The Folk Music Revival Then and Now: Politics, Commercialism
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THE FOLK MUSIC REVIVAL THEN AND NOW: POLITICS, COMMERCIALISM, AND AUTHENTICITY IN FOLK MUSIC COMMUNITIES IN THE U.S. AND JAPAN BY MIKIKO TACHI B.A., THE UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO, 1998 M.A., THE UNIVERSITY OF TOKYO, 2000 A.M., BROWN UNIVERSITY, 2002 A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN THE DEPARTMENT OF AMERICAN CIVILIZATION AT BROWN UNIVERSITY PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND MAY 2009 © Copyright 2009 by Mikiko Tachi This dissertation by Mikiko Tachi is accepted in its present form by the Department of American Civilization as satisfying the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Date___________ ______________________________ Susan Smulyan, Advisor Recommended to the Graduate Council Date___________ _____________________________ Paul Buhle, Reader Date___________ _____________________________ Jeff Titon, Reader Approved by the Graduate Council Date___________ _____________________________ Sheila Bonde, Dean of the Graduate School iii CURRICULUM VITAE Mikiko Tachi was born on January 30, 1976, in Tokyo, Japan. She attended the University of Tokyo, where she received her B.A. (1998) and M.A. (2000) in American studies. She entered the Ph.D. program in American Civilization at Brown University as a Fulbright scholar in 2000, and received her A.M. in 2002. She passed the preliminary examination and advanced to Ph.D. candidacy in December 2002. From April 2004 to September 2005, she served as research associate at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Japan. In October 2005, she was appointed as an assistant professor at the Division of International Languages and Cultures, Faculty of Letters, Chiba University, Japan, where she works as an associate professor from April 2007. She is the author of ―Bob Dylan‘s Reception in Japan, 1960s-1970s,‖ in Bob Dylan‟s Road from Minnesota to the World, eds. Colleen J. Sheehy and Thomas Swiss (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2009), forthcoming; ―The Reception of American Folk Singers in the Underground Folk Music Scene in Japan in the late 1960s,‖ Proceedings of the 7th Hawaii International Conference on Arts and Humanities (2009), 3018-3042; ―Academic, Political, and Cultural Crossroads: A Study of the Folk Music Scene at Cornell University in the 1950s,‖ Proceedings of the 4th Hawaii International Conference on Arts and Humanities (2006), 5956-5976; ―‗A Thousand Songs‘: A Study of the Folk Process and Continuity in a Folk Music Community in Ithaca, New York,‖ ODYSSEUS 9 (2004)：70-88; ―Commercialism, Counterculture, and the Folk Music Revival: A Study of Sing Out! Magazine, 1950-1967,‖ The Japanese Journal of American Studies 15 (2004): 187-211; and ―American Advertising, Japanese Advertising: A Cross-Cultural Study Beyond Cultural Essentialism,‖ Proceedings of the 2nd Hawaii International Conference on Arts and Humanities (2004): 6145-6155. iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to extend my deepest gratitude to my advisor and mentor, Professor Susan Smulyan, who has guided me for the past nine years with extraordinary compassion, generosity, and kindness. Professor Smulyan has led me through every step of my graduate study, and I would not be anywhere near completion had it not been for her detailed advice and patient encouragement. Throughout the years, Professor Smulyan deepened my critical thinking, improved my writing and teaching skills, and transformed me from a student to a scholar. She spent countless hours advising me and going through my drafts innumerable times, each time providing detailed comments filled with insights, constructive criticisms, and specific advice. She understood the challenges I faced first as an international student and later as a dissertation writer with a full-time job halfway across the globe, and she was very generous in her support and always willing to help; at the same time, she never compromised on the quality of work or lowered her expectations from me and instead encouraged me to aim higher. I grew intellectually and found strength in myself because of her efforts. She also made me realize that a truly confident and knowledgeable person does not hesitate to speak or write clearly and that one can be articulate and frank while being considerate and thoughtful. I admire her ability to be compassionate and professional at the same time as well as her wealth of knowledge, insights, and sense of humor and I hope that I can emulate her in my future career. I consider myself to be extremely fortunate to have Professor Smulyan as my advisor, and I will always be grateful to her and look up to her as a