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Eric Von Schmidt
Background information
Born	(1931-05-28)May 28, 1931 Bridgeport, Connecticut, U.S.
Died	February 2, 2007(2007-02-02) (aged 75) Fairfield, Connecticut, U.S.
Genres	Folk blues
Occupations	Musician painter
Instruments	Guitar vocals
Years active	1950s–2007
Labels	Folkways Folklore Prestige Transatlantic Smash Poppy Philo Gazell Tomato

Eric Von Schmidt (May 28, 1931 – February 2, 2007) was an American folk musician and painter. He was associated with the folk boom of the late 1950s and early 1960s and was a key part of theCambridgefolk music scene.^[1] As a singer and guitarist, he was considered to be the leading specialist in country blues in Cambridge at the time, the counterpart of Greenwich Village'sDave Van Ronk. Von Schmidt co-authored withJim RooneyBaby, Let Me Follow You Down: The Illustrated Story of the Cambridge Folk Years.^[2]

Von Schmidt's father,Harold von Schmidt, was a Western painter who did illustrations for theSaturday Evening Post. Von Schmidt began selling his own artwork while he was still a teenager. Following a stint in the army, he won a Fulbright scholarship to study art inFlorence. He moved toCambridge,Massachusetts, in 1957, where he painted and became part of the coffeehouse scene.

Von Schmidt shared his large repertory of traditional music, passing them along to new performers who were developing a more modern version of folk music. He influencedTom Rush, with whom he revived and arranged the traditional song "Wasn’t That a Mighty Storm?" about the 1900 hurricane that destroyedGalveston,Texas.^[3] When he metBob Dylan, the two tradedharmonica licks, drank red wine and played croquet. Dylan eagerly absorbed von Schmidt's voluminous knowledge of music, including folk, country and the blues. "I sang [Dylan] a bunch of songs, and, with that spongelike mind of his, he remembered almost all of them when he got back to New York," von Schmidt said inThe Boston Globe.^[4]

Von Schmidt is widely (and erroneously) credited as the author of the song, "Baby, Let Me Follow You Down", which was for years a staple of Dylan's musical catalogue. In a spoken introduction to the song on his 1962 self-titled debutalbum, Dylan jokingly mentioned that he first "heard" the song from "Rick von Schmidt" and told of meeting him "in the green pastures ofHarvard University." In fact, von Schmidt had adapted the song fromBlind Boy Fuller and creditedReverend Gary Davis as author of "three-quarters" of the song.^[5] His 1979 book about the Cambridge scene is titled after the song.

Among his best known and performed original compositions is the song "Joshua Gone Barbados" which depictsEbenezer Joshua the head of labor union and head of the government ofSaint Vincent (island) vacationing during a time of labor strife leading indirectly to the deaths of three men. The accuracy of Von Schmidt's characterization of Joshua's involvement in the incident has been disputed. Given that Mr. Joshua died poor and remains a revered figure on the island, his depiction in the song is probably less sympathetic than it should be.^[6] Nonetheless, the song remains a powerful evocation of the plight of the poor people of Saint Vincent.

In 1963, von Schmidt andRichard Fariñarecorded inLondon'sDobell's Jazz Record store, with Dylan on harmonica. Two years later,The Folk Blues of Eric von Schmidt appeared atop a pile ofrecords on thecover of Dylan's albumBringing It All Back Home.

In May 1964, Dylan visited Von Schmidt at his home in Sarasota, Florida and recorded several songs there, including an early version of "Mr. Tambourine Man". The recordings were released in 2014 as part of Dylan's "50th Anniversary Collection 1964".^[7]

In the liner notes for Von Schmidt's 1969 Smash album,Who Knocked The Brains Out Of The Sky? (SRS 67124), notes which also appeared on a cover sticker for Von Schmidt's 1972 Poppy album2nd Right 3rd Row, Dylan wrote:

Of course we had heard about Eric Von Schmidt for many years. The name itself had become a password. Eventually, after standing in line to meet him, there it was – his doorstep, a rainy day, and he greeted his visitors, inviting them in. He was told how much they liked Grizzly Bear [a von Schmidt song] and he then invited the whole bunch to the club, where he was about to perform the thing live. "C'mon down to the club" he said – "I'm about to perform it live." We accepted the invitation. And that is what his record is. An invitation. An invitation to the glad, mad, sad, biting, exciting, frightening, crabby, happy, enlightening, hugging, chugging world of Eric Von Schmidt. For here is a man who can sing the bird off the wire and the rubber off the tire. He can separate the men from the boys and the note from the noise. The bridle from the saddle and the cow from the cattle. He can play the tune of the moon. The why of the sky and the commotion from the ocean. Yes he can.^[8]

