The death of John Prine on Tuesday from complications of COVID-19 is a cruel blow to anyone who favors decency, empathy, community, and good jokes—you know, all those things that once defined the American character but in the face of the federal malfeasance surrounding this pandemic feel like sentimental niceties from a bygone era. I hope I’m wrong.
Folk music has always denounced scoundrels—only the names change. Today they’re called “deplorables.”
“A guy with John’s talent is vanishingly rare,” says Chicago singer-songwriter Robbie Fulks. “Fifty years of great songs in a writer’s voice that was all his own, and songs that everyone wants to sing and play—and can, because they’re beautifully simple. Original folk music. Funny and dark mixed together in a casual, natural way.”
Success came quickly. By 1971 Prine had a record deal with Atlantic, which released his self-titled debut. He would continue to perform many of its songs for nearly 50 years: “Donald and Lydia,” “Sam Stone,” “Hello in There.” Like many of his records to follow, it became a touchstone for songwriters in its wake. While Bob Dylan was more of a conceptualist, leaning on themes, images, and language from film, literature, music, and history, Prine was a strict craftsman who used economical lyrics and just a few chords to construct songs that sounded simple but were deeply wrought with mystery, goofy humor, or sorrow—and often all three.
“This might sound odd—usually I’m the last one to know what it is I’m writing about. I just dive in,” Prine said. “If somebody asked when I was writing those songs, I wouldn’t have told them I was writing about disjointed relationships. The best way I can explain it, now that I’m finished, is that they seem to be the songs that are hitting home runs for me. They seem like the kind I’ll be singing for a while. And so I gotta think, maybe it has to do with the way a lot of people are feeling. I’m not sure if I’m as good of a radar as I used to be, but I’m picking up on something.’
Holstein, who still teaches at the Old Town School, is also a songwriter whose material has been covered by the likes of Bette Midler and Tom Rush; he’s now one of a small circle of performers and songwriters left from that bygone scene. He says Prine was “very much Chicago,” in large part due to the performance style he honed at those folk clubs. “You couldn’t just get up there and sing one song after another. You had to relate to an audience,” he explains.
