Bruce Langhorne
Encyclopedia
Bruce Langhorne is an American
folk music
ian. He was active in the Greenwich Village
folk scene in the 1960s, primarily as a session guitar
ist for folk
albums and performances. He lost the fifth and fourth fingers on his right hand in an accident when seven years old, contributing to his distinctive finger picking style.
Langhorne worked with many of the major performers in the Folk Revival of the 1950s and 1960s, including The Clancy Brothers & Tommy Makem, Joan Baez
, Richie Havens
, Carolyn Hester
, Peter LaFarge, Gordon Lightfoot
, Hugh Masakela, Odetta
, Babatunde Olatunji
, Peter, Paul and Mary
, Tom Rush
, and Buffy Sainte-Marie
.
The title character of Bob Dylan
's song "Mr. Tambourine Man
" is inspired by Langhorne, who used to play a large Turkish frame drum
in performances and recordings.http://www.richieunterberger.com/langhorne2.htmlhttp://www.richieunterberger.com/langhorne.html The drum, which Langhorne had purchased in a music store in Greenwich Village, had small bells attached around its interior, giving it a jingling sound much like a tambourine. Langhorne used the instrument most prominently with Richard
and Mimi Fariña
. The drum is now in the collection of Seattle's Experience Music Project
.
In addition to inspiring the title character of "Mr. Tambourine Man", Langhorne played the electric guitar countermelody on the song. His guitar is also prominent on several other songs on Dylan's Bringing It All Back Home
album, particularly "Love Minus Zero/No Limit
" and "She Belongs to Me
", but also "Subterranean Homesick Blues
", "Outlaw Blues
", "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream
" and "Maggie's Farm
", on which he played the lead guitar
part. He also played the guitar with Dylan for Dylan's television
performances of "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)" and "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue
on The Les Crane Show in February 1965, a month after the Bringing It All Back Home sessions. Two years earlier, Langhorne had performed on Dylan's The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
on "Corrina, Corrina" as well as the outtake "Mixed-Up Confusion
" that was eventually released on Biograph. Years later, Langhorne also played on tracks for Dylan's Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid.
Langhorne composed the highly distinctive music for the cult Peter Fonda
western film The Hired Hand
(1971), which combined sitar
, fiddle
, and banjo
to great effect. He also provided the film score
for Fonda's 1973 science fiction film
Idaho Transfer
.
In 1992 Langhorne founded a hot sauce company known as Brother Bru-Bru's African Hot Sauce. This hot sauce is unique for containing "African Spices."
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
folk music
Folk music
Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....
ian. He was active in the Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village
Greenwich Village, , , , .in New York often simply called "the Village", is a largely residential neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. A large majority of the district is home to upper middle class families...
folk scene in the 1960s, primarily as a session guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
ist for folk
Folk music
Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....
albums and performances. He lost the fifth and fourth fingers on his right hand in an accident when seven years old, contributing to his distinctive finger picking style.
Langhorne worked with many of the major performers in the Folk Revival of the 1950s and 1960s, including The Clancy Brothers & Tommy Makem, Joan Baez
Joan Baez
Joan Chandos Baez is an American folk singer, songwriter, musician and a prominent activist in the fields of human rights, peace and environmental justice....
, Richie Havens
Richie Havens
Richard P. "Richie" Havens is an African American folk singer and guitarist. He is best known for his intense, rhythmic guitar style , soulful covers of pop and folk songs, and his opening performance at the 1969 Woodstock Festival.-Career:Born in Brooklyn, Havens was the eldest of nine children...
, Carolyn Hester
Carolyn Hester
Carolyn Hester is an American folk singer and songwriter. She was a figure in the early 1960s folk music revival.-Biography:...
, Peter LaFarge, Gordon Lightfoot
Gordon Lightfoot
Gordon Meredith Lightfoot, Jr. is a Canadian singer-songwriter who achieved international success in folk, folk-rock, and country music, and has been credited for helping define the folk-pop sound of the 1960s and 1970s...
, Hugh Masakela, Odetta
Odetta
Odetta Holmes, known as Odetta, was an American singer, actress, guitarist, songwriter, and a human rights activist, often referred to as "The Voice of the Civil Rights Movement". Her musical repertoire consisted largely of American folk music, blues, jazz, and spirituals...
