Van Ronk - A brilliant guitarist and singer, America's Best kept secret source of musical history. I saw Dave many times. Always a gentle giant, full of tales, many laughs, amazing repetoire, and the music soared even when whispered. Oh yeah, this kid named Bob from Minnesota used to crash on his couch when he 1st hit New York City.
I saw him a couple of times at my local cool place, The Town Crier... I didn’t get him at first. Oddly enough, I felt enriched after his show. I was a young, silly kid. Years ago there were so many amazing artists playing small local venues. BB King, Branford Marsalis, Santana, John Lee Hooker... I saw BB King in small local venues more times than I have fingers. It was sad when he had to move to a chair. He almost said hello out on the sidewalk going towards his bus- I don’t recall seeking him out, jus5 being surprised he used an exit next to the one everyone else used. It was The Chance,, there weren’t many choices - tiny place. Blues is the life blood of most modern music. I think It originated from working and religious songs sung primarily by enslaved brothers and sisters. We owe them so much for this and far more.
I had the opportunity, the pleasure and the honor to study with Dave in his Greenwich Village apartment in 1975..........an awesome man, teacher and musician. The first and maybe the last time I ever drank Irish Whiskey
now thats a lucky man.. in other areas of my life than music, I haver had the same opportunity to study with one of the best.. its stays with you for life. this is one of the most beautiful songs out there.
Got to meet Dave in 1998. Bumped into him at a little coffeehouse bar in Brooklyn and he was nice enough to pick a few songs with me. It was a night I will never forget. R.I.P., Dave..
as someone who grew up in the 50's and 60's and got to see all of these people including dave, dylan, len chandler (who he mentions) and the real jim and jean in and around the village...i'm glad to read all these post from those of you brought here by the music of " inside llewyn davis." however you got here..it's just great to see the appreciation for this music by another generation.
The last time I saw him was around '74. I was living in Portland and saw that he was playing at the Passim (the old club 47) so I drove down and got to sit almost at his feet as he sang and talked for a few hours. I'm so glad I made that drive!!
I got back to the East Coast in the early 60's. I was so busy going to school and going to work that, though everything was 12 miles away, I missed it all, Dylan, Van Ronk, Oches, PPM until 10 years later when I heard the songs in a dorm room in Penn.
I knew him and enjoyed all of him comments and music.... and experienced him as the ultimate folk/blues master and performer... he deserves a major tribute in the legends of Americana...
I learnt to fingerpick from Dave Folk Blues & Ragtime Dvd. I decided i would try to contact him via email to tell him how much i had learned from him and how he inspired me, you can imagine how gutted i was when i found out that he had died a few months before i had stumbled on the dvd. Anyway thank you he willalways be an inspiration to me!
A delight to come across this today after so many years of humming Dave's version in my head. He had a gentle way with the country blues, and to my ear his lilting and growling had a way of becoming integral to the song.
I had the VHS tape and still have it. Then immediately put it onto tape, later a cd, mp3. Would listen to this back and forth to work back in the 90's.
As it happens, I was singing this song to myself today - just the chorus and the "soda cracker" verse, which is the only one I remembered. And then just a few minutes ago, purely by chance, I stumbled on this video. It makes me very happy. Dave Van Ronk was one of my absolute favorite singers back in the, I guess, '60s and '70s.
Green rocky road - Van Morrison released a skiffle album last month with this song on it - some lyrics have been changed ua-cam.com/video/CDaMgsp5KN8/v-deo.html
This took me weeks to get down, but I finally figured out how to play and teach this tune! I have a lesson on my channel if anyone is interested in learning it. Thanks to GtrWorkShp for posting this, it really helped seeing the master at work. -Rob
I taped his performance with a cheesy little Memorex cassette player and worked out the song with misheard lyrics and an open D tuning - one of my performance staples for years.
Dave wrote his own system of tablature. It looks like hieroglyphics, but it assigns a job to each finger of each hand. He always said, "Play the notes! Don't play the gist of the song!" He taught me to play using his tab. The alternating thumb sets the timing and plays bass lines in contrary motion to the melodies. I think that his tab has been published - I highly suggest looking for it.
