Taste-making and trend-spotting
the folk revival journalism of Robert Shelton
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/pomh.2006.1.3.307Keywords:
folk music industry, Robert SheltonAbstract
This article explores the work of American folk music journalist Robert Shelton during the folk revival years of 1958 to 1968. It considers his status as a New York Times critic and his contributions to a range of other publications, with particular emphasis on the various readerships addressed by his journalism. Shelton’s idiolect, or personal style, is analysed with particular reference to his use of humour to attract the attention of his readership. His main critical strategies are defined as taste-making and trend-spotting. His relationship with the folk music industry is explained in the context of the critical stance towards Shelton of folk ideologues associated with the magazine Sing Out!, with whom Shelton had a fierce dispute over the legitimacy of the folk-rock genre. A final section considers ways of theorizing Shelton’s and other music journalists’ practice, and concludes that the application of actor-network theory might provide a fruitful way forward.
References
Badeaux, Ed. 1967. ‘The Spectacle Moves On’. Sing Out! 17/4 (August/September): 11–12.
Barthes, Roland. 1977 [1957]. Mythologies, trans. Annette Lavers. New York: Hill and Wang.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1984. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans. R. Nice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Brand, Oscar. 1962. The Ballad Mongers: Rise of the Modern Folk Song. New York: Minerva Press.
Cantwell, Robert. 1996. When We Were Good: The Folk Revival. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press.
Cohen, John. 1968. ‘Letter’. Sing Out! 18/1 (March/April): 45.
Cohen, Ronald D. 2002. Rainbow Quest: The Folk Music Revival and American Society. Amherst and Boston: University of Massachusetts Press.
Goldsmith, Peter D. 1998. Making People’s Music: Moe Asch and Folkways Records. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press.
Gordon, Eric A. 1989. Mark the Music: The Life and Work of Marc Blitzstein. New York: St. Martins Press.
Gray, Michael. 2000. Song and Dance Man: The Art of Bob Dylan. 3rd ed. London and New York: Continuum.
—2006. The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia. London and New York: Continuum.
Gura, Philip A. 1999–2000. ‘Roots and Branches: Forty Years of the New Lost City Ramblers— Part 1’. The Old Time Herald 7/2 (Winter).
Guthrie, Woody. 1965. Born to Win, ed. Robert Shelton. New York: Macmillan.
Hadju, David. 2001. Positively 4th Street: The Lives and Times of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Mimi Baez Fariña and Richard Fariña. New York: North Point Press.
Hammond, John, with Irving Townsend. 1977. John Hammond on Record. New York: Ridge Press.
Heylin, Clinton. 1991. Bob Dylan Behind the Shades: A Biography. London: Viking.
Laing, Dave. 1999. ‘Robert Shelton—Metropolitan Critic’. Unpublished paper given at the 1st Robert Shelton Memorial Conference, University of Liverpool, May 1, 1999.
Latour, Bruno. 2005. Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor–Network–Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
McLeod, Kembrew. 2001. ‘ “* ½”: a Critique of Rock Criticism in North America’. Popular Music 20/1 (January): 47–60.
Malone, Bill C. 2002. Country Music USA. 2nd rev. edn. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Marcus, Greil. 1997. Invisible Republic: Bob Dylan’s Basement Tapes. New York: Henry Holt.
Negus, Keith. 2006. ‘Rethinking Creative Production away from the Cultural Industries’. In Media and Cultural Theory, ed. James Curran and David Morley. London: Routledge.
Reisner, Robert. 1960. ‘The Menace of Folk Music’. Village Voice. February 24.
—1962. Bird: The Legend of Charlie Parker. New York: Da Capo.
Rosenberg, Neil V. 2005. Bluegrass: A History. Rev. edn. Urbana and Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Shelton, Robert. 1956. ‘Hogtalaranlaggningang for Hi-Fi’. New York Times. March 18.
—1958. ‘Popular American Folk Songs on LP’. New York Times. January 26.
—1959a. ‘Folk Music on the Hit Parade’. New York Times. July 12.
—1959b. ‘Folk Joins Jazz at Newport’. New York Times. July 19.
—1959c. ‘Folk Music Festival’. The Nation. August 1: 59–60.
—1960a. ‘Listen, Mr Reisner’. Village Voice. March 2: 5, 7.
—1960b. ‘Modest Proposal for Disk Jockeys’. New York Times. March 6.
—1960c. ‘Folkways in Sound…or the Remarkable Enterprises of Mr Moe Asch’. High Fidelity (June): 42–44, 102–104.