, Babatunde Olatunji
Babatunde Olatunji
Babatunde Olatunji was a Nigerian drummer, educator, social activist and recording artist.- Biography :Olatunji was born in the village of Ajido, a small town near Badagry, Lagos State, in southwestern Nigeria. A member of the Yoruba people, Olatunji was introduced to traditional African music at...
, Peter, Paul and Mary
Peter, Paul and Mary
Peter, Paul and Mary were an American folk-singing trio whose nearly 50-year career began with their rise to become a paradigm for 1960s folk music. The trio was composed of Peter Yarrow, Paul Stookey and Mary Travers...
, Tom Rush
Tom Rush
Tom Rush is an American folk and blues singer, songwriter, musician and recording artist.- Life and career :Rush was born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. His father was a teacher at St. Paul's School, in Concord, New Hampshire. Tom began performing in 1961 while studying at Harvard University after...
, and Buffy Sainte-Marie
Buffy Sainte-Marie
Buffy Sainte-Marie, OC is a Canadian Cree singer-songwriter, musician, composer, visual artist, educator, pacifist, and social activist. Throughout her career in all of these areas, her work has focused on issues of Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Her singing and writing repertoire includes...
.
The title character of Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
's song "Mr. Tambourine Man
Mr. Tambourine Man
"Mr. Tambourine Man" is a song written and performed by Bob Dylan, which was released on his 1965 album Bringing It All Back Home. The Byrds also recorded a version of the song that was released as their first single on Columbia Records, reaching number 1 on both the Billboard Hot 100 chart and...
" is inspired by Langhorne, who used to play a large Turkish frame drum
Frame drum
A frame drum is a drum that has a drumhead width greater than its depth. Usually the single drumhead is made of rawhide or man-made materials. Shells are traditionally constructed of bent wood scarf jointed together; plywood and man-made materials are also used. Some frame drums have mechanical...
in performances and recordings.http://www.richieunterberger.com/langhorne2.htmlhttp://www.richieunterberger.com/langhorne.html The drum, which Langhorne had purchased in a music store in Greenwich Village, had small bells attached around its interior, giving it a jingling sound much like a tambourine. Langhorne used the instrument most prominently with Richard
Richard Fariña
Richard George Fariña was an American writer and folksinger.-Early years and education:Richard Fariña was born in Brooklyn, New York, of Cuban and Irish descent. He grew up in the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn and attended Brooklyn Technical High School...
and Mimi Fariña
Mimi Fariña
Mimi Baez Fariña was a singer-songwriter and activist, the youngest of three daughters to a Scottish mother and Mexican-American physicist Albert Baez .- Early years:Fariña's father, a physicist affiliated with Stanford University and MIT, moved his family...
. The drum is now in the collection of Seattle's Experience Music Project
Experience Music Project
The EMP Museum is a museum dedicated to the history and exploration of both popular music and science fiction located in Seattle, Washington...
.
In addition to inspiring the title character of "Mr. Tambourine Man", Langhorne played the electric guitar countermelody on the song. His guitar is also prominent on several other songs on Dylan's Bringing It All Back Home
Bringing It All Back Home
Bringing It All Back Home is singer-songwriter Bob Dylan's fifth studio album, released in March 1965 by Columbia Records. The album is divided into an electric and an acoustic side. On side one of the original LP, Dylan is backed by an electric rock and roll band - a move that further alienated...
album, particularly "Love Minus Zero/No Limit
Love Minus Zero/No Limit
"Love Minus Zero/No Limit" is a song written by Bob Dylan for his fifth studio album Bringing It All Back Home, released in 1965 . The song was originally written as a tribute to Dylan's future wife Sara Lowndes...
" and "She Belongs to Me
She Belongs to Me
"She Belongs to Me" is a song by Bob Dylan, and was first released as the second track on his 1965 album Bringing It All Back Home. It was one of the first anti-love songs and one of Dylan's first of many songs that describe a "witchy woman"...
", but also "Subterranean Homesick Blues
Subterranean Homesick Blues
"Subterranean Homesick Blues" is a song by Bob Dylan, originally released in 1965 as a single on Columbia Records, catalogue 43242. It appeared 19 days later as the lead track to the album Bringing It All Back Home. It was Dylan's first Top 40 hit, peaking at #39 on the Billboard Hot 100. It also...
