S.O.D. "Blue" by Peter, Paul & Mary

7/15/2016      I was trying to find a song having to do with man's best friend.  There was a nice long list of them.  This is supposed to be a children's song, but is entertaining to everyone, with some light satire.  Perhaps you were expecting a song from this folk group about a mythical creature instead.  I'm sure that will eventually surface.  Releasing 26 singles, some being Bob Dylan compositions, they were one of the most successful folk groups of all time.  Peter Yarrow, Paul Stookey and Mary Travers made up the trio that got their start in New York City, 1961.  All three applied their vocal and songwriting abilities, with Stookey and Yarrow on guitar.  

     In 1961, talent manager Albert Grossman (managed Bob Dylan as well) auditioned many singers before finding the right mix, forming Peter, Paul and Mary.  Their first gig was a coffeehouse in Greenwich Village called The Bitter End which was already a popular place for folk music and comedy, featuring every act you could possibly think of from that era. Their 1962 debut album "Peter, Paul & Mary," held the #1 position for 7 weeks and was a top seller for decades afterwards, becoming popular internationally and reaching double platinum status in the U.S.  

     Some of their more well known hits are "Blowin' in the Wind," "Leaving on a Jet Plane" and of course "Puff (The Magic Dragon)" which the group insists has nothing to do with drugs. It is based on a poem about the lost innocence of childhood, written by Leonard Lipton, a fellow student at Cornell University with Yarrow.  In 2009 just before Mary Travers passed on to Music Heaven from leukemia, Paul and Peter completed the tour as a duo and called it, "Peter & Paul Celebrate Mary and 5 Decades of Friendship."