The philosophers song bill staines biography
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Before long Staines was playing atClub 47, the Unicorn and a number of the small clubs that lined Charles Street and had landed an ongoing gig as the emcee at Club 47’s Sunday Hootenanny.
Albums, Awards, Memoir
He got into touring, started recording albums (beginning with Bag of Rainbows in 1966), wrote a number of children’s songs (his albums The Happy Wanderer and One More River won the Parents’ Choice Award) and made appearances on A Prairie Home Companion and Mountain Stage. Best known among his more than 300 original tunes are “Bridges,” “A Place in the Choir” and “River.” In 2003, Xlibris published Staines’ memoir, The Tour: A Life Between the Lines.
Death, Legacy
After making his home in Rollinsford, New Hampshire, for a number of years, Bill Staines passed away on December 5, 2021, at age 74 of prostate cancer.
The Philosophers Song letra
(Traducción al español)
1 views
by Bill Staines
Album
The second million miles
Released to
January 1, 2000
The Philosophers Song letra
(Traducción al español)
Versículo 1
¿Dónde estás hoy, con tu viejo sombrero y sonrisa?
He’s right up there with things we’ll always value here.”
(by Ed Symkus)
Rock ‘n’ roll beginnings, Switch to folk
Yet Staines started out as a rocker.
When he was 11, his friend Dick Curtis got a guitar, so Staines got a guitar (a Sears Silvertone three-quarter size model). Another important recognition was given to him in 2007. Additionally, his music has been used in a number of films including Off and Running, with Cyndi Lauper, and The Return of the Secaucus Seven, John Sayles' debut as a writer- director.
In 1975, Bill won National Yodeling Championship in Kerrville Texas.
His first solo paying gig was at The King’s Rook (later Stonehenge Club) in Ipswich in April of 1965. Now, well into his fifth decade as a folk performer, he has gained an international reputation as a gifted songwriter and performer.
Singing mostly his own songs, he has become one of the most popular and durable singers on the folk music scene today, performing nearly 200 concerts a year and driving over 65,000 miles annually.
“He’s a New Hampshire gem, as much as maple syrup and the Old Man of the Mountain. “I would see them play at a place called the Maples in Billerica. He's a New Englander who dreams of open plains and vast, Western skies, and damn his soul, he writes better cowboy songs than anybody in the Southwest.”
— The Houston Post
"Bill Staines is a prototypical singer/songwriter, long on the anecdote, quick with the quip, not a stranger to his character's plights and/or escapades.
I've always wanted to bring something of value to people through my songs." With these thoughts, Bill continues to drive the highways and back roads of the country year after year, bringing his music to listeners, young and old.
In the fall of 2015 Yankee Magazine, New England's premiere magazine, published it's "80th Anniversary Issue." In the issue, along with the likes of Stephen King and Katherine Hepburn, Bill was chosen as "One of the 80 gifts New England has given to America." A true honor.
A Virtual Tribute to Bill Staines
Hosted by the Woodstock Folk Festival
February 6, 2022
What Other People Said About Bill
“There is no better writer of instantly memorable singalong choruses in this genre of music!”
— The Boston Globe
"Folk singer Bill Staines' compositions recall the paintings of Grandma Moses - simple, literal and evocative of a bucolic tranquility that modern times have almost erased."
— Hartford Courant
"His gentle lilting voice, spacious melodies and common-chord lyrics give his songs a homespun grace that often belies his mastery of the folk form.
A self-taught guitarist, he was watching a lot of other performers at the time and picked up on the fingerpicking style of local folk-scene regular Jackie Washington. From the time in 1971 when a reviewer from the Boston Phoenix stated that he was "simply Boston's best performer", Bill has continually appeared on folk music radio listener polls as one of the top all time favorite folk artists.
He is such a pure pleasure too, people forget to notice how damn good at the job of singer-songwritering he really is."
— New England Folk Almanac
"Bill Staines is one of our very best folk and country singer/songwriters.
¿Estás obligado a encontrar un arco iris en un cielo nublado? A New England native, Bill became involved with the Boston-Cambridge folk scene in the early 1960's and for a time, emceed the Sunday Hootenanny at the legendary Club 47 in Cambridge.
His song, All God's Critters, has been recently released as a Simon and Schuster children's book with illustrations by Caldecott honor-winning artist, Kadir Nelson.
"Folk music is rich in the human spirit and experience. Johnny did a bunch of yodeling. Presented by the Boston Area Coffeehouse Association, The Jerry Christen Award recognized Bill's contribution to New England folk music.
Bill recorded 26 albums; The Happy Wanderer and One More River were winners of the prestigious Parents' Choice Award, taking a gold medal and silver medal respectively.
[He writes] pensive, probing narratives made especially memorable by their ability to translate the common details of common lives into songs of uncommon eloquence and beauty."
— The Austin American-Statesman
"He is a poet with Insight about a world that many of us let pass by.
¿Estás escuchando el viento, ¿te está cantando una canción
como te rodea por todo el camino por tanto tiempo? He's an old hand at selling you the kind of truisms that crop back into your consciousness a few days after his tunes have floated off into the ether."
— The New Paper (Providence)
"One of the most admired and imitated writers on the contemporary folk circuit..