—1960d. ‘A Man to Remember: Woody Guthrie’. Newport Folk Festival Program.
—1960e. ‘Folk Music is Making its Imprint on the Night Life of the City’. New York Times. November 17.
—1961a. ‘Musical Energy without Style: New Young Ensembles Distort Standards of Folk Music’. New York Times. January 8.
—1961b. ‘Gospel Concert Shows Vitality’. New York Times. February 28.
—1961c. ‘Bob Dylan: A Distinctive Folk Song Stylist’. New York Times. September 29.
—1961d. ‘Folk Recital Given by Carolyn Hester’. New York Times. October 2.
—1961e. ‘Foreign Folk Music in “Village” ’. New York Times. November 15.
—1962a. ‘City Lends an Ear to Country Singer’. New York Times. January 16.
—1962b. ‘Country Music’. International Musician. April.
—1962c. ‘Songs a Weapon in Rights Battle’. New York Times. August 20.
—1962–63. ‘Singing for Freedom: Music in the Integration Movement’. Sing Out! 12/5: 4–7, 12–17.
—1963. ‘New Folk Singers in “Village” Demonstrate a Pair of Trends’. New York Times. June 13.
—1964a. ‘Biography’. In The Josh White Song Book. Chicago: Quadrangle Books.
—1964b. ‘Art or Pap?’ New York Times. April 5.
—1964c. ‘The Musical Convulsion that Threatens Folk Music’s Popularity’. Hootenanny 4. November.
—1964d. ‘First Edition of “Singing Paper” is Issued Hot Off the Guitars’. New York Times. n.d.
—1965. ‘Novelties Sung by Judy Collins’. New York Times. December 27.
—and Burt Goldblatt. 1966a. The Country Music Story: A Picture History of Country and Western Music. Secausas, NJ: Castle Books.
—1966b. ‘On Records: The Folk-Rock Rage’. New York Times. January 30.
—1966c. ‘The View from the Critic’s Desk’. Aspen no. 3, item 4.
—1966d. ‘Barbershop Chords Stir Carnegie Hall’. New York Times. June 4.
—1966e. ‘The Year that was in Folk Music’. Cavalier. December: 90–91.
—1966f. ‘Meet a New Folk Hero, the Truck Driver’. New York Times. December 4.
—1967a. ‘Records—Trendsville’. Cavalier. February: 14–15.
—1967b. ‘Country-Rock by Buck Owens Suggests New Musical Trend’. New York Times. November 13.
—1967c. ‘A New Love Affair: Rock and Country’. New York Times. December 10.
—1968a. ‘For Pop Groups Blues is Still Boss’. New York Times. January 19.
—and David Gahr. 1968b. The Face of Folk Music. New York: Citadel.
–1968c. ‘Sound, Light and Color Barrage Draws 2,000 at Carnegie Hall 8 June 1968’. New York Times. June 8.
—1968d. ‘Rock Music Groups Going for Baroque’. New York Times. September 5.
—1968e. ‘When Flatt and Scruggs Sing Dylan, What’s Up?’ New York Times. November 24.
—1975. ‘Something Happened in America’. In Dave Laing, Karl Dallas, Robin Denselow and Robert Shelton, The Electric Muse: The Story of Folk into Rock, 7–82. London: Methuen.
—1986. No Direction Home: The Life and Music of Bob Dylan. London: New English Library.
Silber, Irwin, Robert Shelton, Nat Hentoff and Paul Nelson. 1966. ‘Symposium…’ New York Times. February 20.
Skinner, Katherine. 2006. ‘ “Must Be Born Again”: Resurrecting the Anthology of American Folk Music’. Popular Music 25/1 (January): 57–75. doi:10.1017/S0261143005000735
Strachan, Robert. n.d. ‘“Where do I begin the Story”: Establishing Biographical Authority in the Rock Biography’. Unpublished Ms.
Sweet, Brian. n.d. ‘Terence Boylan biography’, http://www.terenceboylan.com/biography. html
Talese, Gay. 1969. The Kingdom and the Power: The Story of the Men who Influence the Institution that Influences the World—the New York Times. Cleveland: World Publishing.
Unterberger, Richie. 2002. ‘Interview with Irwin Silber’. http://www.furious.com/Perfect/ irwinsilber.html
—2004. Turn! Turn! Turn: The ’60s Folk-Rock Revolution. New York: Backbeat Books.
