The Folksmen
Encyclopedia
The Folksmen are a fictitious American folk music trio, conceived and performed by actors/comedians/musicians Christopher Guest
, Michael McKean
and Harry Shearer
. Originally created in 1984 for a TV comedy sketch, the Folksmen have subsequently maintained an intermittent public presence for more than twenty-five years. The trio is best known for its depiction in the mockumentary
film A Mighty Wind
(2003), but has also made a number of meta-performances on stage and television, often in conjunction with the same creators' fictitious heavy metal band, Spinal Tap
.
screened on November 3, 1984. Guest and Shearer had both been regular cast members for some time, while McKean was appearing that night as a special guest. All three had previously worked together on comedy projects involving musical parody, including the Lenny and the Squigtones
LP and a television pilot, The TV Show, which marked the first appearance of Spinal Tap. The SNL sketch, entitled "The Folksmen Reunion" had a similar satirical intent, targeting the renewed interest in American folk music following then-recent reunions of such artists as Peter, Paul & Mary (1978), The Weavers
(1980) and The Kingston Trio
(1981). Introduced by Pamela Stephenson
, the SNL sketch depicted the Folksmen as caricatures of semi-retired folk musicians: three conservatively-dressed middle-aged men, spouting homilies and performing simplistic songs with cloying lyrics. In a 2009 interview, Shearer stated that the songs were intended to satirize "the fake folk music being written in office buildings in Manhattan’s Upper West Side."
Guest, McKean and Shearer made a cameo appearance as the Folksmen in the 1992 film The Return of Spinal Tap, which documented the latter group's real-life reunion concert at Royal Albert Hall
in London. When the trio subsequently toured as Spinal Tap during 2001, they would occasionally perform in the guise of the Folksmen as an ostensible "opening act"; not all of the audiences appreciated (or even understood) this in-joke, with one appearance in New York City reportedly being booed by a restless audience. Of this twist, Shearer once stated: "You can think you're in control of the amusing notion of the wrong act opening for a rock band - but when you actually find yourself being the wrong act, it doesn't feel any better." In a 2009 interview, Guest reflected further on the phenomenon:
The line between fiction and reality had previously blurred when, in 1993, Guest, McKean and Shearer performed as The Folksmen at a genuine folk festival held at UCLA in Los Angeles, alongside such real-life folk artists as Arlo Guthrie
, Joni Mitchell
and Peter, Paul & Mary. According to Guest, the Folksmen went over "better than the other acts", while McKean recalled that "Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul & Mary looked at us and muttered, 'Too close, too close'."
The Folksmen were incorporated into Christopher Guest's mockumentary, A Mighty Wind (2003), which depicted a fictitious reunion concert of three fictitious folk music acts, following the death of their mutual fictitious manager, Irving Steinbloom. The film included interviews with the band members (which established much of their fictional backstory), reconstructed vintage footage and album covers, and various original songs performed in rehearsal as well as the purported concert, An Ode to Irving. To publicise the film, Guest, McKean and Shearer appeared as the Folksmen on a number of television programmes, in which they performed songs and were interviewed in character. Between September and November 2003, the three fictitious folk groups from the film "reformed" to undertake a real-life concert tour of cities on the West Coast (Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle) and the East Coast (Boston, Philadelphia, New York, Washington DC).
More recently, in April 2009, Guest, McKean and Shearer embarked upon the Unwigged & Unplugged tour to mark the 25th anniversary of the release of the film This is Spinal Tap
. This time, they appeared as themselves, performing various songs associated with Spinal Tap, the Folksmen and various other film and comedy projects from their long careers. After touring thirty cities in the United States, the trio performed a special "One Night Only World Tour" concert at London's Wembley Arena on June 30, 2009, in which they performed (this time in full costume) as both Spinal Tap and the Folksmen.
