Topic: Commercial Folk Music Revival
The folk revival sparked by the Kingston Trio [1] assumed people who attended colleges had parties where they sang. It was one of those self-fulfilling concepts: because people believed this was what people like themselves were doing, they began doing it. With singing, one needed songs, and if a tradition did not exist, then there was an need for someone to create a repertoire.
James Franklin Leisy produced two songbooks in 1961 that filled that void. Songs for Swingin’ Housemothers [2] and Songs for Singin’ [3] provided words and tunes to the gross and naughty songs children and adolescents sang to shock their elders. They did not include the truly obscene ones young men, including those in fraternities, sang to impress each other. [4]
Mixed in with lyrics for "Grandma’s in the Cellar" [5] and "Worms Crawl In" [6] were drinking songs like "Unfortunate Miss Bailey" [7] and "Three Jolly Coachman" [8] that were recorded by the Kingston Trio. The only folk revival songs Leisy included were the Trio’s "Tom Dooley" [9] and "Worried Man Blues," [10] and Harry Belafonte’s "Banana Boat Song." [11]
Leisy’s background was similar to the men in the Trio. While Dave Guard and Bob Shane were in Hawaii when Pearl Harbor was bombed, [12] Leisy graduated from high school in 1944 [13] and served a year in the Naval Reserve. [14] At that time, he copyrighted some songs in the popular music vein. [15]
While all three members of the Trio graduated from college with degrees in business, Leisy attended Southern Methodist University where his father was on the English faculty. [16] Leisy himself was a business major. After graduation in 1949, he was hired as an editor by Prentice Hall. In 1954, he moved to Allen and Bacon. [17]
The Kingston Trio didn’t plan to create folk music. Each of the men began with the popular music traditions they heard when they were adolescents. For Leisy, that was country music. In the early 1950s, he had some songs [18] recorded by second tier artists who had a few popular recordings and mainly toured as the opening acts for others: Hawkshaw Hawkins, [19] Hank Locklin, [20] and the Davis Sisters. [21]
Leisy’s songwriting career ended in 1957 when the popularity of Elvis Presley changed the taste in popular and country music. He had founded his own publishing company the year before in California that specialized in technical books. Wadsworth Publishing prospered after the Soviet Union launched its first satellite in 1957. [22] He indulged his interest in music by producing collections for the Methodist Church. [23] Its publishing arm was still in New York City.
The success of Leisy’s two college collections led to a contract with Fawcett Publications. That company published magazines, like True Confessions and Woman’s Day, and issued original mass-market paperbacks. [24]
In 1962, Leisy published Songs for Pickin’ and Singin’. [25] It mixed sections of "Folk Songs and Ballads" and "Campus Favorites" with "Gospel and Spiritual." While it included Roy Acuff’s "Great Speckled Bird," [26] it didn’t include "Michael Row the Boat Ashore." "Kumbaya" didn’t appear because Joan Baez hadn’t yet released her recording of it. [27]
Leisy issued another collection for Fawcett in 1964 to exploit the popularity of the ABC Television program, Hootenanny, discussed in the post for 3 November 2019. Hootenanny Tonight! included a version of "Kum Ba Ya" influenced by The Weavers. [28] He took their word it was a fragment, and printed only one verse. He described it as "lullaby-like." [29]
The same year he produced a different collection for Sam Fox, the publisher of plays. Folk Song Fest was subtitled "Songs and Ideas for Performance Artistry."
As a songwriter and publisher, he understood the copyright law. He added his own verse, "someone’s hoping," to the usual three in Fest to create a unique text. While he always used the key of D, with two sharps, he changed the rhythm from publication to publication. Hootenanny used 3/4, while Fest utilized 3/2.
His tone was that of a documentarian making polite suggestions, but not issuing decrees. He told Fest readers that "new verses are constantly being coined" and that they were free to use "use ‘kum ba ya’ or ‘come by here’." It also was the singer’s choice to treat the verses as an open ended song, a finite song, or one that alternated a "kumbaya" burden with unique stanzas.
His only requirement was that it be sung "slowly with dignity." [30]
Performers
Vocal Soloist: none
Vocal Group: unison
Instrumental Accompaniment: chords
Rhythm Accompaniment: none
Credits
Hootenanny Tonight!
"I’ve been told the song originated in the southern United States and traveled to Africa, where this fragmentary version became traditional. According to this legend the lyrics are an attempt to imitate the words ‘come by here.’ A few years ago this song was ‘found’ in Africa and brought back to the U.S., where it has now become part of our tradition."
Folk Song Fest
"There is a widely circulated theory that this song was based by Africans on the words ‘come by here’ learned from American missionaries."