Wein, George with Nate Chinen. 2003. Myself Among Others: A Life in Music. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press.
White, D.M. 1950. ‘The Gatekeeper: A Case Study in the Selection of News’. Journalism Quarterly 27: 383–90.
Woliver, Robbie. 1986. Bringing It All Back Home: Twenty-Five Years of American Music at Folk City. New York: Pantheon Books.
Barthes, Roland. 1977 [1957]. Mythologies, trans. Annette Lavers. New York: Hill and Wang.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1984. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans. R. Nice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Brand, Oscar. 1962. The Ballad Mongers: Rise of the Modern Folk Song. New York: Minerva Press.
Cantwell, Robert. 1996. When We Were Good: The Folk Revival. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press.
Cohen, John. 1968. ‘Letter’. Sing Out! 18/1 (March/April): 45.
Cohen, Ronald D. 2002. Rainbow Quest: The Folk Music Revival and American Society. Amherst and Boston: University of Massachusetts Press.
Goldsmith, Peter D. 1998. Making People’s Music: Moe Asch and Folkways Records. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press.
Gordon, Eric A. 1989. Mark the Music: The Life and Work of Marc Blitzstein. New York: St. Martins Press.
Gray, Michael. 2000. Song and Dance Man: The Art of Bob Dylan. 3rd ed. London and New York: Continuum.
—2006. The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia. London and New York: Continuum.
Gura, Philip A. 1999–2000. ‘Roots and Branches: Forty Years of the New Lost City Ramblers— Part 1’. The Old Time Herald 7/2 (Winter).
Guthrie, Woody. 1965. Born to Win, ed. Robert Shelton. New York: Macmillan.
Hadju, David. 2001. Positively 4th Street: The Lives and Times of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Mimi Baez Fariña and Richard Fariña. New York: North Point Press.
Hammond, John, with Irving Townsend. 1977. John Hammond on Record. New York: Ridge Press.
Heylin, Clinton. 1991. Bob Dylan Behind the Shades: A Biography. London: Viking.
Laing, Dave. 1999. ‘Robert Shelton—Metropolitan Critic’. Unpublished paper given at the 1st Robert Shelton Memorial Conference, University of Liverpool, May 1, 1999.
Latour, Bruno. 2005. Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor–Network–Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
McLeod, Kembrew. 2001. ‘ “* ½”: a Critique of Rock Criticism in North America’. Popular Music 20/1 (January): 47–60.
Malone, Bill C. 2002. Country Music USA. 2nd rev. edn. Austin: University of Texas Press.
Marcus, Greil. 1997. Invisible Republic: Bob Dylan’s Basement Tapes. New York: Henry Holt.
Negus, Keith. 2006. ‘Rethinking Creative Production away from the Cultural Industries’. In Media and Cultural Theory, ed. James Curran and David Morley. London: Routledge.
Reisner, Robert. 1960. ‘The Menace of Folk Music’. Village Voice. February 24.
—1962. Bird: The Legend of Charlie Parker. New York: Da Capo.
Rosenberg, Neil V. 2005. Bluegrass: A History. Rev. edn. Urbana and Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Shelton, Robert. 1956. ‘Hogtalaranlaggningang for Hi-Fi’. New York Times. March 18.
—1958. ‘Popular American Folk Songs on LP’. New York Times. January 26.
—1959a. ‘Folk Music on the Hit Parade’. New York Times. July 12.
—1959b. ‘Folk Joins Jazz at Newport’. New York Times. July 19.
—1959c. ‘Folk Music Festival’. The Nation. August 1: 59–60.
—1960a. ‘Listen, Mr Reisner’. Village Voice. March 2: 5, 7.
—1960b. ‘Modest Proposal for Disk Jockeys’. New York Times. March 6.
—1960c. ‘Folkways in Sound…or the Remarkable Enterprises of Mr Moe Asch’. High Fidelity (June): 42–44, 102–104.
—1960d. ‘A Man to Remember: Woody Guthrie’. Newport Folk Festival Program.
—1960e. ‘Folk Music is Making its Imprint on the Night Life of the City’. New York Times. November 17.
—1961a. ‘Musical Energy without Style: New Young Ensembles Distort Standards of Folk Music’. New York Times. January 8.
—1961b. ‘Gospel Concert Shows Vitality’. New York Times. February 28.
—1961c. ‘Bob Dylan: A Distinctive Folk Song Stylist’. New York Times. September 29.
