Chad Mitchell Trio

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The Chad Mitchell Trio was a popular folk music group during the 1960s. The group became known for their willingness to perform both serious and satirical songs that criticized current events and news-makers, taking more risks to do so than the typical 'folk music' groups of their time.

1 Beginnings and Membership Changes
2 The Songs
3 Discography
4 Source
5 External links

[edit] Beginnings and Membership Changes

The original group was formed by Gonzaga University students and Glee Club members William Chad Mitchell (from Spokane, Washington); Mike Kobluk (from Trail, British Columbia, Canada); and Mike Pugh (from Pasco, Washington). They were encouraged by Spokane, Washington Roman Catholic priest Reinard W. Beaver, who invited the three to travel with him to New York City in the summer of 1959 and to try performing in the burgeoning folk-music scene.

The key people that helped the Trio get going were musical arranger Milton Okun and star performer/singer Harry Belafonte. Okun provided a professional polish to their performing skills, which helped them gain both a key booking at New York City's Blue Angel club and radio appearances with Arthur Godfrey and television appearances with Pat Boone. Belafonte had them appear as back-up singers, with a small featured spotlight, in his May 1960 Carnegie Hall concert, and signed them to his Belafonte Enterprises management firm.

In the summer of 1960, Pugh left the group to return to college. After auditioning over 150 singers, Joe Frazier (from Lebanon, Pennsylvania; not the heavyweight champion boxer) was chosen to replace Pugh.

After releasing mostly conventional folk songs, the Trio unleashed the then-daring satire "The John Birch Society" (Fighting for the right/To fight the right fight for the Right), which established their ability to perform far more controversial material than other groups could. Their departure from Belafonte Enterprises in 1962, followed by their move to Mercury Records in 1963, gave them more freedom to add aggressively political songs to their body of folk, love, and world-music songs.

Mitchell left the Trio in 1965 to embark on a solo singing career. Another audition process replaced him with young singer/songwriter named John Denver. The group retained the well-known "Mitchell Trio" name, with Denver writing some of the group's songs as Mitchell had done.

Frazier's departure from the Trio in 1966 brought on replacement David Boise. After a final live release, Kobluk left; Denver and Boise replaced Kobluk with Michael Johnson (who would later go on as a solo artist to record "Bluer Than Blue" among other popular songs)and, because of contractual requirements that prohibited using the "Mitchell" name after the last original member left, became "Denver, Boise and Johnson". Soon, however, the group disbanded, thus ending an important chapter in American music.

Mike Kobluk, Joe Frazier and David Boise later left the music industry, Chad Mitchell released a number of solo albums before retiring from music, and Denver's time with the Trio became the springboard to his solo career (he died in October of 1997). Michael Johnson lives in Nashville and continues to record.

The Mitchell/Kobluk/Frazier trio and John Denver all reunited in 1987 for several concerts, some broadcast on PBS, which are the only recordings of all four members singing together.

The Mitchell/Kobluk/Frazier trio reuited again in 2005 for a short program as part of a concert also featuring Tom Paxton and the Kingston Trio's current lineup in Minneapolis, MN. The trio mentioned that Paxton was a contender for the spot Frazier eventually filled and they all sang a Paxton song together at the end. The trio indicated that future performances are not out of the question, but most likely they would be similar combined concerts.

Unlike many fellow folk-music groups, none of the Trio's members played instruments (until Denver began playing guitar in their performances). Other featured musicians for the Trio through the years included:

Jim McGuinn - Guitar, Banjo (who later founded The Byrds and took the name Roger McGuinn)
Paul Prestopino - Guitar, Banjo, and Mandolin
David (Jake) Ander - Guitar
Pete Soloway - Acoustic Bass

[edit] The Songs

The Trio's first recordings for Colpix were not different from the conventional sort of folk songs that were gaining popularity then as an alternative to the early rock-and-roll genre. It was songs from their first Kapp Records release--"Mighty Day" (about the 1900 Galveston, Texas hurricane); "Rum By Gum" (about the Temperance/Prohibition movement); and, "Lizzie Borden" (a strange satire about the celebrated accused axe murderess)--which began to make the Trio distinct from the other 'Folkies.'

