When We Were Good

Robert S. Cantwell is Adjunct Professor of American Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is the author of Ethnomimesis: Folklife and the Representation of Culture and the classic Bluegrass Breakdown: The Making of the Old Southern Sound.

• Prologue: Tom Dooley History of a Song 1. We Are the Folk Backgrounds of the Revival 2. The New Minstrelsy Jim Crow and John Henry 3. Ballad for Americans The Search for a People's Opera 4. Ramblin' Round Your City The Almanac Singers 5. Wasn't That a Time Folk Music and the Cold War 6. Smith's Memory Theater The Great Folkways Anthology 7. He Shall Overcome Pete Seeger 8. Happy Campers The Children's Underground 9. Lady and the Tramp Joan Baez and Bob Dylan 10. Nobles, Patrons, Patriots, Reds Democracy and Revivalism Notes Acknowledgments Index

In his rich and suggestive, quirky and lyrical…study of the folk revival of the late 1950s and early 60s, Robert Cantwell…shows that the history of 20th-century folk music has depended on most unlikely associations. He argues persuasively that folk music’s ability to move people, even to change their lives, comes from the fact that it has already crossed some of the deepest divides in American culture—race, class and region—and he invites listeners to do the same. The real strength of When We Were Good lies in the energy with which Mr. Cantwell, the author of two previous books on folk music and folk culture, pursues and celebrates this music’s roots… Mr. Cantwell’s book demonstrates beautifully that the convenient academic categories we use to slice up American history and culture are inadequate to grasp a cultural phenomenon like folk music… This is a rich and rewarding book, driven by evident passion… In this age of proliferating academic specialization and popular pride in one’s ‘roots,’ Mr. Cantwell shows us that American popular music—and by extension much of our culture—is a hopelessly hybrid creation, descended from accidental couplings, political conflicts and ironies, blacks and whites. No wonder it has a haunting melody.