During televised appearances, Barrows/Guest has also been seeing playing the zither (on "Barnyard Symphony", as performed on Saturday Night Live in 1984) and penny whistle (on "Corn Wine", in a deleted scene from A Mighty Wind). The studio recording of "The Skeletons of Quinto", included on the film's soundtrack CD, included guest appearances from prominent musicians David Nichtern
(nylon string guitar) and Marston Smith (cello).
in Delaware, Ohio
. However, in a 2003 interview, Mark Shubb and Alan Barrows stated that the two had actually met in late 1961 when both were studying at the University of Vermont in Burlington, Vermont
. Barrows recalled that "we were both interested in folk music and there was a big folk music scene, as there were at many colleges." They subsequently formed a musical duo known as The Twobadors. As recorded in an official band biography, later issued by Folktown Records, "In 1961, Vermont's own The Twobadors boarded a bus bound for New York City. Their first stop: Greenwich Village and The Folk Place. Inside, performing on the legendary stage was Jerry Palter". Palter, who was performing there as a guitarist and backing singer, sang baritone. As Barrows noted, "Mark was a bass singer and I was a tenor singer, so we had lead - no glue, no middle. We ended up getting together, and it just clicked." As their official bio put it, "Alan and Mark had found their mid-range, and the Folksmen were born".
The newly-renamed trio soon attracted the attention of folk music impresario Irving Steinbloom (1920–2003), who became their manager and signed them to Folktown Records – as Palter once put it, "THE label to be on." In 1962, the group released the single "Old Joe's Place", which became a Top 70 hit and remains their best-known song. According one one source, the Folksmen remained together for 26 months (ie two and a half years), during which time they "played and sang their own brand of 'eclectified folk' music." During this time they released no fewer than five studio albums. In a 2003 interview, Barrow recalled: "We figured that it would be amusing, at least to us, to have one word album titles, and we'd lop off the g's." This, however, eventually came to a halt when, as Shubb noted in the same interview: "We violated our covenant with the audience with a record called Saying Something, which is two mistakes by my account – two words, and two g's. All of our goodwill and tradition and good luck went down the toilet." Compounding the problem, that album was released on a lesser subsidiary label, Folktone Records, which, as Palter notes, was "a decent label – they just didn't have the distribution." The album, elsewhere described as "their one and only experiment in electric", was not a success, and the trio disbanded soon afterward. Relegated to the status of a minor footnote in the annals of American folk music, the Folksmen would later be characterised as "the group who were too popular to be purist and too purist to be popular."
near Philadelphia and also taught a yoga class. In 1984, folk music impresario Albert Lilienthal (best-known as the man who established the Eighty-eight Cent Hoot at the Seaman's Institute) invited the Folksmen to re-form for a special one-off appearance on Saturday Night Live. At the time, it was noted that this was the first time that they had performed together in almost twenty years. Their appearance prompted a renewed interest in the group's work, and it was subsequently reported that "they are again becoming a popular late addition to folk festivals within a day’s auto travel of their homes."
In 1992, the trio was scheduled to open for heavy metal band Spinal Tap during the latter's comeback concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London. However, there was some concern that the rowdy audience might threaten the safety of the performers, so they did not appear; instead, the Folksmen attempted to recoup their costs by busking, performing a version of "Kumbaya
" inside South Kensington tube station
. It was later reported on Spinal Tap's website that the Folksmen had signed a four-month lease on a 1994 Chrysler minivan in anticipation of Spinal Tap's proposed 1996 Third World Tour, and there were rumours that the Folksmen might put out a CD. However, neither the anticipated tour, nor the album, ever eventuated.
In June 1993, the Folksmen appeared at the Troubadors of Folk festival at UCLA in Los Angeles, where they performed on the same bill as Paul Stookey, Mary Chapin Carpenter
, Roger McGuinn
and others. Eight years later, they returned to UCLA to make a guest appearance at a tribute concert, The Harry Smith Project, dedicated to the late folk music anthologist Harry Everett Smith
.
In 2003, the Folksmen reunited far more prominently for another tribute concert, this time in honour of their former manager, Irving Steinbloom, who died that year. In the days leading up to the concert, the trio met for a reunion barbecue in upstate New York, during which they rehearsed several numbers from their back-catalogue including "Blood on the Coal", "Corn Wine", "Loco Man" and "Skeletons of Quinto". At the concert itself, the group originally intended to open with "Never did no wanderin" but instead performed only their hit, "Old Joe's Place" and the rarely-heard "Barnyard Symphony".
