Celebrated America writer William Faulkner said in his Nobel Prize acceptance speech “it’s a poet's, or writer's, duty to write about courage, honour, hope, pride, compassion, pity, and sacrifice.” Eric Andersen, songpoet, visionary, and figurehead of the ’60s folk singer songwriter movement from its Greenwich Village and Woodstock roots through its 21st century Americana and alt-Americana renaissance is a living example of that edict.
It would have been easy, and no doubt acceptable, for him to sit back and be satisfied with his extensive body of work starting in 1965 with his most famous early compositions like “Thirsty Boots,” “Violets of Dawn,” and “Close The Door Lightly When You Go” being covered by the likes of Bob Dylan, Ricky Nelson, Judy Collins, the Brothers Four, the Kingston Trio, the Blues Project and a host of others. But not acceptable to Eric. Being a true artist and writer Eric continues to create new works, seven decades in.