Happy Traum - American Stranger (1977)

American folk musician Harry Peter "Happy" Traum was a linchpin of the Greenwich Village music scene of the 1960s and the post-Woodstock artistic movement of the '70s and '80s. His influence was not limited to his music; he also served as editor of Sing Out! magazine, a significant platform in the folk music community. Additionally, he ran Homespun Tapes, a company that sold instructional tapes narrated by well-known folk and rock artists for over 40 years.
Born in the Bronx on May 9, 1938, Traum attended the High School of Music and Art and later received his bachelor's degree at New York University. As a teen, he attended music gatherings at Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village, eventually joining that thriving community. His first recorded output appeared in 1962 with the release of Folkways' Broadside Ballads, Vol. 1, featuring Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger, Peter LaFarge, and the Freedom Singers. He was a member of the New World Singers, who cut the first recorded version of Dylan's "Blowing in the Wind" in 1963 -- Traum's musical relationship with Dylan would stretch into the '70s and '80s. He formed a short-lived folk-rock band in the mid-'60s called the Children of Paradise with his brother Artie, Eric Kaz, and others, and later worked with Artie as one half of Happy and Artie Traum, who went on to issue four studio albums: Happy and Artie Traum (1969), Double Back (1971), Hard Times in the Country (1975), and The Test of Time (1994).
A talented blues guitarist known for his deft fingerpicking -- he spent several years under the tutelage of folk and Piedmont blues singer and guitarist Brownie McGhee -- Traum's solo efforts, which include Relax Your Mind (1975), American Stranger (1977), Buckets of Songs (1987), and I Walk the Road Again (2005) showcased his deep understanding of classic and contemporary folk styles, and how they were shaped by American roots music. Traum's last solo album, There's a Bright Side Somewhere, appeared in 2022, two years before his death from cancer on July 17, 2024.