—1961d. ‘Folk Recital Given by Carolyn Hester’. New York Times. October 2.
—1961e. ‘Foreign Folk Music in “Village” ’. New York Times. November 15.
—1962a. ‘City Lends an Ear to Country Singer’. New York Times. January 16.
—1962b. ‘Country Music’. International Musician. April.
—1962c. ‘Songs a Weapon in Rights Battle’. New York Times. August 20.
—1962–63. ‘Singing for Freedom: Music in the Integration Movement’. Sing Out! 12/5: 4–7, 12–17.
—1963. ‘New Folk Singers in “Village” Demonstrate a Pair of Trends’. New York Times. June 13.
—1964a. ‘Biography’. In The Josh White Song Book. Chicago: Quadrangle Books.
—1964b. ‘Art or Pap?’ New York Times. April 5.
—1964c. ‘The Musical Convulsion that Threatens Folk Music’s Popularity’. Hootenanny 4. November.
—1964d. ‘First Edition of “Singing Paper” is Issued Hot Off the Guitars’. New York Times. n.d.
—1965. ‘Novelties Sung by Judy Collins’. New York Times. December 27.
—and Burt Goldblatt. 1966a. The Country Music Story: A Picture History of Country and Western Music. Secausas, NJ: Castle Books.
—1966b. ‘On Records: The Folk-Rock Rage’. New York Times. January 30.
—1966c. ‘The View from the Critic’s Desk’. Aspen no. 3, item 4.
—1966d. ‘Barbershop Chords Stir Carnegie Hall’. New York Times. June 4.
—1966e. ‘The Year that was in Folk Music’. Cavalier. December: 90–91.
—1966f. ‘Meet a New Folk Hero, the Truck Driver’. New York Times. December 4.
—1967a. ‘Records—Trendsville’. Cavalier. February: 14–15.
—1967b. ‘Country-Rock by Buck Owens Suggests New Musical Trend’. New York Times. November 13.
—1967c. ‘A New Love Affair: Rock and Country’. New York Times. December 10.
—1968a. ‘For Pop Groups Blues is Still Boss’. New York Times. January 19.
—and David Gahr. 1968b. The Face of Folk Music. New York: Citadel.
–1968c. ‘Sound, Light and Color Barrage Draws 2,000 at Carnegie Hall 8 June 1968’. New York Times. June 8.
—1968d. ‘Rock Music Groups Going for Baroque’. New York Times. September 5.
—1968e. ‘When Flatt and Scruggs Sing Dylan, What’s Up?’ New York Times. November 24.
—1975. ‘Something Happened in America’. In Dave Laing, Karl Dallas, Robin Denselow and Robert Shelton, The Electric Muse: The Story of Folk into Rock, 7–82. London: Methuen.
—1986. No Direction Home: The Life and Music of Bob Dylan. London: New English Library.
Silber, Irwin, Robert Shelton, Nat Hentoff and Paul Nelson. 1966. ‘Symposium…’ New York Times. February 20.
Skinner, Katherine. 2006. ‘ “Must Be Born Again”: Resurrecting the Anthology of American Folk Music’. Popular Music 25/1 (January): 57–75. doi:10.1017/S0261143005000735
Strachan, Robert. n.d. ‘“Where do I begin the Story”: Establishing Biographical Authority in the Rock Biography’. Unpublished Ms.
Sweet, Brian. n.d. ‘Terence Boylan biography’, http://www.terenceboylan.com/biography. html
Talese, Gay. 1969. The Kingdom and the Power: The Story of the Men who Influence the Institution that Influences the World—the New York Times. Cleveland: World Publishing.
Unterberger, Richie. 2002. ‘Interview with Irwin Silber’. http://www.furious.com/Perfect/ irwinsilber.html
—2004. Turn! Turn! Turn: The ’60s Folk-Rock Revolution. New York: Backbeat Books.
Wein, George with Nate Chinen. 2003. Myself Among Others: A Life in Music. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press.
White, D.M. 1950. ‘The Gatekeeper: A Case Study in the Selection of News’. Journalism Quarterly 27: 383–90.
Woliver, Robbie. 1986. Bringing It All Back Home: Twenty-Five Years of American Music at Folk City. New York: Pantheon Books.
Published
2004-02-10
Issue
Section
Articles
How to Cite
Laing, D. (2004). Taste-making and trend-spotting: the folk revival journalism of Robert Shelton. Popular Music History, 1(3), 307-328. https://doi.org/10.1558/pomh.2006.1.3.307
