The Brothers Four

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The Brothers Four
General information
Genre (s) Folk
founding 1958
Website www.brothersfour.com
Founding members
Mike Kirkland (until 1969)
John Paine
Baritone singing, guitar
 Dick Foley (until 1990)
Baritone singing, bass singing , double bass
Bob Flick (until 197?)
Current occupation
Mark Pearson (1969–1971, from 1989)
Baritone singing, guitar
 John Paine
Vocals, guitar
 Terry Lauber (from 1990)
Baritone singing, bass singing, double bass
 Bob Flick (from 197?)
former members
Vocals, guitar
 Bob Haworth (1971-1989)
Tom Coe (19 ?? - 19 ??)

The Brothers Four is an American folk band whose music is very much oriented towards a traditional interpretation.

Band history

In 1956 Mike Kirkland, John Paine, Dick Foley and Bob Flick attended the University of Washington in Seattle together and began performing as a folk band at university events the following year.

It was more by accident that the four students eventually became professional musicians. Once, one of the other students took the liberty of joking. He asked a woman to call the band members and pretend to be the secretary of the manager of the "Colony Club" and to hire the band for a performance there. When the musicians arrived at the club, they discovered that the call was a fake . In order for the band not to come in vain, the manager still allowed them to play a few songs. He was so enthusiastic about the performance that he finally hired them as a club band, albeit for the low fee of $ 5 per band member and evening.

Until 1958, the four singers, who now called themselves The Brothers Four, appeared regularly in the "Colony". Once in July of Tom Dooley from the Kingston Trio a huge hit and became a folk - revival initiated, the band moved to San Francisco , where they had a job at the " Hungry I club got". It was there that she was discovered by Mort Lewis , who offered to become a band manager and made a demo recording with the band. He then sent this to the record label Columbia Records , which the Brothers Four then signed in July 1959.

The band moved to New York City and the first single Greenfields , a lyrically slightly modified version of the popular folk song Greensleeves , reached number two in the charts in 1960 . At the end of the year the debut album was released, which was simply called The Brothers Four and made it into the top 20. The soundtrack to the John Wayne film The Alamo then produced the single The Green Leaves of Summer , which reached number 65 on the pop charts. Despite the low single success, the title was nominated for an Oscar . The 1961 work BMOC - Best Music on / off Campus reached number four on the LP charts.

Chart positions
Explanation of the data
Albums
The Big Folk Hits
  US 56 11/30/1963 (20 weeks)
More Big Folk Hits
  US 134 11/14/1964 (4 weeks)
The Honey Wind Blows
  US 118 May 22, 1965 (5 weeks)
Try to Remember
  US 76 01/22/1966 (15 weeks)
A Beatles' Songbook
  US 97 09/03/1966 (7 weeks)
Singles
Greenfields
  US 2 02/22/1960 (20 weeks)
  UK 40 06/29/1960 (2 weeks)
My Tani
  US 50 07/04/1960 (7 weeks)
The Green Leaves of Summer
  US 65 10/31/1960 (20 weeks)
Frogg
  US 32 04/10/1961 (5 weeks)
Blue Water Line
  US 68 01/20/1962 (8 weeks)
Hootenanny Saturday Night
  US 89 December 14, 1963 (3 weeks)
Try to Remember
  US 91 11/06/1965 (3 weeks)

In the winter of 1961 to 1962 they performed as part of a tour of the United States within 90 days at 100 colleges. In the meantime, the Brothers Four toured various countries, including Japan in April 1962. As part of their “College Tour” 1962/1963, they had over 200 appearances at universities and colleges. They have appeared several times on television shows, including "Mitch Miller's Sing Along", "Bell Telephone Hour" and repeated over several years on the "Ed Sullivan Show".

At the end of 1961 The Brothers Four Songbook appeared , which mainly offered traditional folk songs with rewritten texts. The single Frogg , a new version of the song Frog Went A Courting written in 1580 , reached number 32 and Blue Water Line number 68 on the pop charts. In 1962 and '63, the live albums The Brothers Four in Person and Cross-Country Concert were released.

Also in 1963 was Bob Dylan's protest album The Freewheelin 'Bob Dylan , which dealt mainly with political issues. It was a great success and other folk bands began to deal with these topics. Before long, most music listeners turned away from the easy entertainment music of the Brothers Four. With the title music of the TV series "Hootenanny", the title Hootenanny Saturday Night , the Brothers Four achieved a small success after almost a year at the end of 1963, with the single reaching number 89. The band's albums continued to appear on a regular basis, but they weren't so successful for a long time. With the album Beatles' Songbook in 1966 they tried to catch up with the new trends, the single If I Fell at least got into the easy listening charts. But even if the successes in America waned, overseas, especially in Japan, they remained somewhat in business. In the USA at the end of 1965 the song Try To Remember from the Broadway musical "The Fantasticks" was a last and modest hit parade. The single reached number 91 on the charts.

