Dave Guard

At 56 years old, Dave Guard physical status not available right now. We will update Dave Guard's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

When Shane left the Calypsonians and returned to Hawaii to work in his family's business, Guard added two members, bassist Joe Gannon and vocalist Barbara Bogue, making the Calypsonians a quartet. Later, when Reynolds also left the Calypsonians, Guard replaced him with Don MacArthur to keep the quartet format intact, but by that time the national interest in calypso rhythms was waning, while Guard's musical growth was reaching out from calypso as well. Still appreciating Caribbean rhythms and vocals, but given his more eclectic folk music interests, Guard changed the name of the four Calypsonians to The Kingston Quartet.

In 1956, publicist Frank Werber offered his services to Guard and his bandmates, including Reynolds at the time. Werber's offer, however, was contingent upon replacing Gannon and Bogue, and shortly thereafter both left the group. Guard and Reynolds contacted former Calypsonian member Shane (who was performing part-time in Honolulu) asking him to join the reconstituted group. In 1957, back again as a trio as in their previous college days, they changed its name to The Kingston Trio.

With material gathered from a variety of sources, under Guard's musical arrangements and direction, the Kingston Trio quickly became a success. Guard, Shane, and Reynolds worked well together. In addition to developing the characteristic "Kingston Trio sound" of the group's two guitars and a banjo, success came to the group from Guard's musical arrangements and renditions of folk and Irish ballads, Shane's talent for style and performance along with an innate knowledge of what pleased audiences, and Reynolds's management of the group's logistics.

The Kingston Trio with Guard recorded for Capitol Records; subsequent iterations of the group managed first by Werber and Shane and later by Shane alone recorded for Decca Records, Folk Era, Silverwolf, Pair, Collector's Choice Music, CEMA, and MCA, and had many hit songs in its initial 10-year run. The Kingston Trio's many songs include "Tom Dooley", "A Worried Man", "Hard Travelin'", "The Tijuana Jail", "Greenback Dollar", "Reverend Mr. Black", "Sloop John B", "Scotch and Soda", "Merry Minuet", "Hard, Ain't It Hard", "Zombie Jamboree", "M.T.A.", "Three Jolly Coachmen", and "Raspberries, Strawberries".

Guard was aware that among the Kingston Trio, he was the only one who could read music and who had some understanding of music theory; his partners basically played by rote, and the three of them sang in simple three-part harmony. With help from the Trio's bassist and musicologist David "Buck" Wheat, Guard embarked on a self-education program of learning more about harmony, becoming more and more disenchanted with what appeared to him to be a lack of willingness or effort to "improve" on the part of his partners.

By late 1960 Guard's frustration and discontent with his partners, combined with an alleged embezzlement of the group's finances, had reached a point where he no longer wanted to work with Reynolds and Shane. Giving his partners notice that he intended to leave the Trio, and unwilling to cause the group he had founded to disband, Guard agreed to stay on with the Trio until his personal commitments were completed and until Shane and Reynolds were able to find a suitable replacement for him. By early 1961 Shane and Reynolds had found a replacement. After a reportedly acrimonious meeting with Shane, Reynolds, and the Trio's business manager over the future of the Trio, Guard quit the group. The group continued to perform for six years as the Kingston Trio before disbanding in 1967, with John Stewart taking Guard's place.

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