HistoricSiteMarkers
Postwar & Contemporary

Club 47

Cambridge, Middlesex County, Massachusetts

Marker Inscription

Club 47. Here Joan Baez and Bob Dylan sang duets, Muddy Waters played the blues, and Tom Rush, the Charles River Valley Boys and Eric Von Schmidt led the 60s folk revival. 1958-1963

Erected by Cambridge Historical Commission

The Story

Club 47 was a small Cambridge coffeehouse that became the beating heart of the early-1960s folk revival. On its stage Joan Baez and Bob Dylan sang duets, Muddy Waters brought the blues, and performers like Tom Rush and Eric Von Schmidt helped define a new acoustic sound. In just a few years it launched careers that would shape a generation of American music.

Why it matters

The club was a birthplace of the folk revival, a cultural movement that carried traditional and blues roots into the mainstream and gave voice to the era's social ferment.

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Related people

  • · Joan Baez
  • · Bob Dylan
  • · Muddy Waters

Themes & tags

African American HistoryLandmark

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