Glenn Yarbrough

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Glenn Robertson Yarbrough (January 12, 1930 – August 11, 2016) was an American folk singer and guitarist.

He was the lead singer (tenor) with the Limeliters from 1959 to 1963.

He also had a long career as a soloist, recording on various labels.

Early life

Glenn Yarbrough was born in Milwaukee on January 12th and later moved to New York, where his parents were working as social workers. However, because there were no jobs available during the Great Depression, his father moved around the country from one job to another, and Yarbrough spent her as a paid boy soprano in the Choir of Men and Boys in Manhattan.

He was given a scholarship at St. Paul's School, which is located in Brooklandville, Maryland, and graduated in 1948. He enrolled in college at St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, where his roommate, Jac Holzman, later the founder of Elektra Records, spent a year traveling around the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Initialy, Holzman wanted to call the name Elektra-Stratford Records, but "I suggested Elektra Records because it was a little shorter," Yarbrough said, "we went with Elektra Records because it was a little shorter."

Yarbrough became interested in folk music and learned the guitar when Woody Guthrie performed an impromptu performance for the roommates. Holzman will later record Here We Go Baby (also known as Songs by Glenn Yarbrough), an early solo album by Yarbrough in 1957. Greg Adams said that the album was "ahead of the game in terms of mixing pop and folk music," but that it was not a success commercially [was] "an entertaining and informative workicraft from the folk boom's pre-dawn period." In the liner notes, the album was also described as a departure from more traditional folk music on the Elektra label, as a "showcase to highlight and expose [Yarbrough's] virtuosity [undertaken for the sake of an unusual talent." Fred Hellerman approached Yarbrough and asked if Pete Seeger would play the banjo on certain tracks, and this brought Yarbrough into contact with the McCarthyism period of blacklists of musicians. Yarbrough believed that having Seeger on the record was a risk, expressed disappointment with his attitude and quality of work, and asked Erik Darling to replace him.

During the Korean War, Yarbrough served in the US Army, first deciphering codes and later with the entertainment corps. After military service, he went to South Dakota to help his father run a square dance barn and began appearing on local television shows. Al Grossman, a small folk club in Chicago, booked Yarbrough for a two-week engagement in the mid-1950s. He established some of his most lasting friendships with artists such as Odetta and Shel Silverstein.

Personal life

Yarbrough underwent elective surgery on his larynx in the hopes of saving his faltering singing voice. The surgery was unsuccessful, and he went into cardiac arrest while in the recovery room and was put on a ventilator. He lived, but he started to suffer from dementia and never performed in public again. Yarbrough's father, Holly Yarbrough Burnett, had to be cared for full time by his daughter, Bonnie Yarbrough Burnett, who died in Nashville in 2016 from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Despite suffering from dementia in the last years of his life, Burnett's story tells, her father was a "warm, happy guy" who never died.

Yarbrough has married four times. Peggy Goodhart, Ann Graves, and Laurie Ann Pool died in divorce, and he and his fourth wife Kathleen Pommer were divorced at the time of her divorce. Holly Yarbrough's father, two children from his first marriage, Stephany Yarbrough and Sean Yarbrough; two stepdaughters, Brooke and Heather, have migrated from his marriage to Poole; and a great-grandson.

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Solo career

Yarbrough made other albums before joining the Limeliters, as well as the folk-oriented 1957 solo album Here We Go, Baby. According to the sleeve notes of the 1957 album Come and Sit, Yarbrough [brought] "folk music is up to date, performs in a way that modern listeners will comprehend and appreciate...[a] a new, youthful interpretation of the old songs. He and Marilyn Child made an album in 1958. "Both of these highly personal, highly personal styles, but their voices and delivery are perfectly suited to each other," Robert Sherman said.

