AboutMike Turner Expertise Folk Music, particularly the Child Ballads and that great body of industrial and work-related songs which arose during the Industrial Revolution. I am well-versed in the history of the Folk Revival, and I have a particular interest in political and agit-prop songs, as well as in traditional Irish dance music. For ten years I was a committee member and resident singer/song-writer/musician with the Grey Cock Folk Club in Birmingham (the pre-eminent traditional club in the English midlands, which was founded by Charles Parker of `Radio Ballad` fame).
Expert: Mike Turner Date: 4/19/2008 Subject: Looking for an album
Question I am looking for an album like i received for a Christmas
present 1964. It was a collection of Folk Music songs
that included Puff the Magic Dragon, Little Bitty Baby,
When I first came to this Land, etc. The cover was white with the Dragon on it.
Answer Hi Valrie,
If you are looking for that one specific album, you will have quite a hard job. It sounds like a compendium album, which may either have been a collection of hit tracks by different folk artistes, or a set of cover versions of hit tracks performed by some lesser-known house musicians.
There have been a large number of such albums produced over the years, and it is doubtful whether even the Internet has sufficient references to such albums, to start a search there with reasonable chance of success. By way of example, I tried a Google search on all three of your quoted titles in a single search, and only three hits were returned, none of which had all three songs mentioned.
You could of course try collecting each of the tracks that you recall from this album, in separate ways. "Puff the Magic Dragon" was mostly done by Peter Paul and Mary, and they may also have recorded "When I First Came to This Land". "Little Bitty Baby" doesn't ring any bells as a song title, but there are several songs in which it crops up - PP&M's "Jane Jane" for example, or the first verse of "Old Cotton Fields Back Home" which I used to have by the New Christy Minstrels.
Do you have *any* other clues? The names of any of the artistes, the record label, or the name of anyone who wrote the sleeve notes?