Saw Dave perform in the basement of the Unitarian church in Worcester, MA in 1985 with about twenty other people....very intimate setting....Special....
Great Post, Great Talent, Great Song Thank you so much, remember when! He had a major effect on the music of early 60's and the musicians, an original!
I was lucky enough to have seen him play at Merlefest a few years before he past. I'm over at my own channel with over 100 originals, come on over and visit. Tim E. in Tennessee
I watched this video 13 years ago, when I was a 14 year old transfixed by the folk music of the 1960s Greenwich village scene... I see now how divorced this stripped down sincere sound is from popular music today. And I don't lament that, every generation has its preferences and the pendulum always returns, always. But it's good to have videos like this to come back to like a well of nostalgia and reprieve
A great man and a great story. In his tutorial video, he describes the song as being in dropped D tuning "sometimes called English D tuning". I never heard it called that before - anyone have more info?
I don’t see many parallels between Goodman’s character and Van Ronk. Goodman’s character was a polio afflicted, dope addicted, bitter old curmudgeon. So I suppose it’s possible, but I fail to see much of a juxtaposition twixt the two characters. Just my 0.02$ anyway.
Have you guys read the book 'The Mayor of Macdougal Street', Dave's memoir? Funny as heck and full of wonderful anecdotes about that rich period of 50s/60s in the Village. Thanks for this clip which is very fresh and also touching.
I love Dave Van Ronk and cover lots of his songs when playing acoustic guitar. For me tho, Terry Callier does a great version of this on his “New Folk Sound of Terry Callier” album.
I think *I discovered* that they actually assembled this song - that most of the lyrics were lifted from two songs from the record “Ring Games”. The two songs are “Green Green, Rocky Road” and “Rosie Darling Rosie”. “Ring Games: Line Games and Play Party Songs of Alabama” might be my all time favorite record. FP 704 Folkways NY (also FC 7004) ua-cam.com/video/vXkxNP8qDk4/v-deo.html ua-cam.com/video/sdJfO5sjj6E/v-deo.html
For an amazing experience, after listening to this, listen to FRED NEIL do the same song. To men with acoustic guitars making a song so "theirs" you can bearly recognize it, and both versions are indispenceable. Who do you love ?
This song isn't about anything. It makes almost no sense. But watching Van Ronk smile at some of the lyrics hooks me in. The song defies logic and so grows in meaning. And I am jealous cuz I could never make up such beautiful nonsense.
Well sort of and sort of not The followin version was copyrighted in 1961 by Len Chandler and Robert Kaufman and appears in the Sing Out! reprints. The notes say the song was collected from the children of Lilly Chapel School in York, Alabama and is found in "Negro Songs From Alabama" by Harold Courlander.
Dave was the inspiration for the music in the movie "Inside LLewyn Davis." So why was his name never mentioned in the movie or even in the credits? Shame!
That's how great the film was. If u loved the music and went to do a little research you would find this treasure. I mean it seem like he was the main inspiration to the film. They mentioned him in the film original soundtracks though.
Kaufman was a true rebel poet , hated by the cops and authorities on both coasts . He was involuntarelly committed to a mental hospital and electroshocked as a way to silence and sideline him . It worked . He died in San Francisco , close to a vagabond , homeless status . He left a book , " Solitudes Crowded With Lonliness " and other books .
@@markmandel6738 Oh , sorry . He wrote or co-wrote the song that Peter Paul and Mary recorded , and many other folk groups . He was a famous Beat poet who fell on hard times by the early 1960's . His books are good .
Van Ronk - A brilliant guitarist and singer, America's Best kept secret source of musical history. I saw Dave many times. Always a gentle giant, full of tales, many laughs, amazing repetoire, and the music soared even when whispered.
Oh yeah, this kid named Bob from Minnesota used to crash on his couch when he 1st hit New York City.
He means Dylan, all you kids.
I saw him a couple of times at my local cool place, The Town Crier... I didn’t get him at first. Oddly enough, I felt enriched after his show. I was a young, silly kid.