Following the memorial concert, which was broadcast live on public television, bass player Mark Shubb came out as a Trans woman
, and subsequently performed with the Folksmen in female attire. As he put it:
Christopher Guest
Christopher Haden-Guest, 5th Baron Haden-Guest , better known as Christopher Guest, is an American screenwriter, composer, musician, director, actor and comedian. He is most widely known in Hollywood for having written, directed and starred in several improvisational "mockumentary" films that...
, Michael McKean
Michael McKean
Michael John McKean is an American actor, comedian, writer, composer and musician, perhaps best known for his portrayal of Squiggy's friend, Leonard 'Lenny' Kosnowski, on the sitcom Laverne and Shirley; and for his work in the Christopher Guest ensemble films, particularly as David St...
and Harry Shearer
Harry Shearer
Harry Julius Shearer is an American actor, comedian, writer, voice artist, musician, author, radio host and director. He is known for his long-running role on The Simpsons, his work on Saturday Night Live, the comedy band Spinal Tap and his radio program Le Show...
. Originally created in 1984 for a TV comedy sketch, the Folksmen have subsequently maintained an intermittent public presence for more than twenty-five years. The trio is best known for its depiction in the mockumentary
Mockumentary
A mockumentary , is a type of film or television show in which fictitious events are presented in documentary format. These productions are often used to analyze or comment on current events and issues by using a fictitious setting, or to parody the documentary form itself...
film A Mighty Wind
A Mighty Wind
A Mighty Wind is a 2003 mockumentary about a folk music reunion concert in which three folk bands must reunite for a television performance for the first time in decades. It was directed by Christopher Guest...
(2003), but has also made a number of meta-performances on stage and television, often in conjunction with the same creators' fictitious heavy metal band, Spinal Tap
Spinal Tap (band)
Spinal Tap is a parody heavy metal band that first appeared on a failed 1979 ABC TV sketch comedy pilot called "The T.V. Show", starring Rob Reiner...
.
Film, TV and concert depictions
Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer first appeared as the Folksmen on an episode of Saturday Night LiveSaturday Night Live
Saturday Night Live is a live American late-night television sketch comedy and variety show developed by Lorne Michaels and Dick Ebersol. The show premiered on NBC on October 11, 1975, under the original title of NBC's Saturday Night.The show's sketches often parody contemporary American culture...
screened on November 3, 1984. Guest and Shearer had both been regular cast members for some time, while McKean was appearing that night as a special guest. All three had previously worked together on comedy projects involving musical parody, including the Lenny and the Squigtones
Lenny and the Squigtones
Lenny and the Squigtones is a fictional musical group headed by Michael McKean and David Lander, the two actors who played the characters Lenny and Squiggy on the television series Laverne & Shirley. Recorded live at the Roxy in Hollywood, they perform parodies of 50's rock ballads...
LP and a television pilot, The TV Show, which marked the first appearance of Spinal Tap. The SNL sketch, entitled "The Folksmen Reunion" had a similar satirical intent, targeting the renewed interest in American folk music following then-recent reunions of such artists as Peter, Paul & Mary (1978), The Weavers
The Weavers
The Weavers were an American folk music quartet based in the Greenwich Village area of New York City. They sang traditional folk songs from around the world, as well as blues, gospel music, children's songs, labor songs, and American ballads, and selling millions of records at the height of their...
(1980) and The Kingston Trio
The Kingston Trio
The Kingston Trio is an American folk and pop music group that helped launch the folk revival of the late 1950s to late 1960s. The group started as a San Francisco Bay Area nightclub act with an original lineup of Dave Guard, Bob Shane, and Nick Reynolds...
(1981). Introduced by Pamela Stephenson
Pamela Stephenson
Pamela Helen Stephenson Connolly is a New Zealand-born Australian clinical psychologist and writer now resident in the United Kingdom. She is best known for her work as an actress and comedian during the 1980s...
