The life story of the father of the folk revival. "In 1953 a young man named Bob Gibson, inspired by a meeting with Pete Seeger, left behind a successful job to hit the road collecting folk songs. When he emerged, banjo in hand, ready to share what he'd found, he created an electricity the world of folk music had never seen. His arrangements, songwriting, and musical innovations took his audiences by storm, lighting the fire that led to the full-blown folk revival of the late 1950s to mid-1960s. He introduced Joan Baez in 1959, Judy Collins in 1960, and the album Gibson & Camp at the Gate of Horn in 1961, creating musical history. "Bob co-wrote 'Abilene,' 'Well, Well, Well,' and 'You Can Tell the World.' His songs have been recorded by Peter, Paul & Mary, Simon & Garfunkel, the Byrds, the Smothers Brothers, the Kingston Trio, and countless others. He is credited as being an influence on most of the performers who came out of the folk-revival era, and that impact is still felt in most of today's popular music. He should have been folk music's biggest star, yet his name and story are sadly unknown by most. Out of personal frustration at the lack of information about him, I approached Bob Gibson in the last year of his life with an offer to help tell his story." --Carole Bender "In 1974 when doing publicity for my father's album Funky in the Country, I was fortunate to have mentors at the Old Town School explaining how to do it. Hamilton Camp helped too, giving me an earful one day at the caf� under the El tracks, when I showed him my first draft of the bio. He jumped up out of the booth, so frustrated that he was hopping up and down and hollering, 'You just don't get it! Your father was not an influence! He invented folk music!' "I'm so glad to hear my dad's voice again, and I do hear it. Carole has done such a fabulous job of capturing his speech. He sounds like he's well again. Carole's offer was what he wanted and needed. Carole has not only gotten his story, she got his cadence. And I think he knew she would." --Meridian Green Robert Gibson was born on November 16, 1931, in New York City, New York. As an adolescent, Gibson was drawn to the music played in small, New York clubs and coffeehouses. His father, who was a professional singer, was also an influence on him. In time, Gibson realized that music was his calling. He developed his own trademark sound on the twelve-string guitar and, before long, acquired a following of fans. He made regular television appearances on shows such as Arthur Godfrey Time and Hootenany. Gibson also performed at the prestigious Carnegie Hall. Gibsonís successes as a folk singer pushed the folk-singing industry into the mainstream. He was highly influential to folk icons such as Gordon Lightfoot, Tom Paxton, and Roger McGuinn, founder of the folk-rock quartet The Byrds. But of all of the young singers to whom Gibson gave a helping hand, he is widely remembered for launching the career of folk singer Joan Baez in 1959 at the first Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island. Curiously, the same historic Newport performance that thrust Joan Baez into the public eye also marked the beginning of a slow decline in the career of Bob Gibson. He persistently suffered from health problems associated with exhaustion and also experienced intermittent loss of his voice. A ten-year absence from the public eye led to rumors that Gibson was in the midst of drug addiction. In 1988, he recorded and released A Childís Happy Birthday for pre-school children, which was described by All Music Guide as Used Book in Good Condition