Years ago there were so many amazing artists playing small local venues. BB King, Branford Marsalis, Santana, John Lee Hooker... I saw BB King in small local venues more times than I have fingers. It was sad when he had to move to a chair. He almost said hello out on the sidewalk going towards his bus- I don’t recall seeking him out, jus5 being surprised he used an exit next to the one everyone else used. It was The Chance,, there weren’t many choices - tiny place.
Blues is the life blood of most modern music. I think It originated from working and religious songs sung primarily by enslaved brothers and sisters. We owe them so much for this and far more.
I had the opportunity, the pleasure and the honor to study with Dave in his Greenwich Village apartment in 1975..........an awesome man, teacher and musician. The first and maybe the last time I ever drank Irish Whiskey
Lucky man!
now thats a lucky man.. in other areas of my life than music, I haver had the same opportunity to study with one of the best.. its stays with you for life. this is one of the most beautiful songs out there.
Got to meet Dave in 1998. Bumped into him at a little coffeehouse bar in Brooklyn and he was nice enough to pick a few songs with me. It was a night I will never forget. R.I.P., Dave..
I’m so glad the Coen Brother’s brought me here.
These are our mentors... keepers of the flame.
Philly Folk Festival 1977 - Dave was playing this softly and the whole damn hillside was singing along. A truly magical moment in my life.
as someone who grew up in the 50's and 60's and got to see all of these people including dave, dylan, len chandler (who he mentions) and the real jim and jean in and around the village...i'm glad to read all these post from those of you brought here by the music of " inside llewyn davis." however you got here..it's just great to see the appreciation for this music by another generation.
Holy shit I love this song. So much going on here. Absolute brilliance. Rest In Peace, sir.
The last time I saw him was around '74. I was living in Portland and saw that he was playing at the Passim (the old club 47) so I drove down and got to sit almost at his feet as he sang and talked for a few hours. I'm so glad I made that drive!!
You can't beat that
I got back to the East Coast in the early 60's. I was so busy going to school and going to work that, though everything was 12 miles away, I missed it all, Dylan, Van Ronk, Oches, PPM until 10 years later when I heard the songs in a dorm room in Penn.
Always gives me goosebumps. Dave, you are still missed.
Dave was the man! One of a kind and deserves a huge spot in popular music history....
I knew him and enjoyed all of him comments and music.... and experienced him as the ultimate folk/blues master and performer... he deserves a major tribute in the legends of Americana...
Just beautiful! Still listening in 2020!!
On of the best folk singers from that era
I learnt to fingerpick from Dave Folk Blues & Ragtime Dvd. I decided i would try to contact him via email to tell him how much i had learned from him and how he inspired me, you can imagine how gutted i was when i found out that he had died a few months before i had stumbled on the dvd. Anyway thank you he willalways be an inspiration to me!
A delight to come across this today after so many years of humming Dave's version in my head. He had a gentle way with the country blues, and to my ear his lilting and growling had a way of becoming integral to the song.
Had the pleasure of seeing him at Poor David's Pub in Dallas in the early '80's.
I had the VHS tape and still have it. Then immediately put it onto tape, later a cd, mp3. Would listen to this back and forth to work back in the 90's.
As it happens, I was singing this song to myself today - just the chorus and the "soda cracker" verse, which is the only one I remembered. And then just a few minutes ago, purely by chance, I stumbled on this video. It makes me very happy.
Dave Van Ronk was one of my absolute favorite singers back in the, I guess, '60s and '70s.
Beautiful
Not by chance. The phones listen now. Google.. They changed everything.
Green rocky road - Van Morrison released a skiffle album last month with this song on it - some lyrics have been changed
ua-cam.com/video/CDaMgsp5KN8/v-deo.html
I miss you so much Dave Van Ronk
Maybe I'm feeeling a little fragile. maybe I'm overthinkinhg. The first 20 second however completely swept me away. Teared up and enjoyed.
This took me weeks to get down, but I finally figured out how to play and teach this tune! I have a lesson on my channel if anyone is interested in learning it. Thanks to GtrWorkShp for posting this, it really helped seeing the master at work. -Rob
was a great lesson and it really helped me nail the tune.