, the SNL sketch depicted the Folksmen as caricatures of semi-retired folk musicians: three conservatively-dressed middle-aged men, spouting homilies and performing simplistic songs with cloying lyrics. In a 2009 interview, Shearer stated that the songs were intended to satirize "the fake folk music being written in office buildings in Manhattan’s Upper West Side."
Guest, McKean and Shearer made a cameo appearance as the Folksmen in the 1992 film The Return of Spinal Tap, which documented the latter group's real-life reunion concert at Royal Albert Hall
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....
in London. When the trio subsequently toured as Spinal Tap during 2001, they would occasionally perform in the guise of the Folksmen as an ostensible "opening act"; not all of the audiences appreciated (or even understood) this in-joke, with one appearance in New York City reportedly being booed by a restless audience. Of this twist, Shearer once stated: "You can think you're in control of the amusing notion of the wrong act opening for a rock band - but when you actually find yourself being the wrong act, it doesn't feel any better." In a 2009 interview, Guest reflected further on the phenomenon:
The line between fiction and reality had previously blurred when, in 1993, Guest, McKean and Shearer performed as The Folksmen at a genuine folk festival held at UCLA in Los Angeles, alongside such real-life folk artists as Arlo Guthrie
Arlo Guthrie
Arlo Davy Guthrie is an American folk singer. Like his father, Woody Guthrie, Arlo often sings songs of protest against social injustice...
, Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
and Peter, Paul & Mary. According to Guest, the Folksmen went over "better than the other acts", while McKean recalled that "Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul & Mary looked at us and muttered, 'Too close, too close'."
The Folksmen were incorporated into Christopher Guest's mockumentary, A Mighty Wind (2003), which depicted a fictitious reunion concert of three fictitious folk music acts, following the death of their mutual fictitious manager, Irving Steinbloom. The film included interviews with the band members (which established much of their fictional backstory), reconstructed vintage footage and album covers, and various original songs performed in rehearsal as well as the purported concert, An Ode to Irving. To publicise the film, Guest, McKean and Shearer appeared as the Folksmen on a number of television programmes, in which they performed songs and were interviewed in character. Between September and November 2003, the three fictitious folk groups from the film "reformed" to undertake a real-life concert tour of cities on the West Coast (Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle) and the East Coast (Boston, Philadelphia, New York, Washington DC).
More recently, in April 2009, Guest, McKean and Shearer embarked upon the Unwigged & Unplugged tour to mark the 25th anniversary of the release of the film This is Spinal Tap
This Is Spinal Tap
This Is Spinal Tap is an American 1984 rock musical mockumentary directed by Rob Reiner about the fictional heavy metal band Spinal Tap...
. This time, they appeared as themselves, performing various songs associated with Spinal Tap, the Folksmen and various other film and comedy projects from their long careers. After touring thirty cities in the United States, the trio performed a special "One Night Only World Tour" concert at London's Wembley Arena on June 30, 2009, in which they performed (this time in full costume) as both Spinal Tap and the Folksmen.
Personnel
The fictional members of the Folksmen are:- Alan Barrows (played by Christopher Guest) – vocals (tenor), guitar, banjo, mandolin
- Jerry Palter (played by Michael McKean) – vocals (baritone), guitar, mandolin
- Mark Shubb (played by Harry Shearer) – vocals (bass), acoustic bass
During televised appearances, Barrows/Guest has also been seeing playing the zither (on "Barnyard Symphony", as performed on Saturday Night Live in 1984) and penny whistle (on "Corn Wine", in a deleted scene from A Mighty Wind). The studio recording of "The Skeletons of Quinto", included on the film's soundtrack CD, included guest appearances from prominent musicians David Nichtern
David Nichtern
David Nichtern is an American songwriter and television composer, soundtrack artist and Buddhist teacher.-Biography:Nichtern is the son of broadway producer Claire Nichtern, the first female Tony award winner. He began his career as a professional musician during his college years at Columbia...
(nylon string guitar) and Marston Smith (cello).
