Oscar Brand
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Oscar Brand (born February 7, 1920, in Winnipeg, Manitoba) is a folk singer and songwriter. In his career, spanning over 60 years, he has composed at least 300 songs and released nearly 100 albums. He has played alongside such legends of American folk music as Leadbelly, Woody Guthrie, and Pete Seeger. He currently resides in Great Neck, New York.
He has been hosting the radio show Oscar Brand's Folksong Festival [link] every Saturday at 10 pm, on WNYC-AM 820 in New York City. The show has run more or less continuously since 1945, making it the longest-running show on radio or television. The show recently celebrated its 60th anniversary on Dec 10th, 2005. Over its run it has introduced such talents to the world as Bob Dylan, Arlo Guthrie, Joan Baez, Huddie Ledbetter, and Pete Seeger. Other notable guest performers over the years have included Harry Chapin, Burl Ives, Harry Belafonte, John Denver, and B.B. King.
Oscar Brand has also won the Peabody Award for broadcast excellence in 1982 for his broad The Sunday Show on National Public Radio, and was awarded the Personal Peabody Award in 1997 (shared with Oprah Winfrey).
Brand is well known for writing catchy, themed, folk songs -- including the theme music to his show, "Something to Sing About (This Land Of Ours)" -- and has collaborated on a number of musicals, most notably The Education of HYMAN (a musical version of Leo Rosten's The Education of H*Y*M*A*N K*A*P*L*A*N), and A Joyful Noise.
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