ed Sanders, Gregory Corso and several other well-known musicians and beat poets. This resulted in a long friendship and musical association between Traum and Allen Ginsberg.

After their third duet album, Happy and Artie Traum produced and played on three albums featuring top folk and rock musicians under the collective title, The Woodstock Mountains Revue. The core group, comprised of Bill Keith, Jim Rooney, John Herald, Roly Salley, Larry Campbell, Pat Alger, and Happy & Artie Traum, toured the Northeast, Europe and Japan. Other members who appeared on the recordings included John Sebastian, Eric Andersen, Rory Block, Paul Butterfield, Eric Kaz, Lee Berg, Maria Muldaur, Arlen Roth, Caroline Dutton and many others.

Happy Traum recorded his first solo album, “Relax Your Mind,” in 1975 which was followed by “American Stranger” in 1977, “Bright Morning Stars” in 1980, and “Friends And Neighbors,” recorded “live” in a Woodstock concert, was released in 1983. Shanachie Records released a compilation album, Buckets Of Songs, in 1988, and Bright Morning Stars was re-released on CD both in the U.S. and in Japan in 2001.

Although their musical careers had diverged, Happy and Artie continued to perform together at concerts, clubs and festivals until Artie’s untimely passing in July, 2008. In 1994, Happy and Artie released “Test of Time,” their first CD as a duo in many years. As Levon Helm of the Band said: “Their music still flows as natural and clear as a Catskill Mountain stream.”

Perhaps Happy Traum’s most important and lasting musical contribution has been Homespun Tapes, which he and his wife, Jane, co-founded in 1967. This dynamic and growing company has a catalog of more than 500 music lessons on DVDs, CDs, books and downloads, and their products are distributed and sold around the globe. Taught by top professional performing musicians, the lessons cover a wide variety of instruments and musical styles. Traum produces all of the lessons, and brings to Homespun over 40 years of experience as a guitarist, performer, writer, teacher, and popular member of the music community.

The Mainstay (Home of Musical Magic) is the friendly informal storefront performing arts center on Rock Hall’s old time Main Street. It is a 501(c)(3), non profit dedicated to the arts, serving Rock Hall, MD and the surrounding region. It is committed to presenting local, regional and national level talent, at a reasonable price, in an almost perfect acoustic setting. Wine, beer, sodas and snacks are available at the bar.

The Mainstay is supported by ticket sales, fundraising including donations from friends and audience members and an operating grant from the Maryland State Arts Council.

For information and reservations call the Mainstay at 410-639-9133. More information is also available at the Mainstay’s website https://www.mainstayrockhall.org.