Yarbrough had intended to sail around the world after leaving the Limeliters, but in a November 1964 episode of Wagon Train, he appeared as a guitarist. He did buy a boat but RCA advised him not to, a trip, and single albums were held. Timing to Move On (1964), the Limeliters' first solo since leaving the Limeliters, was described by one reviewer as "the tone for the remainder of his career": light acoustic arrangements, songs from an eclectic array of sources, and vibrato-laden vocals, falling somewhere between pop and folk." Jason Verlinde, a music journalist and co-founder of the Fretboard Journal, compared Yarbrough's smooth voice on this record to "the mighty seas that gave this legendary folksinger a case of wanderlust" - "sometimes rough but always beautiful and strong." Baby the Rain Must Fall, the title song from the 1965 film of the same name, made it to #22 on the singles chart, making it his biggest hit. On the charts, an LP, also known as "Baby the Rain Must Fall," debuted at #35.

Yarbrough, a 1966-born journalist, said that it had all been "intellectual [with]...Lou Gottlieb and Alex Hasseliv to sign autographs and be scintillating at after-show parties, but that as a solo performer he had to deal with more direct interest from his followers, even though he was regarded as a "sex symbol."

Yarbrough had a long association with Rod McKuen, and by 1968, he had recorded around half of his songs. In a later interview, he claimed that he had no memory of the first McKuen song he recorded, but that the balladeer thanked him and they became close friends.

Solo performances were generally well received. Lani Presswood wrote in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in 1967, after a visit to the Texas Woman's University campus in Denton, Texas, Lani Presswood characterized Yarbrough's voice "as one of those rare, unmistakable things [with]..." "as one of the rare, unmistakable things [with] a lyrical quality that makes you think of a field of ankle-deep clover." Following a concert at Coe College, Iowa in 1969, a reviewer said the performance was "professional," concluding that "Glenn Yarbrough puts on a worthwhile spectacle." The audience paid three dollars apiece and got about five dollars worth of entertainment. Yarbrough appeared at the Saskatchewan Centre of the Arts in September 1970. He was said to be in complete command, with electric warmth, a "vibrancy that sweeps over the audience and envelopes it," and even gained success in doing content that promoted audience involvement, which was deemed by the reviewer as "one of the most risky tricks in show business."

By 1972, Yarbrough was writing dissatisfaction with the entertainment industry, later remarking that he never sang to people's hopes, had "mixed reactions about stardom" and considered money as "pain in the ass not to worry about." In an interview in 1983, Yarbrough admitted that although he didn't care about the music industry, the call had to be made occasionally to perform in order to earn money.

Yarbrough performed "The Return of the King" (1977) and "The Return of the King" (1980), singing "Frodo of the Nine Fingers" (1980).

Yarbrough unveiled what one journalist described as "his new sound" in 1980, with less upbeat ballads and more mellow tunes as a result of a case of strep throat at the time. In the same article, Yarbrough noted that major recording companies were refusing to support his latest album Changing Force, which, according to them, had no hits. Yarbrough said the album was made up of "rock ballads," and although acknowledging that his music at the time was commercial, he argued that it was more than just "old stuff" and certainly not nostalgia as he "liked to move ahead."

Although it was not a reunion, Yarbrough appeared on the same bill as the Limeliters at the Sacramento Community Center in August 1982. On stage, he said it was bizarre to see the Limeliters standing backstage, adding, "it is an object lesson" if you believe you cannot be replaced in this world." After the performance, Alex Hassilev said that the Limeliters had selected some of their sets to fit with the "mood of Yarbrough's" and included pieces that was more subtle than a comedic focus.

Yarbrough had claimed that he "loved Christmas music," but after reading "The Forgotten Carols" which brought him "chills up and down [his] spine] and brought him to tears, he was inspired to tour Utah Composer Michael McLean's Forgotten Carols and making a CD of the performance. Yarbrough's Christmas mood was said to be attributed to his childhood, because his parents often couldn't afford to bring him home for the holidays, and he spent a lot of time alone. Michael McLean told Michael McLean that Christmas was never meaningful to him, but that his voice was God-given and he wanted his voice to be used to perform his music. "Lean" was praised by Yarbrough for assisting him "rediscover Christmas and Christmas by assisting him in regaining his love, according to the author. Yarbrough appeared on both narration and music, playing "to help people open their minds to the true meaning of Christmas."

After a performance of a protest song at the United States Air Force Academy, he protested the Vietnam war, claiming that it had "burned the moral fabric of our nation" and said the audience applauded.

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