John Prine is often hailed as one
of the best narrative songwriters of his generation and has been compared to
fellow great songwriters Paul Simon, Loudon Wainwright, and James Taylor.
The basics
about this learning experience
John Prine (October 10, 1946 –
April 7, 2020) was an American country folk singer-songwriter. He was active as
a composer, recording artist, and live performer from the early 1970s until his
death, and was known for an often humorous style of original music that has
elements of protest and social commentary.
Born and raised in Maywood,
Illinois, Prine learned to play the guitar at the age of 14. He attended
classes at Chicago's Old Town School of Folk Music.
After serving in West Germany
with the U.S. Army, he returned to Chicago in the late 1960s, where he worked
as a mailman, writing and singing songs first as a hobby, and then becoming a
club performer.
A member of Chicago's folk
revival, Prine credited film critic Roger Ebert and singer-songwriter Kris
Kristofferson with discovering him, resulting in the production of Prine's
eponymous debut album with Atlantic Records in 1971.
The acclaim earned by this LP led Prine to
focus on his musical career, and he recorded three more albums for Atlantic. He
then signed with Asylum Records, where he recorded an additional three albums.
In 1981, he co-founded Oh Boy Records, an independent record label with which
he would release most of his subsequent albums.
Widely cited as one of the most
influential songwriters of his generation, Prine was known for humorous lyrics
about love, life, and current events, as well as serious songs with social
commentary and songs that recollect melancholy tales from his life. In 2020, he
received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.
Prine was the son of William
Mason Prine, a tool-and-die maker, and Verna Valentine (Hamm), a homemaker,
both from Muhlenberg County, Kentucky. He was born and raised in the Maywood
suburb of Chicago.
In summers, they would go back to
visit family near Paradise, Kentucky.[4] Prine started playing guitar at age
14, taught by his brother, David. He attended classes at Chicago's Old Town
School of Folk Music, and Proviso Township High School (later called Proviso
East) in Maywood, Illinois. He was a U.S. Postal Service mailman for five years
and was drafted into the United States Army during the Vietnam War era, serving
in Germany, before beginning his musical career in Chicago.
In the late 1960s, while Prine
was delivering mail, he began to sing his songs (often first written in his
head on the mail route) at open-microphone evenings at the Fifth Peg on
Armitage Avenue in Chicago. The bar was a gathering spot for nearby Old Town
School of Folk Music teachers and students. Prine was initially a spectator,
reluctant to perform, but eventually did so in response to a "You think
you can do better?" comment made to him by another performer. After his
first open mic, he was offered paying gigs. In 1970, Chicago Sun-Times movie
critic Roger Ebert heard him by chance at the Fifth Peg and wrote the first
review Prine ever received, calling him a great songwriter:
He appears on stage with such
modesty he almost seems to be backing into the spotlight. He sings rather
quietly, and his guitar work is good, but he doesn't show off. He starts slow.
But after a song or two, even the drunks in the room begin to listen to his
lyrics. And then he has you.
After the review was published,
Prine's popularity grew.] Prine became a central figure in the Chicago folk
revival, which also included such singer-songwriters as Steve Goodman, Michael
Peter Smith, Bonnie Koloc, Jim Post, Tom Dundee, Anne Hills, and Fred Holstein.
Joined by such established musicians as Jethro Burns and Bob Gibson, Prine
performed frequently at a variety of Chicago clubs. He was offered a one-album
deal of covers and with a few of his original songs, by Bob Koester from
Delmark Records, but decided the project was not right for him.
In 1971, Prine was playing
regularly at the Earl of Old Town. Steve Goodman, who was performing with Kris
Kristofferson at another Chicago club, persuaded Kristofferson to go see Prine
late one night.] Kristofferson later recalled, "By the end of the first
line we knew we were hearing something else. It must’ve been like stumbling
onto Dylan when he first busted onto the Village scene."
Prine's self-titled debut album
was released in 1971. Kristofferson (who once remarked that Prine wrote songs
so good that "we'll have to break his thumbs", invited Prine and
Goodman to open for him at The Bitter End club in New York City. In the
audience was Jerry Wexler, who signed Prine to Atlantic Records the next day.