Notes on Lyrics
Hootenanny Tonight
Language: English
Pronunciation: koom bay yah
Verses: kumbaya
Pronoun: none
Term for Deity: Lord
Special Terms: none
Ending: none
Unique Features: none
Folk Song Fest
Language: English
Pronunciation: koom bay yah
Verses: kumbaya, crying, singing, praying, hoping
Pronoun : Someone
Term for Deity: Lord
Special Terms: none
Basic Form: may be open-ended or finite
Verse Repetition Pattern: "New verses are constantly being coined. A few examples are shown here. It’s use to you whether you use "kum ba ya" or "come by here." You will hear it performed both ways. You may repeat the chorus after each verse."
Ending: none
Unique Features: none
Notes on Music
Hootenanny Tonight
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Time Signature: 3/4
Rhythm: "six even beats to a measure"
Folk Song Fest
Opening Phrase: 1-3-5
Time Signature: 3/2
Tempo: slowly
Both
Key Signature: two sharps
Guitar Chords: D G A A7
Basic Structure: strophic repetition
Singing Style: one syllable to one note except for final "Lord"
Vocal-Accompaniment Dynamics - Song Fest: "light strumming accompaniment (down and up strum to each beat)."
Audience Perceptions
Leisy’s collections were used. One man said he bought Songs for Pickin’ and Singin’ to replace my wife’s falling-apart copy. [31] Another bought a replacement for Swingin’ Housemothers because "at sometime Ioaned" my copy "to someone (against my better judgement, and never saw it again. Was able to remember my favorites but missed the book Still play and sing. It is my ‘psychiatrist and mood elevator. And to be reunited with my book brings me peace and happiness." [32]
The books became part of family traditions. One woman said Pickin’ and Singin’ "has been a musical mainstay for my husband/family," [33] while a man told Amazon customers Swingin’ Housemothers "was a book of songs my family used to sing out of when I was a mere youth." [34]
Notes on Performers
Leisy came from a Mennonite family. His maternal great-great-grand father migrated from the Palatine [35] sometime after his son was born in 1832. [36] His grandfather edited the denomination’s newspaper [37] and helped found Bethany College. [38]
He used the name Jim Leisy for his country lyrics, James F. Leisy when he was publishing collections for Fawcett and the Methodist Church, and Frank Lynn for his college songbooks. His family moved to Dallas soon after he was born in 1927, [39] and he grew up in a Methodist social environment. This use of three pen names allowed him to isolate activities financed by the church from more secular ones. It is not known if this was a simply a businessman’s recognition of the need to keep Methodists happy by not offending their public morality, or signified some deeper ambivalence toward the various activities.
Availability
Book: James F. Leisy. "Kum Ba Ya. In Hootenanny Tonight. Greenwich, Connecticut: Fawcett Publications, 1964. 39.
Book: James F. Leisy. "Kum ba ya." In Folk Song Fest: Songs and Ideas for Performance Artistry. New York: Sam Fox Publishing Company, 1964. 12.
End Notes
1. The role of the Kingston Trio was discussed in the post for 13 October 2019.
2. Frank Lynn. Songs for Swingin’ Housemothers. San Francisco: Chandler Publishing Company, 1961.
3. Frank Lynn. Songs for Singin’. San Francisco: Chandler Publishing Company, 1961.
4. It was only in 1959 that a Federal Court in the United States ruled books by D. H. Lawrence and Henry Miller were not obscene because of their artistic intent. [40] No one pretended bawdy college songs were sung for aesthetic reasons, and so were essentially unpublishable in the early 1960s. Gershon Legman’s books that provided a scholarly rationale for publishing erotica didn’t appear in the United States until 1970. [41]
5. "Grammaws in the Cellar." 30 in Housemothers.
6. "The Hearse Song." 60 in Housemothers.
7. "Miss Bailey." 224 in Housemothers.
Kingston Trio. "The Unfortunate Miss Bailey." Here We Go Again! Capitol Records T-1258. 1959.
8. "Landlord, Fill the Flowing Bowl." 77 in Housemothers. Also, 11 in Frank Lynn. The Beer Bust Songbook. San Francisco: Fearon Publishers, 1963. [42]
Kingston Trio. "Three Jolly Coachmen." The Kingston Trio. Capitol Records T-996. 1958.
9. "Tom Dooley," 167 in Housemothers; and 43 in Beer Bust.
Kingston Trio. "Tom Dooley." The Kingston Trio.
10. "Worried Man Blues," 243 in Housemothers; and 43 in Beer Bust.
Kingston Trio. "A Worried Man." Here We Go.
