A Prairie Home Companion

The songwriters in the Lake Wobegon area have been commissioned by Jack’s Auto Repair to compose songs for the Jack’s Autoharp, which I have right here. Songs in which all the necessary chords are incorporated right in the lyrics so there can be no mistake about it. You know, it’s not an easy thing to play these three-chord songs.

We’re trying to incorporate chords like F and G7 into the lyrics. Well, it’s kind of a hard task, as you can understand. The possibilities are rather limited after you write ten songs about “A minor’s life, A minor’s child,” write songs like they wrote last week, “Hand Me Down that Augmented Fifth, Let’s Diminish it before we Go To C.” After you use up the really good ideas you get down to things like “Doe, a deer, a female deer, ray, a drop of golden sun…” By that time you’re climbing the wall.

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Garrison talks about “the Autoharp Life” during our second broadcast — July 13th, 1974, live from the Janet Wallace Fine Arts Center at Macalester College in St. Paul, MN

Guests included Butch Thompson (“Butch Thompson, is that his name? What’s his real name? Shirt?”), Bill Hinkley and Judy Larson, the Sundowner String Band, and poet Keith Gunderson