The album included Prine's signature songs
"Illegal Smile" and "Sam Stone", and songs that became folk
and country standards, "Angel from Montgomery" and
"Paradise." The album also featured "Hello in There", a
song about aging that was later covered by numerous artists, and "Far From
Me", a lonely waltz about lost love for a waitress, about which Prine
later said was his favorite of all his songs. The album received many positive
reviews, and some hailed Prine as "the next Dylan." Bob Dylan himself
appeared unannounced at one of Prine's first New York City club appearances,
anonymously backing him on harmonica.
Prine's second album, Diamonds in
the Rough (1972), was a surprise for many after the critical success of his first
LP; it was an uncommercial, stripped-down affair that reflected Prine's
fondness for bluegrass music and features songs reminiscent of Hank Williams.
Highlights of the compilation include the allegorical "The Great
Compromise", which includes a recitation and addresses the Vietnam War,
and the ballad "Souvenirs", which Prine later recorded with Goodman.
His subsequent albums from the
nineteen seventies include Sweet Revenge (1973), containing such fan favorites
as "Dear Abby", "Grandpa Was a Carpenter", and
"Christmas in Prison", and Common Sense (1975), with "Come Back
to Us Barbara Lewis Hare Krishna Beauregard." The latter album was Prine's
first to chart on the U.S Top 100 by Billboard and reflected his growing
commercial success. It was produced by Steve Cropper. Bruised Orange from 1978
is a Steve Goodman-produced album that gave listeners songs such as
"That's The Way That The World Goes 'Round", "Sabu Visits the
Twin Cities Alone", "Fish and Whistle", and the title track.
In 1974, singer David Allan Coe
achieved considerable success on the country charts with "You Never Even
Called Me by My Name", co-written by Prine and Goodman. The song
good-naturedly spoofs stereotypical country music lyrics to create what it
self-describes as "the perfect country and western song." Prine
refused to take a songwriter's credit (stating he was too drunk when the song
was written to remember what he had contributed) and Goodman received sole
credit. Goodman bought Prine a jukebox as a gift from his publishing royalties.
In 1975, Prine toured the U.S.
and Canada with a full band featuring guitarist Arlen Roth.
The 1979 album Pink Cadillac
features two songs produced by Sun Records founder Sam Phillips, who by this
time rarely did any studio work. The song "Saigon" is about a Vietnam
veteran traumatized by the war ("The static in my attic's gettin' ready to
blow"). During the recording, one of the guitar amplifiers blew up (which
is evident on the album) The other song Phillips produced is "How Lucky",
about Prine's hometown.
Prine was married three times.
His first marriage was to high-school sweetheart Ann Carole in 1966. The
marriage lasted until the late 1970s. Prine was married to bassist Rachel Peer
from 1984 to 1988. Prine met Fiona Whelan, who later became his manager, in
1988. Prine and Whelan had two sons together, Jack and Tommy, and Prine adopted
Whelan's son, Jody, from a previous relationship. Prine had a home, and spent
part of the year, in Galway, Ireland.
In early 1998, Prine was
diagnosed with squamous-cell cancer on the right side of his neck. He had major
surgery to remove a substantial amount of diseased tissue, followed by six
weeks of radiation therapy. The surgery removed a piece of his neck and severed
a few nerves in his tongue, while the radiation damaged some salivary glands. A
year of recuperation and speech therapy were necessary before he could perform
again. The operation altered his vocals and added a gravelly tone to his voice.
In 2013, Prine underwent surgery
to remove cancer in his left lung. After the surgery, a physical therapist put
him through an unusual workout to build stamina; Prine was required to run up
and down his house stairs, grab his guitar while still out of breath, and sing
two songs. Six months later, he was touring again
Death
On March 19, 2020, amid the
coronavirus pandemic in the United States, Prine's wife Fiona revealed that she
had tested positive for the SARS-CoV-2 and had been quarantined in their home
apart from him. He was hospitalized on March 26 after experiencing COVID-19
symptoms. On March 30, Fiona tweeted that she had recovered and that John was
in stable condition but not improving.[50][51][52] Prine died on April 7, 2020,
of complications caused by COVID-19 at the age of 73.[53]
In accordance with Prine's wishes
as expressed in his song "Paradise", half of his ashes were spread in
Kentucky's Green River. The other half were buried next to his parents in