Guthrie plays to packed Finney

Folk legend lives up to reputation for parents' weekend

"I wasn't planning on singing this song tonight.... In fact, I wasn't planning on singing this song this decade." But he did.

Last Saturday night Arlo Guthrie untied his song bag and pulled out an incredible concert complete with "Alice's Restaurant Massacree Revisited," an updated version of the song which first brought him fame.

Arlo, the son of folk music legend Woody Guthrie, also played homage to his father's lasting legacy with several of his father's songs including a sing-along version of "This Land is Your Land," and the dustbowl classic, "I Ain't Got No Home."

He also joked with the audience about his contemporary, Bob Dylan. "I think songwriting is a lot like fishing. I once called Bob up and asked him, 'Hey Bob, why don't you ever throw the small ones back?' He didn't think it was too funny, but you know, he's never really got the happy camper look about him anyway." Guthrie's raw-edged voice ripped a vesion of "Mr. Tambourine Man" out to thunderous applause by the audience.

Speaking on his reasons for writing a children's book, Mooses Come Walking, Guthrie explained, "I wrote it as kind of a reaction to these new age-y sensitive children's books. I always liked the old ones which scared the hell out of you."

By way of an introduction to his "first in a series of moose poems," Guthrie recounted a concert he gave in a small coffehouse. "I was just about to start my recitation of Mooses Come Walking when there at the back of the room I saw Allen Ginsberg, and it was like, 'yeah...' For that moment I could feel it. We were poet to poet. I mean, he wasn't there when I was done, but still."

The audience's mood throughout the concert was electric, and Guthrie moved flawlessly between a piano version of "City of New Orleans" and his guitar for a memorable "Ring around the Rosy Rag."

The concert ended and Guthrie was applauded until he did two encore pieces, the piano classic "Saint Louis Tickle," and his own haunting "Highway in the Wind." A jam-packed Finney Chapel loved every last note.