I taped his performance with a cheesy little Memorex cassette player and worked out the song with misheard lyrics and an open D tuning - one of my performance staples for years.
Dave wrote his own system of tablature. It looks like hieroglyphics, but it assigns a job to each finger of each hand. He always said, "Play the notes! Don't play the gist of the song!" He taught me to play using his tab. The alternating thumb sets the timing and plays bass lines in contrary motion to the melodies. I think that his tab has been published - I highly suggest looking for it.
So wonderful! Thanks for posting. I never dreamed I see such material!
same here llewyn davis. thank you Coen Brothers (AGAIN - first musical journey was from O Brother Where Art Thou)
Saw Dave perform in the basement of the Unitarian church in Worcester, MA in 1985 with about twenty other people....very intimate setting....Special....
Great Post, Great Talent, Great Song Thank you so much, remember when! He had a major effect on the music of early 60's and the musicians, an original!
What a memorable talented musician. Thank you for posting this!
This is the Dave Van Ronk I remember.
Thanks to the Coen Bruhs. I heard Dave Van Ronks voice. Thank you
I play this number with the Baltimore-based Patapsco Delta Boys. Great to hear such a definitive version!
One of the great authentic interpreters...Dylan owes him (and many others..) a ton...
I saw Dave Van Ronk at a small club in Bryn Mawr PA, in the early 70's. Natural Story teller.
Loved hearing the story about Bob Kaufman. And of course DVR, and his jumbo Guild.
I was lucky enough to have seen him play at Merlefest a few years before he past. I'm over at my own channel with over 100 originals, come on over and visit. Tim E. in Tennessee
thanks for this upload, my absolute favourite musician.
He's the real deal.
As one is born out of time, I am envious of those who met Dave Van Ronk, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, CSN(Y), and the rest.
I find this song very compelling for some reason. I really like the way he does this in this particular version. timing and general feel....
Brings a tear to my eye.
Who do I love? You Dave!
i wish he had been this appreciated before he crossed over....
Actually, among the cognoscenti, he was.
Theres a great book "The Mayor of McDougall Street Its Dave Van Ronk finished by Elijah Wald. Cannot recommend it enough (great photographs)
I saw him a couple of times at the old Main Pointe in Bryn Mawr, Pa. during the 1970s. I miss him!
I was lucky to see this show on the campus of Ohio University, Athens, in 1980. Lucky indeed...
I watched this video 13 years ago, when I was a 14 year old transfixed by the folk music of the 1960s Greenwich village scene... I see now how divorced this stripped down sincere sound is from popular music today. And I don't lament that, every generation has its preferences and the pendulum always returns, always. But it's good to have videos like this to come back to like a well of nostalgia and reprieve
5:10 most satisfying "yeah" i've ever heard
Legendary. So inspiring
A great man and a great story. In his tutorial video, he describes the song as being in dropped D tuning "sometimes called English D tuning". I never heard it called that before - anyone have more info?
I wonder if John Goodman’s performance or appearance in Llewyn Davis was taken from this later period Dave Van Ronk...
I don’t see many parallels between Goodman’s character and Van Ronk. Goodman’s character was a polio afflicted, dope addicted, bitter old curmudgeon.
So I suppose it’s possible, but I fail to see much of a juxtaposition twixt the two characters. Just my 0.02$ anyway.
@@TheKiller-yh3pi They look very similar.
I love Dave
This guy has a great voice! Van Ronk is a good picker as well.
When I go by Baltimore , need no carpet on my floor.
I have no idea what he means by that, but there is something about that line that gets me.
Who needs carpet when you have a green green rocky road.... In Baltimore I guess!
Song starts at 2:25.
Frank Blangeard but why would you skip the story part though?
this is the best version of this song
Have you guys read the book 'The Mayor of Macdougal Street', Dave's memoir?
Funny as heck and full of wonderful anecdotes about that rich period of 50s/60s
in the Village. Thanks for this clip which is very fresh and also touching.
he was a friend of mine
Brilliant!
Marvelous song
that shit is amazing
More songs like this?
A 1960 voice of folk speak an all that. Green green rocky road
I love Dave Van Ronk and cover lots of his songs when playing acoustic guitar. For me tho, Terry Callier does a great version of this on his “New Folk Sound of Terry Callier” album.