Origins and early fame
Characteristically, there is some dispute regarding the origins of the Folksmen. It was once claimed that the three members of the group originally met while they were freshman at Ohio Wesleyan UniversityOhio Wesleyan University
Ohio Wesleyan University is a private liberal arts college in Delaware, Ohio, United States. It was founded in 1842 by Methodist leaders and Central Ohio residents as a nonsectarian institution, and is a member of the Ohio Five — a consortium of Ohio liberal arts colleges...
in Delaware, Ohio
Delaware, Ohio
The City of Delaware is a city in and the county seat of Delaware County in the United States state of Ohio. Delaware was founded in 1808 and was incorporated in 1816. It is located near the center of Ohio, is about north of Columbus, and is part of the Columbus, Ohio Metropolitan Area...
. However, in a 2003 interview, Mark Shubb and Alan Barrows stated that the two had actually met in late 1961 when both were studying at the University of Vermont in Burlington, Vermont
Burlington, Vermont
Burlington is the largest city in the U.S. state of Vermont and the shire town of Chittenden County. Burlington lies south of the U.S.-Canadian border and some south of Montreal....
. Barrows recalled that "we were both interested in folk music and there was a big folk music scene, as there were at many colleges." They subsequently formed a musical duo known as The Twobadors. As recorded in an official band biography, later issued by Folktown Records, "In 1961, Vermont's own The Twobadors boarded a bus bound for New York City. Their first stop: Greenwich Village and The Folk Place. Inside, performing on the legendary stage was Jerry Palter". Palter, who was performing there as a guitarist and backing singer, sang baritone. As Barrows noted, "Mark was a bass singer and I was a tenor singer, so we had lead - no glue, no middle. We ended up getting together, and it just clicked." As their official bio put it, "Alan and Mark had found their mid-range, and the Folksmen were born".
The newly-renamed trio soon attracted the attention of folk music impresario Irving Steinbloom (1920–2003), who became their manager and signed them to Folktown Records – as Palter once put it, "THE label to be on." In 1962, the group released the single "Old Joe's Place", which became a Top 70 hit and remains their best-known song. According one one source, the Folksmen remained together for 26 months (ie two and a half years), during which time they "played and sang their own brand of 'eclectified folk' music." During this time they released no fewer than five studio albums. In a 2003 interview, Barrow recalled: "We figured that it would be amusing, at least to us, to have one word album titles, and we'd lop off the g's." This, however, eventually came to a halt when, as Shubb noted in the same interview: "We violated our covenant with the audience with a record called Saying Something, which is two mistakes by my account – two words, and two g's. All of our goodwill and tradition and good luck went down the toilet." Compounding the problem, that album was released on a lesser subsidiary label, Folktone Records, which, as Palter notes, was "a decent label – they just didn't have the distribution." The album, elsewhere described as "their one and only experiment in electric", was not a success, and the trio disbanded soon afterward. Relegated to the status of a minor footnote in the annals of American folk music, the Folksmen would later be characterised as "the group who were too popular to be purist and too purist to be popular."
Reunions
Little is known of the activities of the band members after its demise around 1968. In the early 1970s, Alan Barrows began teaching a creative writing course at Swarthmore CollegeSwarthmore College
Swarthmore College is a private, independent, liberal arts college in the United States with an enrollment of about 1,500 students. The college is located in the borough of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, 11 miles southwest of Philadelphia....
near Philadelphia and also taught a yoga class. In 1984, folk music impresario Albert Lilienthal (best-known as the man who established the Eighty-eight Cent Hoot at the Seaman's Institute) invited the Folksmen to re-form for a special one-off appearance on Saturday Night Live. At the time, it was noted that this was the first time that they had performed together in almost twenty years. Their appearance prompted a renewed interest in the group's work, and it was subsequently reported that "they are again becoming a popular late addition to folk festivals within a day’s auto travel of their homes."
In 1992, the trio was scheduled to open for heavy metal band Spinal Tap during the latter's comeback concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London. However, there was some concern that the rowdy audience might threaten the safety of the performers, so they did not appear; instead, the Folksmen attempted to recoup their costs by busking, performing a version of "Kumbaya
Kumbaya
"Kumbaya" or "Kumbayah" — is an African-American spiritual song from the 1930s. It enjoyed newfound popularity during the folk revival of the 1960s and became a standard campfire song in Scouting and nature-oriented organizations...