In 1969, after the death of his son, Kirkland left the Brothers Four. He was replaced by Mark Pearson. After the release of Let's Get Together in the same year, the contract with Columbia ran out, and the band switched to Fantasy Records . There have been a few line-up changes since then without the band ever breaking up. Record sales remained at the lowest level, the Brothers Four now mainly appeared in hotels. In the 1990s they even started releasing new albums again.

US discography

Vinyl singles

From page Catalog no. published
Columbia
Chicka Mucka Hi Di / Darlin 'Won't You Wait 41461 09/1959
Greenfields / Angelique O 41571 01/1960
My Tane / Eli You Left Me in Charleston 41692 05/1960
Green Leaves of Summer / Beautiful Brown Eyes 41808 09/1960
Frogg / Sweet Rosanne 41958 02/1961
Nobody Knows / My Woman Left Me 42142 08/1961
Christmas Bells / What Child Is This 42235 11/1961
Blue Water Line / Summer Days Alone 42256 12/1961
La Fayette / Darlin 'Sportswoman Jenny 42391 03/1962
This Train / Summertime 42450 05/1962
Five Weeks in a Balloon / Land of the Midnight Sun 42507 09/1962
Tavern Song / 25 Minutes to Go 42586 11/1962
Welcome Home Sally / Ringing Bells 42756 03/1963
Fifty-Five Days At Peking / All for the Love of a Girl 42787 05/1963
Four Strong Winds / The John B. Sails 42888 09/1963
Hootenanny Saturday Night / Across the Sea 42927 11/1963
Seven Daffodils / San Francisco Bay Blues 43025 03/1964
Little Play Soldiers / Take This Hammer 43147 10/1964
Somewhere / Turn Around 43211 01/1965
Come Kiss Me Love / Lazy Harry's 43317 06/1965
Try to Remember / Sakura 43404 10/1965
It Was a Very Good Year / Wild Colonial Boy 43493 12/1965
Muleskinner / Ratman And Bobbin in the Clipper Caper 43547 02/1966
If I Fell / Nowhere Man 43621 04/1966
We Can Work It Out / Ballad of Alvarez Kelly 43811 09/1966
I'll Be Home for Christmas / Twas the Night Before Christmas 43919 11/1966
And Then the Sun Goes Down / All I Need Is You 43984 02/1967
Ain't No More Cane on the Brazos / Shenandoah 44058 03/1967
First Time Ever I Saw Your Face / Walkin 'Backwards 44175 06/1967
Here Today and Gone Tomorrow / No Sad Songs from Me 44278 09/1967
I'm Falling Down / Sweet Dreams Sweet 44578 06/1968
Skip a Rope / Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream 44832 04/1969
Fantasy
Here I Go Again / Going Back to Big Sur 640 04/1970

LPs *

title Catalog no. published Top 200
The Brothers Four Columbia 1402 02/1960 011
BMOC Columbia 1578 02/1961 004th
The Brothers Four Songbook Columbia 1697 12/1961 071
The Brothers Four In Person Columbia 1828 09/1962 102
Cross-Country Concert Columbia 1946 03/1963 081
The Big Folk Hits Columbia 2033 10/1963 056
More Big Folk Hits Columbia 2213 10/1964 134
The Honey Wind Blows Columbia 2305 05/1965 118
Try to Remember Columbia 2379 11/1965 076
A Beatles' Songbook Columbia 2502 07/1966 097

* only with billboard rating

literature

  • Stambler, Irwin / Landon, Grelun: Encyclopedia Of Folk, Country And Western Music . New York / London: St. Martin's Press, 1969, p. 37f.
  • Billboard Magazine , February 22, 1960 ff. (US single chart positions).
  • Ehnert, Günter (Ed.): Hit Records British Chart Singles 1950-1965 Taurus Press 1995, ISBN 3-922542-32-8 .
  • Whitburn, Joel: Top Pop Albums 1955-1996 . Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin: Record Research Ltd., 1996, pp. 107f.

swell

  1. ↑ Stambler, Irwin / Landon, Grelun: Encyclopedia Of Folk, Country And Western Music . New York / London: St. Martin's Press, 1969, p. 37
  2. ↑ Charts UK Charts US
  3. ↑ Stambler, Irwin / Landon, Grelun: Encyclopedia Of Folk, Country And Western Music . New York / London: St. Martin's Press, 1969, p. 38

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