Peter, Paul and Mary sign their first recording contract
Peter Paul and Mary didnt revolutionize folk music the way Bob Dylan did.Dylans songwriting fundamentally altered and then ultimately transcended the folk idiom itself while Peter Paul and Mary didnt even write their own material.They were good-looking crowd-pleasing performers first and foremosthand-selected and molded for success by a Greenwich Village impresario named Albert Grossman.
Yet in their good-looking crowd-pleasing way Peter Paul and Mary helped make Dylans revolution possible both by popularizing his songs and by proving the commercial potential of serious folk music in doing so.They took a decisive step on their path to success on January 29 1962 when they signed their first recording contract with Warner Bros.the label they still call home nearly half a century later.Peter Yarrow Noel Paul Stookey and Mary Travers ran in the same Greenwich Village circles but had never performed together before Albert Grossman came along.Grossman a co-founder of the Newport Folk Festival was a controversial figure on the New York folk scenea man openly seeking to commercialize a movement that wore its self-serious leftist political roots on its sleeve.
Grossman recognized commercial potential in the message songs he was hearing in famous Village venues like Gerdes Folk City if only he could combine the music of brilliant songwriters like Pete Seeger with the non-threatening appeal of singers like the Kingston Trio.Pete Seegers former group the Weavers had enjoyed enormous success in the early-1950s with hits like Goodnight Irene until their leftist background derailed their career during the Red Scare.The downfall of the Weavers led to a split within the nascent folk revivala split between political folk that had no chance for commercial success and entertaining folk that was utterly apolitical.Grossman believed that he could span that divide with a group whose youthful good looks and non-threatening demeanor would make subtly political folk music acceptable within the popular mainstream.
Enter Peter Paul and Mary and songs like If I Had a Hammer and Where Have All the Flowers Gone both from their debut album in 1962.In 1963 Peter Paul and Mary would release their biggest hit ever Blowin in the Wind written by a new client of Grossmans named Bob Dylan.It was the first sample of Dylans work that most of the world would ever hear.Mary Travers passed away in 2009.