11. "Banana Boat Loader’s Song." 259 in Housemothers.
Harry Belafonte. "The Banana Boat Song." RCA 447-0324. Recorded 20 October 1955, released 1956.
12. See post for 13 October 2019 for discussion of World War II and the Kingston Trio.
13. Amazon advertisement for Highland Park High School [Dallas, Texas] yearbook for 1944 edited by senior James Leisy.
14. "James Franklin Leisy." Prabook website.
15. The United States Copyright Office’s Catalog of Copyright Entries: Musical compositions, Part 3. Unpublished music listed ten songs by James Franklin Leisy of Dallas in 1946. The titles included: "I’ll Take a Raincheck on Love" and "In the Hills of Old Tennessee."
16. "Leisy, Ernest E. (1888-1968)." Mennonite Weekly Review 3:14 March 1968.
17. James Leisy, Prabook.
18. Leisy also had songs recorded by country artists whose names weren’t as recognizable. My list came from WorldCat, which had entries from the John Edwards Memorial Foundation collection of country music records, and Discogs, which connected Jim Leisy with James F. Leisy.
19. Hawkshaw Hawkins. "Rebound." Written by Jim Leisy and Ray Male. RCA Victor. 1954. Hawkins had just joined the Ozark Jubilee television program when this was recorded; his more famous records were made later. [43]
20. Hank Locklin. "Pinball Millionaire." Written by James F. Leisy, Hank Locklin, and Slim Willet. 4 Star Records 1466. 1950. Locklin’s biggest hit, "Send Me the Pillow That You Dream On," had been released in 1949. [44]
21. The Davis Sisters. "Fiddle Diddle Boogie." Written by Charles Grean and Jim Leisy. RCA Victor 47-6086. 1955. At this time the group consisted of Skeeter Davis and Georgia Davis. The original member, Billy Jack Davis, was killed in 1954. Skeeter had adopted the Davis name to perform, and recorded "The End of the World" as a soloist in 1962. [45]
22. "James F. Leisy; Leading Textbook Publisher." Los Angeles Times. 15 July 1989. The satellite was Sputnik. [46]
23. James F. Leisy. Abingdon Song Kit. New York: Abingdon Press, 1957.
James F. Leisy. Let’s All Sing. New York: Abingdon Press, 1959.
24. Wikipedia. "Fawcett Publications."
25. James F. Leisy. Songs for Pickin’ and Singin’. Greenwich, Connecticut: Fawcett Publications, 1962.
26. Roy Acuff. "The Great Speckled Bird." Vocalion 04252, OKeh 04252, and Conqueror 8740. 1936. [47]
27. Joan Baez’s concert album appeared later in 1962. See the post for 9 October 2017 for details.
28. The Weavers’ version was discussed in the post for 3 October 2017.
29. The Weavers treated "Kumbaya" as a lullaby.
30. Leisy, Hootenanny Tonight!.
31. AZ. Comment posted 10 October 2016. Amazon website for Songs for Pickin’ and Singin’.
32. Stuart E. Wunsh. Comment posted 13 March 2016. Amazon website for 1963 edition of Songs for Singin’ Housemothers.
33. Jeannie C. Comment posted 5 September 2013. Amazon website for Songs for Pickin’ and Singin’.
34. Badluck Bob. Comment posted 9 August 2015. Amazon website for 1961 edition of Songs for Singin’ Housemothers.
35. Barbara HARMS Craig. "Johannes ‘John’ Krehbiel." Find a Grave website. 13 March 2010. Leisy’s great-great-grandfather.
36. Barb. "Rev Christian Krehbiel." Find a Grave website. 27 August 2008. Leisy’s great-grandfather.
37. Tom Crago. "Elva Agnes Krehbiel Leisy." Find a Grave website. 12 January 2009. Leisy’s mother. Her father, Leisy’s grandfather, was Henry Peter Krehbiel.
38. "Margaret Leisy Steineger." The Kansas City Star. 25 May 2014. Leisy’s sister.
39. Ernest E. Leisy.
40. Wikipedia. "Lady Chatterley’s Lover."
41. Wikipedia. "Gershon Legman."
42. Beer Bust was published two years after Housemothers and Singin’, and included both new and previously published material. The refinements may have reflected comments he received about his first two books.
43. Wikipedia. "Hawkshaw Hawkins."
44. Wikipedia. "Hank Locklin."
45. Wikipedia. "Skeeter Davis."
46. Wikipedia. "Sputnik 1"
47. "Great Speckled Bird, The." The Traditional Ballad Index. California State University-Fresno website.
No comments:
Post a Comment