" inside South Kensington tube station
South Kensington tube station
South Kensington is a London Underground station in Kensington, west London. It is served by the District, Circle and Piccadilly lines. On the District and Circle lines, the station is between Gloucester Road and Sloane Square, and on the Piccadilly Line, it is between Gloucester Road and...
. It was later reported on Spinal Tap's website that the Folksmen had signed a four-month lease on a 1994 Chrysler minivan in anticipation of Spinal Tap's proposed 1996 Third World Tour, and there were rumours that the Folksmen might put out a CD. However, neither the anticipated tour, nor the album, ever eventuated.
In June 1993, the Folksmen appeared at the Troubadors of Folk festival at UCLA in Los Angeles, where they performed on the same bill as Paul Stookey, Mary Chapin Carpenter
Mary Chapin Carpenter
Mary Chapin Carpenter is an American folk and country music artist. Carpenter spent several years singing in Washington, D.C. clubs before signing in the late 1980s with Columbia Records, who marketed her as a country singer...
, Roger McGuinn
Roger McGuinn
James Roger McGuinn is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. He is best known for being the lead singer and lead guitarist on many of The Byrds' records...
and others. Eight years later, they returned to UCLA to make a guest appearance at a tribute concert, The Harry Smith Project, dedicated to the late folk music anthologist Harry Everett Smith
Harry Everett Smith
Harry Everett Smith was an American archivist, ethnomusicologist, student of anthropology, record collector, experimental filmmaker, artist, bohemian and mystic...
.
In 2003, the Folksmen reunited far more prominently for another tribute concert, this time in honour of their former manager, Irving Steinbloom, who died that year. In the days leading up to the concert, the trio met for a reunion barbecue in upstate New York, during which they rehearsed several numbers from their back-catalogue including "Blood on the Coal", "Corn Wine", "Loco Man" and "Skeletons of Quinto". At the concert itself, the group originally intended to open with "Never did no wanderin" but instead performed only their hit, "Old Joe's Place" and the rarely-heard "Barnyard Symphony".
Following the memorial concert, which was broadcast live on public television, bass player Mark Shubb came out as a Trans woman
Trans woman
A trans woman is a male-to-female transsexual or transgender person and the term trans woman is preferred by some individuals over various medical terms. Other non-medical terms include t-girl, tg-girl and ts-girl...
, and subsequently performed with the Folksmen in female attire. As he put it:
Fictional
- Singin' (Folktown Records) – includes "Old Joe's Place"
- Hitchin' (Folktown Records) – includes "Loco Man"
- Ramblin' (Folktown Records) – includes "Never did no wanderin"
- Wishin' (Folktown Records) – includes "Barnyard Symphony" and "Skeletons of Quinto"
- Pickin' (Folktown Records) – includes "Blood on the Coal"
- Saying something (Folktone Records) – includes "Children of the Sun"
Actual
- A Mighty Wind [original motion picture soundtrack] (DMZ/Columbia/Sony Music Soundtrax 5126562000) 2003
- None More Black (independent release, circa 2003) – bootleg triple-CD recording of Spinal Tap-related material
Fictional
- Town Hall, New York City – televised memorial concert, Ode to Irving (2003)
- Meshak Nation Casino, Sarana Lake, New York – performance in The Little Big Room (2003)
Actual
- Troubadors of Folk festival at Drake Stadium, UCLA, Los Angeles (Jun 5 & 6, 1993)
- Spinal Tap concert at Graumann's Eqyptian Theater, Los Angeles (Sep 5, 2000) – opening act
- The Harry Smith Project tribute concert at Royce Hall, UCLA (Apr 2001) – guest appearance