Their next Kapp album contained "The John Birch Society." "The Ides of Texas" from their final Kapp release took aim at financier Billie Sol Estes.

Once on Mercury, 'the gloves were off.' "Twelve Days" imagined a group of former Nazis singing new lyrics to the old Christmas carol; a similar theme would be explored later in "The I Am Not A Nazi Polka.". "Barry's Boys" ("You too can join the crew/Tippecanoe and Nixon, too") portrayed a view of the followers of conservative Republican 1964 Presidential candidate Barry Goldwater. "A Dying Business" went after funeral costs and customs, while "The Draft Dodger Rag" (by Phil Ochs: "Sarge, I'm only eighteen/I got a ruptured spleen/And I always carry a purse.") explored the beginnings of resistance to the Vietnam War. "What Kind Of Life Is That" pondered on celebrity fame (specifically, that of Elizabeth Taylor). "Alma Mater" ("We'll miss the classrooms/Where we learned/And effigies we burned.") took on segregationist policies at the University of Mississippi, but was only a prelude to the later "Your Friendly, Liberal, Neighborhood Ku-Klux-Klan."

While the Mitchell Trio became best known for such fearless work, they also produced a solid body of work which showed that folk music could be 'polished' yet remain close to its roots. They recorded square dance numbers like "Whup Jamboree" and "Hello Susan Brown". They could do rousing gospel music numbers like "You Can Tell The World," "I Felt So Good About It (Sin Bound Train)," and "One Day When I Was Lost (Easter Morn)." They seemed made to do the modern classics of Tom Paxton, such as "The Marvelous Toy," "What Did You Learn In School Today?" and "We Didn't Know." They also sang the work of Woody Guthrie ("The Great Historical Bum (Bragging Song)"), Shel Silverstein ("The Hip Song (It Does Not Pay To Be Hip)"), and Bob Dylan ("Blowing In The Wind," "With God On Our Side," "Mr. Tambourine Man").

The Mitchell Trio branched out to also do both love and pop songs. They did the first major recording of John Denver's later hit "For Bobbi," and also handled his "Leaving, On A Jet Plane." Their final album offered a gorgeous, soft, harmonized version of The Beatles' "She Loves You." Kobluk's superb solo vocal on "The First Time Ever (I Saw Your Face)" pre-dated the Roberta Flack major hit version by a couple of years.

Johnny Cash cited their version of "Four Strong Winds" as a stylistic influence and included it on his Artist's Choice album of favorites. The 2003 mockumentary A Mighty Wind featured The Folksmen, a group described "as a more leftish variation on the Chad Mitchell Trio." [1]

[edit] Discography

[Chad Mitchell, Mike Kobluk, Mike Pugh:]

The Chad Mitchell Trio Arrives! (Colpix, 1959, reprinted 1964)
In Concert - Everybody's Listening (Colpix, 1964; pre-1960 recordings of the Trio on Side One only, with Side Two featuring "The Gatemen")

[Chad Mitchell, Mike Kobluk, Joe Frazier:]

Mighty Day on Campus (Kapp, 1961)
At The Bitter End (Kapp, 1962)
In Action (Kapp, 1962; re-issued as Blowin' in the Wind)
The Best Of (Kapp, 1963)
Singin' Our Minds (Mercury, 1963)
Reflecting (Mercury, 1964)
Slightly Irreverent (Mercury, 1964)
Typical American Boys (Mercury, 1965)

[Mike Kobluk, Joe Frazier, John Denver:]

That's the Way It's Gonna Be ( Mercury, 1965)
Violets Of Dawn (Mercury, 1966)

[Mike Kobluk, John Denver, David Boise:]

Alive! (Reprise, 1967; final album of 'original' career)

[Reunion albums:]

Mighty Day; The Chad Mitchell Trio Reunion (Folk Era, 1994)
The Chad Mitchell Reunion... Part 2 (Folk Era, 1997)

[edit] Source

The Mitchell Trio Song Book (Robert Shelton, editor/writer; Walter Rain, music editor; Quadrangle Books, Chicago, 1964 [Library Of Congress Catalog Card Number 64-24290] )