Campfire Chronicles

Mike McCoy and I have been friends and have sung together for nearly 50 years now. Nine years ago he joined me in The Brothers Four. Between the fall of 1979 and 1987 my musical career (except for The Brothers Four) was tied to McCoy. It is what I am calling the Fourth Stage in this amazing seven-stage journey.One of the things that makes our relationship so vital is our best shared experience might be the one we are about to have and the best performance the next one. Our personal relationship is a special one…our professional partnership the same. Together they are a most amazing adventure.

One of Those Times in a Life has been a chance for me to learn or become aware of so many things. As I built the last campfire I learned (on a deeper more profound level) that so much of my journey is finding my way home. Building this campfire I realized how deep my gratitude is for the people and experiences who have shared the journey and helped me along the way.

Creating this campfire I realized on some significant level that One of Those Times in a Life is about finding my way home. It has been the journey of a lifetime. I am filled with gratitude for a chance to be able to make such a journey.

This Chronicle is dedicated to my teammates. It is something to think of them and those times and to weave our shared experiences into a larger life’s tapestry all these years later.This Chronicle mentions games the University of Washington played against the University of Oregon and Washington State. As a point of clarification I want to make sure everyone knows these were games played between freshmen teams. 

As usual this chronicle took longer than I thought it would. It is also more satisfying than I could have imagined. A few days ago I realized that each of these Chronicles is like having a conversation with myself from an earlier time. During the first year I went to Nashville I was 28 years old. Also it has been an amazing way to remember things long forgotten or rediscover things I did not even remember losing.

It is an amazing adventure to journey around a life and a career, to find the contour of collected memories. It makes a difference that I am still writing songs, recording, performing and growing as a person in the midst of all this looking back.

This has been a hard Chronicle to create. I realize more than ever how important songwriting is and has been to this journey of a lifetime, how much it has added and continues to add to my life and to each strand of my career. I am filled with gratitude for a chance to spend a lifetime learning the craft of songwriting. 

Each of the seven stages is essential to the journey all are important chapters in the story. It took longer than I thought to find the heartbeat of this, the third stage to rediscover the wonder, the tears, the laughter, the joy of that time now long ago.

Sometime in the preparation of each Chronicle I am reminded of The Old Man in the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. In that story the old man went out further and fished deeper waters than he had ever done before. Even after he had hooked his mighty fish there was doubt about who would give out or up first. In the old man’s case sharks destroyed the incredible fish before he could get back with it to his village. The first 14 Chronicles have made it made it safely home. In another day or two I will set out to sea, or more accurately, to see again. Discovering each Chronicle an adventure connected to a greater one. Thank you for sharing the journey.

There are artists who played roles in the Folk Revival who had significant careers beyond folk music. John Phillips founded The Mamas and Papas after The Journeymen disbanded. Roger McGuinn left The Chad Mitchell Trio to help form The Byrds. Kenny Rogers had a stint with The New Christy Minstrels before becoming, well, Kenny Rogers. John Stewart, who replaced Dave Guard in The Kingston Trio, is remembered both as a solo artist and a songwriter, his most successful song being Daydream Believer. John Denver replaced Chad Mitchell in The Chad Mitchell Trio before going on to historic success as a singer and as a songwriter.As I continue to share my journey and to spin the strands of my career into yarns it is somehow comforting to know that it is part of a larger tapestry.

It breaks my heart to think of the amount of weapons our country continues to export to the rest of the world. It is also heartbreaking to think of how much the song When Johnny Comes Marchin’ Home continues to resonate.To watch and download the HD version of this Campfire please go to my YouTube Channel.

It is something to be remembering those first trips to Japan while creating new memories on my 30th trip to Japan. It is one of the great gifts of my life to grow up and now grow old with Japan remaining a big and important part of my life and career.

It is something to be able to finally tell my whole story. I was quite emotional when I was working on this Chronicle. There are so many things involved in changing the course of a lifetime. I talked to my mom and my brothers about what I am doing. They are each supportive. It means a lot. It also means that I want to be respectful of who and where they are with their lives and stories and journeys as I do this.It is important that people know how much I love my dad, how proud I am of who he was and what he did. That means being honest with myself as I tell this story and know as fully as I can why it is so important to share it. What a journey! 