role model. I would also like to thank Professor Paul Buhle for reading my manuscripts, offering encouraging comments, and always reminding me of the importance of my work. Professor Jeff Titon‘s seminars on ethnomusicology introduced me to the methodologies and ideas that helped me work on Chapter 3, and he offered important criticisms that were incorporated in the final revisions. Professors Robert Lee and Barton St. Armand, along with Professors Smulyan and Titon, served on the preliminary examination committee and helped me prepare for research and teaching. My fellow graduate students in the American Civilization Department and Music Department enriched my experiences at Brown, and I would specially like to thank Jim Gatewood, Aslihan Tokgoz, Stephanie Larrieux, Kelli Shapiro, Gill Frank, Julie Hunter, and Maureen Loughran. My research involved studying communities, and I had the pleasure of getting acquainted with the former and current members of the Cornell Folk Song Club (Society), v who graciously agreed to be interviewed and share their thoughts and experiences. I would particularly like to thank Mr. Bill Steele, Dr. Ellen Stekert, and the late Dr. Naomi Lohr for their hospitality, generosity, and insights. I would also like to thank the members of the Japanese Peter, Paul and Mary Fan Club for generously sharing their thoughts and experiences. The staff at the John Hay Library at Brown University, where I conducted research toward Chapter 1, was also very helpful, and I would like to thank them for their help. I also benefited from the Writing Center at Brown while on campus, and would particularly like to thank Kristie Peterson and Sarah Wald. I would like to give special thanks to Ms. Jean Wood, the Academic Manager in the American Civilization Department, who was very helpful and dependable in managing my paperwork and other logistics when I was away from campus and who always welcomed me warmly when I visited the Department. I am grateful to Professor Andries van Dam of the Computer Science Department, an international colleague and friend of my father, who offered me a home away from home and always reminded me that I could count on his help when in need. Finally, this dissertation would not have been possible without the love, support, and sacrifice of my family. I would like to particularly thank my parents, who have constantly been the greatest source of my strength, and my husband, who enlivened my spirits and endured with me as I went through the agonizing final days of completing my Ph.D. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 Chapter 1: Politics, Commercialism, and Internationalism in Sing Out! and Broadside Magazines in the 1950s and 1960s-----------------------------------------------------------20 Chapter 2: From Commercialism to Politics: Domesticating American Folk Music in Japan in the 1960s---------------------------------------------------------------------------85 Chapter 3: The Cornell Folk Song Club and the Ithaca Folk Community, 1950s to the Present----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------153 Chapter 4: The Reception of Peter, Paul and Mary and Bob Dylan in Japan----------220 Conclusion--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------290 vii INTRODUCTION During the late 1950s and the early 1960s, folk music enjoyed an unprecedented popularity in the United States. Time magazine announced, in 1960, that ―the U.S. is smack in the middle of a folk-music boom.‖ According to the article, the enthusiasm for folk music allowed some 50 professional singers to make a decent living performing folk music. At folk music festivals, audiences brought guitars and banjos and played their own instruments as well as listening to the professional performances.1 Around the same time, Newsweek reported that folk music concerts featuring such popular folk music artists as the Weavers, Theodore Bikel, Pete Seeger, and Odetta attracted so many people that halls with capacities of from 1,000 to 4,000 were easily filled by ardent audiences, many of whom were college students or urban dwellers.2 The folk music boom also spread overseas. American revivalist folk singers such as Pete Seeger and the Brothers Four visited Japan in the early 1960s and encouraged young Japanese to perform folk music. In 1965, Heibon Punch Deluxe magazine reported that there were over three hundred folk song groups in high schools 1 ―Folk Frenzy,‖ Time, July 11, 1960, 81. 2 ―It‘s Folksy…It‘s Delightful, It‘s a Craze,‖ Newsweek, June 6, 1960. 1 2 and colleges across Japan, including the male student bands, the Broadside Four and the Modern Folk Quartet.3 These groups modeled themselves after American revivalist singers and learned their songs and musical arrangements. This dissertation