vid: the folk music of my youth

The late, great Steve Goodman, although from Chicago, sure played Philly enough, sometimes alongside his friend John Prine in some memorable shots at the Phila Folk Fest. I recall a performancer of him and Prine at the '74 fest that was shown on Channel 12, the local PBS channel.

(If anyone videoed those TV shows, I absolutely NEED the whole season of that show.)

While John Hartford was my North Star and Bromberg and Blake defined my aesthetic in a so deep a way that it took the Ramones to shake me up.

But Steve Goodman was the first folk guy I heard do standards -- specifically "It's A Sin To Tell A Lie". And, boy, could he solo. He also wrote "City Of New Orleans" and was a close associate of John Prine and produced his last great album, Bruised Orange.

Ironically, the song real folk people associate most closely with Steve Goodman was written by Mike Smith, a song called "The Dutchman".

The old guy playing the mandolin here is God. Yep -- it's Jethro Burns, another close associate of Steve Goodman.

Class act.