Townes Van Zandt was born in Fort Worth, TX. This artist experienced a lot of different areas in his childhood as his family was constantly moving around from place to place to support his father’s career in the oil business. Van Zandt went to a military academy for a few years before trying out college in Colorado. Eventually, he dropped out to pursue a folksinging career.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The first artifact I chose is a video of Townes Van Zandt performing on the Texas Connection TV Show in 1990. I chose this artifact because I noticed several interesting performing characteristics of Van Zandt in this video. Several secondary sources I had found discussed that this artist typically played with his eyes closed, and often stood far back from the front edge of the stage in an attempt to protect himself from the crowd of fans below him. There is a slight sadness to his guitar playing and it is very delicate, which I felt was unique to this artist. I feel like a lot of other western folk artists we have discussed in class have played their instruments with a higher energy, almost a bounciness if you will. Van Zandt plays and sings as though he is weak or fragile, which may have been the case as he was reported to have struggled with substance abuse throughout most of his career. <\/p>\n\n\n\n