Kingston Trio's Big Bust Up	June 9, 1961 page 126 (top)

SPOTLIGHT

At a one night stand near Los Angeles the most famous singing trio in the country made pretty music for the people out front. But backstage there was no harmony. The Kingston Trio was involved in the year's biggest show business bust-up. In one corner the groups leader, Dave Guard, forlornly strumming a banjo while his two partners, Nick Reynolds and Bob Shane, pointedly yocked it up without him. "A whole gang of differences" said Guard, had split them, so he was pulling out in six months. His defection is likely to cause such an unbrotherly hassle among these old cronies that their most fabled hero, Tom Dooley, would hang head and cry over it.

Stakes in this looming battle royal are legal rights to the name, the Kingston Trio, for the winner could walk off with the bulk of the group's annual take of more than $1 million. Presently each of the threesome -- Guard, Bob Shane and Nick Reynolds, -- own 24 ½ % of a corporation called the Kingston Trio, Inc. Another slice is owned by their manager, Frank Werber. Recently Guard has argued with Werber over bookings and another bone of contention is a $127,000 shortage in their jointly owned publishing subsidiary, High Ridge Music. Guard has also been out of tune with Shane and Reynolds. One year, said Guard, "We were 280 days on the road, most of it cooped up in a small aircraft. This is a good cooking pot for any troubles."

Helping to make the pot boil over was Guard's demand that the Kingstons begin crooning more authentic music than their brand of psuedo folk songs. He even asked his partners to join in learning to read music. But Shane and Reynolds refused to alter their successful formula. "The Kingston Trio has been a four-way effort all the way through." said Werber, who counts himself as number four. "It will remain a four-way effort, just not with the same people."

Nevertheless, Guard's departure is bound to be a bitter loss. He is the group's personality kid, and personality is their stock and trade, not music. An old friend of the Kingstons observed, "To say Dave Guard is the best musician is to say that a school kid who can spell c-a-t is the most literate boy in class." -- Thank you to Louie Seven for providing the transcription and pics.

Last revised: February 23, 2006.