Grammy Award Winning Folk Group Sing About Importance of Nutrition

For many people, children’s music is a lesser form of the art, sandwiched somewhere between Barney the purple dinosaur and the Brothers Grimm. It’s cute and sometimes catchy, but real art, it is not.

But those watching Thursday night at the George Mason High School auditorium, as Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer performed from their food themed Grammy award-winning album Bon Appetite, gained a new perspective on the genre, one when well done, has the ability to convey essential information in an approachable and often unforgettable format.

The visit to the school was part of a tour funded by a grant to teach nutrition education at schools, not the usual support for the folk duo, but a great way to work with kids and share they wrote about the importance of proper nutrition, ranging from the most important meal of the day; breakfast, to the facts of the food pyramid.

Throughout nearly all their songs, they invite their audience to join in with them. Their concert started with a performance of their album’s title song “Bon Appetite,” as they were joined on stage by the Thomas Jefferson Elementary School chorus. Accompanied by the chorus during the refrain, the two played the banjo and guitar, and sang about food.

After that opening, they moved onto songs about the nutrition of bananas, the importance of breakfast, and even the humble potato. The group kept all the kids in the audience involved, sometimes asking them to participate from their seats and at other times, inviting volunteers up on the stage with them to dance, sing, and even hula hoop.

Meanwhile, the two never miss a beat, switching instruments from song to song, some store bought, others handmade, the whole time chatting about food as if they’ve been doing this for years.

Not surprisingly, they have.

The two actually began performing together over 20 years ago, after meeting at a Toronto folk festival in 1980. While playing and watching others, they both quickly recognized the other’s talents and saw the potential in joining together. They played together frequently before becoming full-time partners in 1984. Since then they have played at countless festivals and produced eight folk albums, and 14 children’s albums.

Both women came to music at a young age, having grown up playing guitar. When Marxer was 20 she was a part of a string band in Detroit, where she and friends would play at local festivals. Eventually, they were overhead by Canadian folk legend Stan Rogers, who loved their work and booked them in all his festivals.

From then on Marxer’s life in music started expanding quickly. Before long she was attending festivals, playing in workshops and learning to flat pick guitar with the likes of folk royalty like Dave Van Ronk.

Cathy Fink came to music in her own way. Also a guitarist, Fink purchased a five string banjo when she saw one for cheap. Though she played it on occasion, she never connected to it. Then one time after taking a few lessons on it, she started hearing something else in it and things started to click. Fink went on to become an expert in the banjo, winning three West Virginia state contests in the instrument. Both went on to become part of the folk scene, traveling throughout the U.S and the world, learning about all different types of music and many diverse peoples. Later when they started playing together, they experimented with different types of music, incorporating them all into their vast experience of music.

Marxer told the News-Press that despite being known as a folk musician, she enjoys and performs all types of music, except pop. She said that at its essence, all music can be seen as a kind folk music; coming from people.

Rather than the typical Woody Guthrie songs, which have come to symbolize the entire genre, the duo incorporates everything from music of forgotten tribes to rock and roll.

Amid all their folk recording, they have always continued to write and perform children’s music. Fink pointed out that it allows the two to ignore some of the restraints of serious music and just stretch out a little.

Little could they have known that their writing for young people would garner the greatest mainstream recognition. Over the period of their time together the group has been nominated for 8 Grammies, one for their folk record “Postcards” and 7 for children’s albums. They finally won their first with Bon Appetite and then followed it up a year later winning another Grammy with cELLAbration: A Tribute to Ella Jenkins, an album dedicated to the memory and classic work of the children’s music legend.

While it’s often light and fun, children’s music can be just as profound and just as difficult as traditional folk music. One of the biggest draws of children’s music is that it often sticks with kids for their entire life, making it possible to share ideas that can have a lasting impact. “It’s access to the arts for kids, and that’s something we really believe in,” Fink said.

She said that in their children’s concerts, each kid in the audience can usually point to a single moment or message where they can say, “That’s me!”

At the same time, though, kids can be a very difficult audience. “Kids are about as honest as it gets,” Marxer said. While many audiences will be polite and willing to go along with a performance, kids will lose interest quickly if the artists are not connecting or if the songs are not fun. As a result, performing to children often requires more energy than adult based concerts.

For Fink and Marxer, the combination of traditional folk and kids music has provided enough challenge and inspiration to keep them going, and of course after working on educational albums like Bon Appetite, they never miss breakfast.