Happy Traum

Happy Traum (b. Harry Peter Traum, May 9, 1938, The Bronx, New York City) is an American folk musician who started playing music in the Fifties.

Music Career

Collaborations with Bob Dylan

Happy first appeared on record at a historic session in 1963 when a group of young folk musicians, including Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger, Peter LaFarge and The Freedom Singers gathered in Folkways Records' studio for an album called "Broadside, Vol.1." Happy with his group, the New World Singers, cut the first recorded version of "Blowin' In The Wind," and Happy sang a duet with Dylan on his anti-war song "Let Me Die in My Footsteps." (These tracks were re--released in August, 2000 by Smithsonian/Folkways Recordings as part of a boxed set, "The Best of Broadsides 1962 - 1988: Anthems from the American Underground"). Later that year, the New World Singers (Happy, Bob Cohen and Gil Turner) recorded an album for Atlantic Records, with liner notes by Bob Dylan and featuring the first released recording of "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right."

In 1971 Happy once again joined Bob Dylan in the studio, playing guitar, banjo, bass, and singing harmony on three songs, which appeared on Bob Dylan's "Greatest Hits, Vol. 2." Dylan also invited Happy to participate in a famous session with poet Allen Ginsberg, which resulted in the box set, "Holy Soul Jelly Roll."

See also

• American folk music
• Artie Traum
• Brownie McGhee
• Bob Dylan
• Guitarists
• Banjo

External links

• http://www.happytraum.com/ Official Website
• http://www.myspace.com/happytraummusic Happy Traum on MySpace
• http://www.homespun.com/ Homespun Tapes
• http://www.bobdylan.com/#/node/6308 Album Info from "Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Volume II" on Bob Dylan's website