", "Outlaw Blues
Outlaw Blues
Outlaw Blues is a 1977 film that stars Susan Saint James and Peter Fonda. It was directed by Richard T. Heffron and is rated PG in the USA. Many of the songs were sung by Fonda and three of songs from the film were written by Hoyt Axton.-Plot summary:...
", "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream
Bob Dylan's 115th Dream
"Bob Dylan's 115th Dream" is a song by Bob Dylan, released on his fifth album, Bringing It All Back Home. In 2005, Mojo Magazine rated the song as the #68 greatest Bob Dylan song....
" and "Maggie's Farm
Maggie's Farm
"Maggie's Farm" is a song written by Bob Dylan, recorded on January 15, 1965, and released on the album Bringing It All Back Home on March 22 of that year...
", on which he played the lead guitar
Lead guitar
Lead guitar is a guitar part which plays melody lines, instrumental fill passages, guitar solos, and occasionally, some riffs within a song structure...
part. He also played the guitar with Dylan for Dylan's television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
performances of "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)" and "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue
It's All Over Now, Baby Blue
"It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" is a song written and performed by Bob Dylan and featured on his Bringing It All Back Home album, released on March 22, 1965 by Columbia Records . The song was originally recorded on January 15, 1965 with Dylan's acoustic guitar and harmonica and William E. Lee's bass...
on The Les Crane Show in February 1965, a month after the Bringing It All Back Home sessions. Two years earlier, Langhorne had performed on Dylan's The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan is the second studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released in May 1963 by Columbia Records. Whereas his debut album Bob Dylan had contained only two original songs, Freewheelin initiated the process of writing contemporary words to traditional melodies....
on "Corrina, Corrina" as well as the outtake "Mixed-Up Confusion
Mixed-Up Confusion
Mixed-Up Confusion is a song written and recorded by Bob Dylan.It was recorded with an electric band on November 14th 1962 during the sessions for The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, but was not used on that album, which was entirely acoustic. Instead the song, backed with "Corrina, Corrina", a...
" that was eventually released on Biograph. Years later, Langhorne also played on tracks for Dylan's Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid.
Langhorne composed the highly distinctive music for the cult Peter Fonda
Peter Fonda
Peter Henry Fonda is an American actor. He is the son of Henry Fonda, brother of Jane Fonda, and father of Bridget and Justin Fonda...
western film The Hired Hand
The Hired Hand
The Hired Hand is a 1971 American western film directed by Peter Fonda, with a screenplay by Alan Sharp. The film stars Fonda, Warren Oates, and Verna Bloom. The cinematography was by Vilmos Zsigmond, and Bruce Langhorne provided the moody film score. The story is about a man who returns to his...
(1971), which combined sitar
Sitar
The 'Tablaman' is a plucked stringed instrument predominantly used in Hindustani classical music, where it has been ubiquitous since the Middle Ages...
, fiddle
Fiddle
The term fiddle may refer to any bowed string musical instrument, most often the violin. It is also a colloquial term for the instrument used by players in all genres, including classical music...
, and banjo
Banjo
In the 1830s Sweeney became the first white man to play the banjo on stage. His version of the instrument replaced the gourd with a drum-like sound box and included four full-length strings alongside a short fifth-string. There is no proof, however, that Sweeney invented either innovation. This new...
to great effect. He also provided the film score
Film score
A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
for Fonda's 1973 science fiction film
Science fiction film
Science fiction film is a film genre that uses science fiction: speculative, science-based depictions of phenomena that are not necessarily accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial life forms, alien worlds, extrasensory perception, and time travel, often along with futuristic...
Idaho Transfer
Idaho Transfer
Idaho Transfer is a 1973 science fiction film directed by Peter Fonda. It stars Kelley Bohanon, Kevin Hearst, Dale Hopkins, and Keith Carradine.-Plot summary:...
.
In 1992 Langhorne founded a hot sauce company known as Brother Bru-Bru's African Hot Sauce. This hot sauce is unique for containing "African Spices."
External links
- Bruce Langhorne bio
- Bro Bru-Bru site
- Allmusic entry
- Illustrated Bruce Langhorne discography
- Bruce Langhorne interview (part 1)
- Bruce Langhorne interview (part 2)
- Bruce Langhorne interview (part 3)
- Bruce Langhorne page from Richard and Mimi site