Von Schmidt had a parallel career as apainter, and created album covers forJoan Baez,Cisco Houston,John Renbourn,Reverend Gary Davis, the Blue Velvet Band,Jackie Washington Landron and forJames Baldwin's readings. He also created the cover forThe Blues Project compendium of white blues performers (Elektra EKL-264, 1964). Von Schmidt illustrated a 1973 book of twenty-five ghost stories calledThe Haunting of America, by Jean Anderson. He also painted the starry backdrop for the 1990Universal Pictures logo. In the final 30 years of his life, Von Schmidt recorded only two records, and instead focused on his art career.

Four years before his death, von Schmidt painted his last epic of American history. The canvas' subject was of Lewis and Clark'sCorps of Discovery honoring its bicentennial. He also continued work on his "Giants of the Blues" series of paintings.

Von Schmidt also illustrated numerous children's books including a number of collaborations withSid Fleischman.^[9]

Von Schmidt was known for an exuberant musical style that he liked to apply to American folk classics. "Eric's got that wild spirit, and he doesn't water the music down for polite society,"Ramblin' Jack Elliott told The Boston Globe in 1996.^[10]

Von Schmidt's music has been recorded byTravis MacRae andJeff Buckley.^{[citation needed]} In 2000, the same year he was diagnosed withthroat cancer, he was honored with theASCAP Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award^[11] at an event^[12] fittingly held atClub Passim, his old stomping ground when it was named Club 47. The highlight of the event was a reunion of theJim Kweskin Jug Band includingMaria Muldaur,Geoff Muldaur,Fritz Richmond, and, for the first time in over twenty years, Jim Kweskin.

In 1997, he won aGrammy Award for his work on acompilation album entitledAnthology of American Folk Music, Vol. 1-3. He painted up until his death, and completed an epicmural of theBattle of the Alamo.

Von Schmidt was twicedivorced and had twodaughters. He suffered astroke in August 2006, and died six months later, at the age of 75.

• Come for to Sing, Pathways of Sound, 1963
• The Blues Project,Elektra, 1964
• Folklore Jamboree,Prestige Records, 1964
• TheNewport Folk Festival 1965,Vanguard Records, 1965
• Take a Trip with Me: Psychedelic Hits",Prestige Records, 197?
• Bleecker & McDougal: The Folk Scene of the 60s,Elektra, 1984
• Blues in the Bottle,Big Beat Records, 1988
• Troubadours of the Folk Era, Vol. 1,Rhino Records, 1992
• Blues with a Feeling (Newport Folk Festival Classics),Vanguard, 1993
• The Prestige/Folklore Years, Vol. 1,Prestige Records, 1995
• The Prestige/Folklore Years, Vol. 2,Prestige Records, 1995
• The Acoustic Highway Collection: The Road to Country Rock,EMI, 1996
• Blues in the Sun, Vol. 7 (Blues Blue, Blues White): The Bluesville Years,Prestige Records, 1996
• Blues with a Feeling, Part Two,Vanguard Records, 1997
• Washington Square Memoirs: The Great Urban Folk Boom (1950–1970),Rhino Records, 2001
• Evening at Greasy Spoon Diner,P-Vine Records, 2002

• Obituary,The Guardian, 5 February 2007.
• Official Site of Harold and Eric Von Schmidt
• The Band website
• bobdylanroots.com^[usurped]
• Alan Lewis, New England Music Scrapbook at theWayback Machine (archived October 27, 2009)
• The World's Hippest Geezers
• Illustrated Eric Von Schmidt discography
• Interview with Eric Von Schmidt^[usurped]
• Wasn't That A Mighty Storm lyrics
• Richard & Mimi Fariña's Home Page
• Obituary/New York Times

• 1931 births
• 2007 deaths
• American blues guitarists
• American blues singer-songwriters
• American country singer-songwriters
• American folk singers
• American folk guitarists
• American male guitarists
• American male singer-songwriters
• Musicians from Westport, Connecticut
• Artists from Westport, Connecticut
• Grammy Award winners
• 20th-century American painters
• American male painters
• 21st-century American painters
• 21st-century American male artists
• 20th-century American singer-songwriters
• 20th-century American guitarists
• Prestige Records artists
• Transatlantic Records artists
• Smash Records artists
• 20th-century American male singers
• Singer-songwriters from Connecticut
• 20th-century American male artists

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