- Spinal Tap's Back from the Dead tour (Jun 2001) – opening act for certain performances including Los Angeles (Greek Theatre, Jun 1), New York City (Carnegie Hall, Jun 4 and Beacon Theater, Jun 23) and San Francisco (Warfield Theater, Jun 10)
- A Mighty Wind tour (fall 2003) – with Mitch & Mickey and the New Main Street Singers; tour included Phildelphia (Tower Theater, Sep 19), New York City (Town Hall, Sep 20), Washington DC (The 9:30 Club, Sep 21), San Francisco (Warfield Theater, Nov 9) and Seattle (McCaw Hall, Nov 14)
- Spinal Tap's One-Night-Only World Tour concert at Wembley Arena, London (Jun 30, 2009) – opening act
Fictional
- Hoot-Nite (1965) – performing "Old Joe's Place"
- In the Groove (1968) – performing "Children of the Sun"
- An Ode to Irving (PBN special, 2003) – performing "Old Joe's Place" and "Barnyard Symphony"
Actual
- Saturday Night Live (NBC; Nov 3, 1984) – performing "Old Joe's Place"; excerpt of "Barnyard Symphony"
- A Spinal Tap Reunion – The 25th Anniversary London Sell-Out (NBC special; Dec 31, 1992) - performing "Kumbaya"
- Late Show with David LettermanLate Show with David LettermanLate Show with David Letterman is a U.S. late-night talk show hosted by David Letterman on CBS. The show debuted on August 30, 1993, and is produced by Letterman's production company, Worldwide Pants Incorporated. The show's music director and band-leader of the house band, the CBS Orchestra, is...
(CBS; Apr 8, 2003) – performing "Old Joe's Place" - The View (ABC; Apr 10, 2003) – performing "Never did no wanderin"
- MadTVMADtvMADtv is an American sketch comedy television series. It licensed the name and logo of Mad, but otherwise had no connection with the humor magazine outside the animated Spy vs. Spy and Don Martin cartoon shorts and images of Alfred E. Neuman that the show featured during the late 1990s. Its first...
(Fox; Apr 26, 2003) – performing "Blood on the coal" - Late Night with Conan O'BrienLate Night with Conan O'BrienLate Night with Conan O'Brien is an American late-night talk show hosted by Conan O'Brien that aired 2,725 episodes on NBC between 1993 and 2009. The show featured varied comedic material, celebrity interviews, and musical and comedy performances. Late Night aired weeknights at 12:37 am...
(NBC; Sep 17, 2003) – performing "Start me up"
Songs
| Title | Writer/s | A Mighty Wind film | A Mighty Wind CD | Other TV or concert performance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| "A Mighty Wind" | Levy/Guest/McKean | Ode to Irving concert | Yes | Unplugged and Unwigged |
| "Barnyard Symphony" | ? | Ode to Irving concert | - | SNL (excerpt only) |
| "Blood on the Coal" | Guest/McKean/Shearer | Rehearsal footage | Yes | SNL (excerpt only); MadTV; Unwigged & Unplugged |
| "Children of the Sun" | ? | Vintage film clip (DVD extra) | - | |
| "Corn Wine" | Guest/McKean/Shearer | Rehearsal footage (DVD extra) | - | Unwigged & Unplugged |
| "The Good Book Song" | Guest/McKean/Shearer | Performed by New Main Street Singers | - | Unwigged & Unplugged |
| "Kumbaya" | Traditional | |||
| - | The Return of Spinal Tap | |||
| "Loco Man" | Shearer | Rehearsal footage | Yes | Unwigged & Unplugged |
| "Never did no wanderin" | McKean/Shearer | Rehearsal footage | Yes | The View; Unwigged & Unplugged |
| "Old Joe's Place" | Guest/McKean/Shearer | Ode to Irving; vintage film clip (DVD extra) | Yes | SNL; David Letterman; Unwigged & Unplugged |
| "Skeletons of Quinto" | Guest | Rehearsal footage | Yes | |
| "Start Me Up Start Me Up "Start Me Up" is a song by The Rolling Stones featured on the 1981 album Tattoo You. Released as the album's lead single, it reached #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #7 on the UK Singles Chart.-Writing and recording:... " |
Jagger/Richards | |||
| Yes | Conan O'Brien; Unwigged & Unplugged | |||
| "Valencia" | ? | |||
| SNL (mentioned, but not performed) | ||||