I think *I discovered* that they actually assembled this song - that most of the lyrics were lifted from two songs from the record “Ring Games”. The two songs are “Green Green, Rocky Road” and “Rosie Darling Rosie”.
“Ring Games: Line Games and Play Party Songs of Alabama” might be my all time favorite record.
FP 704 Folkways NY (also FC 7004)
ua-cam.com/video/vXkxNP8qDk4/v-deo.html
ua-cam.com/video/sdJfO5sjj6E/v-deo.html
sounds like mississippi John Hurt
Harvey Walker good point
think "who you love" is a Bo Diddly reference?
His biggest influence! Good ear 😄
For an amazing experience,
after listening to this, listen to FRED NEIL do the same song. To men with acoustic guitars making a song so
"theirs" you can bearly recognize it, and both versions are indispenceable.
Who do you love ?
Baddassss
F####ng brilliant!
inside llewyn davis brought me here
The Coen Bros did it again
ya.... it takes you places
Same
another man done gone
This song isn't about anything. It makes almost no sense. But watching Van Ronk smile at some of the lyrics hooks me in. The song defies logic and so grows in meaning. And I am jealous cuz I could never make up such beautiful nonsense.
I don't know it's history but I believe this was culled from southern black blues and as a blues song it makes it's case and it's quirky too!! lol
The song actually comes from a children's ring game which explains some of the nonsensical lyrics.
Well sort of and sort of not
The followin version was copyrighted in 1961 by Len Chandler and Robert Kaufman
and
appears in the Sing Out! reprints. The notes say the song was collected from
the children of Lilly
Chapel School in York, Alabama and is found in "Negro Songs From Alabama" by
Harold
Courlander.
And because it is in the public domain anyone can change a word or a line or two and claim writership
You’re wrong. It’s about everything.
the real item..right here right now
Dave seems like such an interesting guy
Dave was the inspiration for the music in the movie "Inside LLewyn Davis." So why was his name never mentioned in the movie or even in the credits? Shame!
That's how great the film was. If u loved the music and went to do a little research you would find this treasure. I mean it seem like he was the main inspiration to the film. They mentioned him in the film original soundtracks though.
That's how it's done.
Bob KAUFMAN! wow! my favourite poet. check him out: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Kaufman
johnmannix2009 is correct. It will get no more beautiful than this. My, but Dave is missed.
BIG YEH AH!!
who wrote the song between him and karen dalton ?
2:28 for just the music
check out his life's work and I promise you will be impressed...
sounds like Taj Mahal's Fishin Blues
+Matt Grabowski Music i love that song i think Henry Thomas sang fishing blues 1st but not 100% should check out his version
when in Brooklyn hear Ernie Vega sing this song
Can anyone hear Ted Hawkins- sorry you're sick in this song?
Coen bros if correctly quoted said folk singer almost made. Dave beyond origenal in my opinion. Thanks again an everyone be careful
tim hardins version is f*ckin sweet check it out
ledgend greatff stu
Kaufman was a true rebel poet , hated by the cops and authorities on both coasts . He was involuntarelly committed to a mental hospital and electroshocked as a way to silence and sideline him . It worked . He died in San Francisco , close to a vagabond , homeless status . He left a book , " Solitudes Crowded With Lonliness " and other books .
Who is Kaufman and what has he got to do with Dave Van Ronk, this video, or this song?
@@markmandel6738 Oh , sorry . He wrote or co-wrote the song that Peter Paul and Mary recorded , and many other folk groups . He was a famous Beat poet who fell on hard times by the early 1960's . His books are good .
if you think you are a "folk-singer' songwriter or performer...I urge you to drink from this well
Just picking Townes “Loretta” , now I realize he stole it from Dave . Same song
Maybe I have two left ears, but this sounds nothing like Loretta.
WHO?
02:28
the mayor of macdougal street!
OMG - blow your nose Dave!!
Best performer of this song by unknown writer. No it wasn't Len Chandler. Dave was great at times (Not on blues). Goodbye old Marxist friend.