One of Those Times in a Life is truly underway. I shared the journey with a live audience last week. The Trail Map will soon be ready to share. While there is still so much to do it feels like things are beginning to slow down a little. At the same time The Brothers Four are getting ready to leave for Japan in three weeks for a month of performing. I remain grateful for the great team of people who help make all this possible.

It is fun to begin the next stage of this journey. The Brothers Four videos were recorded recently in the Wheeler Theater at Fort Worden near Port Townsend. I don’t think we have ever sat around and simply sung while the cameras rolled. The videos should be a nice combination with the Campfire Chronicles talking of my first years as one of The Brothers Four.The team of people who are working on this project were all at the house for dinner. It is the first time we have been in one place. It was truly a night of gratitude.

It continues to surprise me how long it takes to create a context while breathing life into the content of this project and journey. I never assumed it would be easy, but I didn’t appreciate how complicated and difficult it would be at times. Part of that is continuing to imagine and see the bigger picture while simultaneously organizing and giving life to the smallest of details. Another thing is having a clear vision of where all this is going while at the same time being open and prepared for surprises and detours along the way.It has been important to put together a team of people who have talents and expertise that help make this possible. They are good people doing good work.There is a part of me that has always been a little anxious and eager to please. While I need to remember and respect those parts of myself it has been important to find ways and reasons to relax in all of this and to be satisfied w

Much of the recent cultural conversation appears to reinforce the notion that we are all in this alone. The social contract we began writing in the 1930’s that includes things like Social Security, the GI Bill, the Interstate Highway System, the Voting Rights Act, and Medicare, is now often described as too expensive, unnecessary, or an intrusion on our individual liberty. While this is not the place to talk about how we might choose to reweave fabric of a society, I will say that I am one of those who believes whether we like it or not that we are all in this together, there must be a greater good we continue to define and refine, and there is something incredibly satisfying when we, when I, am part of something bigger than myself.With that as an introduction in Episode Six I would like to tell you a little bit more about Mike McCoy and the role he played in my life and career.

A Moment to ReflectLately it seems that while life may take a long time that it is over much too soon. It is hard to believe that I’ve been singing with Mike McCoy for more than forty-six years and it’s been forty-three years since I started singing with The Brothers Four. One of the things that make this One of Those Times in a Life is that making music and sharing the journey with McCoy and The Brothers Four is more satisfying than ever and while it still feels like the best days might still be in front of us I am also aware of how precious each day and performance is.The video in Episode Five is called When I Was Young and This Old Guitar Was New. It talks about the many things I didn’t know when this all began as well as a sense of wonder and love I feel at this point in the journey. The audio essay is called The Mourning Ryde. That’s the name of the group McCoy and I were part of in col

From the British Invasion to the 1967 Monterey Pops FestivalIn 1963 it was cool to call yourself a folk singer. By the time I turned seventeen in March of 1964 The Beatles had appeared and folk music quickly lost its cool and commercial appeal. Roger McGuinn known as Jim McGuinn during his folk days as the accompanist for The Chad Mitchell Trio formed The Byrds that same year. By the summer of 1965 Dylan plugged in at the Newport Folk Festival and one-time folkies were soon experimenting with other sounds and genres. Producer Tom Wilson added electric guitar, bass, and drums to the folk version of The Sounds of Silence and Simon and Garfunkel soared. One time New Christie Minstrel Barry McGuire had a smash pop hit called Eve of Destruction.By 1967 another New Christie Minstrel alum Kenny Rogers was finding success as the bearded face of The First Edition before going on to super stardom in country music. That same

A Page Filled with Gratitude… One of the best parts of the last year has been having a chance to work with an amazing group of talented people while getting ready to share this journey of songs and stories. Here are some of the people who are invaluable to the process and the journey: Al Bergstein - Mountainstone Productions Al creates the videos for One of Those Times in a Life. He brings a wonderful artistic and technical sensibility, understanding in life and work that craft is important and art is essential. Jonathan Henson - Oxbow Rising Jonathan’s official title is Web & Systems Developer. Along with his partners, Michael Hayes and Alexa Voyer, they are the ones who create a welcoming and comfortable place for everyone to join in the journey. Renne Emiko Brock-Richmond – uniqueasyou.com Renne describes her work this way: “…Encouraging connections and creating community through