TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/100791/1007520.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 8.9 KB | 186 lines

                                                                                PROFILE, Page 63

No More Clapping Hands


Once the Pied Piper to millions of kids, folk singer RAFFI no
longer warbles about the wonders of childhood. His message is
now one of environmental alarm.

By JOHN MOODY/VANCOUVER


    If you are the parent of a preschooler, suffice it to say
that Raffi, in the throes of middle age, is shaking his sillies
out. If you have no children, or live with them on the moon, it
might be easier to explain that the most popular children's
singer in the English-speaking world has chucked a
multimillion-dollar career, ended his 16-year marriage and
stopped eating nearly everything that tastes good, all in order
to carry out an uncompromising and very grown-up mission: to
alarm the rest of humankind into taking better care of Our Dear,
Dear Mother. Mother Earth, that is.

    If it were merely Placido Domingo announcing that
henceforth he wished to be regarded as a rap singer, folks might
understand. But this is Raffi, the Canadian folk singer who has
mesmerized more preschoolers than anyone else since that piper
from Hamelin. His defection from the marketplace of kids' music
is comparable to Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's departure from the Lakers
-- he leaves behind similar, smaller shadows, but none to take
his place.

    His full name is Raffi Cavoukian, but during his 14 years
as a troubadour to the nursery-rhyme set he achieved the type
of international renown that allows people to become known only
by their first name. With his throaty voice, chocolate-sweet
eyes and zippy rhythms, he provided intelligent amusement to
millions of boys and girls who might otherwise be transported to
the Saturday-morning cartoon swampland of death rays and
superheroes. In the process, he was amply rewarded: his 10
albums sold 6 million copies, and he was awarded Canada's
highest civilian decoration.

    Strumming out rollicking melodies on an inexpensive
guitar, he educated as well as entertained. When he sang about
a giraffe named Joshua pining to leave the zoo, children learned
to wonder about the feelings of animals. Thanks a Lot offered
gratitude to a generic deity for the everyday goodness of life.
His paeans to the peanut-butter sandwich, the horn on the bus,
tooth brushing and bathtime were comforting confirmation to
millions of squirming dissidents that while each of them is
unique, their frustrations and fears are not.

    Why, then, when he was doing so much good for so many, did
he turn his back on the generation of tomorrow? For something
he considers even more important. His latest album, Evergreen
Everblue, is not merely inappropriate for toddlers; it is a
warning screech of apocalypse. Its cover portrays a haunted
Raffi with death's-head stare, his beard spiked with acid-laden
pine trees. Instead of warmly promising, as one of his favorite
children's songs did, that Everything Grows, the new Raffi howls
piercingly, "Why are we poisoning our children? What's the
matter with us?"

    Raffi now refuses to play for children. He calls himself
an eco-troubadour. Sitting on the terrace of his modest
Vancouver apartment, he sighs over the resentment his act of
conscience has created. "I know some parents feel I've abandoned
their children. But I've come to realize that unless I do my
utmost to stop the destruction of the earth, there'll be no
world for those young people to grow up in."

    Raffi is not the first star to become politicized. But
there is something frantic and indiscriminate about his
activism. Along with environmentalism, Raffi is lending his name
across the countercultural spectrum: he supports aggressive
feminism, Native American land claims and animal rights. He
believes oil companies should shut down their refineries not
soon, but tomorrow, and devote their profits to developing solar
energy. No executive of any company should earn more than $1
million a year. "Would that be enough? If not, why not?"

    Resisting contemporary wisdom is nothing new; Raffi has
always been an outsider. Born in Cairo to Armenian parents, he
moved with his family to Toronto when he was 10, facing the
challenge of a new world and an unfamiliar language. He dropped
out of the University of Toronto because what he wanted to learn
was not offered there. "I'm interested in how life is, how the
universe is, and how I'm a part of it," he says.

    Like a million other hippies, Raffi strummed ballads by
Dylan, Guthrie and Seeger, plus a few that he had written, in
local coffeehouses. His wife Debi Pike taught kindergarten. For
a while, the going was tough -- until Raffi found a way to
merge what they both did.

    The bearded balladeer began turning up at kindergartens
and day-care centers, and Blowin' in the Wind was replaced by
songs such as Five Little Ducks. Childless himself, he had no
idea how to woo his audience. "I thought you were supposed to
attract their attention," he says, screwing his thumbs into his
ears. "Hey, kid, watch this!" But with Debi's help, he made a
discovery. "I realized you don't have to impress children," he
said. "They make up their minds very quickly whether they like
you or not."

    They liked Raffi. He surprised and delighted without being
cutesy. He sang "Baa baa white sheep" because, he says, "I never
knew why it had to be black." In Down by the Bay, kids for a
magical moment could imagine a moose kissing a goose and llamas
eating their pajamas. They listened to him sing "I wonder if I'm
growing?" and believed his promise that, eventually, they would.
Raffi's dynamic with children was rooted in trust. He never
patronized.

    In 1976, in a house with a soundproof basement, he
recorded 19 Singable Songs for the Very Young. He borrowed
$4,000 to have the records pressed and sold them from his Toyota
station wagon. His concerts for children became local legends,
with scalpers selling tickets for $300 apiece. "I'd play to
1,200 children in the public library; then that night I'd go to
the coffeehouse to play, and there'd be 30 people. I got the
message."

    Success, and its evil twin self-doubt, moved in around
1980. Each of his children's albums sold more than 200,000
copies, and he and Debi had a huge new house in Toronto. The
cafe revolutionary was practicing yoga, reading Gandhi and
worrying about playing Russian roulette with nature. "I was
scared. I bought organic fruits and vegetables, and I started
drinking bottled water because I was concerned about the purity
of what we ate."

    In 1988 he took a sabbatical. "It was a time of emptying,"
he says. "I had to hear my inner music." He produced a series
of watercolor nudes in the style of Picasso. He also read
feminist literature and decided that patriarchal society was
rooted in violence. The process did not produce inner peace. He
separated from Debi, entered therapy and moved to Vancouver, hub
of Canada's counterculture. "My life as I knew it had come
undone," he says quietly. "Singing for children was out of the
question."

    Finding his new audience has proved difficult. He forced
his new distributor, MCA, to sell his tapes and CDs without
longboxes, because they contained unnecessary packaging. But
retailers argue that abandoning the longbox makes shoplifting
easier and requires refitting store fixtures. So many major
chains have refused to stock Evergreen Everblue. He is also
upset that this album was not reviewed as adult music.

    He hopes to get a break early next year, when his music
will be featured in the animated film FernGully: The Last
Rainforest, starring Robin Williams and Christian Slater. His
song It's Raining Like Magic accomplishes what Evergreen
Everblue did not: it worships the world's wonder without being
starchy.

    Spirit rejuvenated, Raffi, 43, is experiencing the
indignities of middle age. He suffers from chronic fatigue
syndrome, a hernia, bursitis and high cholesterol. To cleanse
his system of impurities, he eats only brown rice and fruit. For
the hernia, he sleeps with a magnet on his stomach.

    Strolling the calm paths of Stanley Park, he muses about
the perils of celebrity. "The hysteria around public figures is
unhealthy," he says. "The inner landscape of their
personalities is barren." A mother approaches, dragging along
a shy three-year-old. "Are you the famous children's singer
Raffi?" she gushes. "I was," he answers. Gently, he declines to
sing or sign an autograph. As the irked mother huffs off, he
blows a kiss to her child, who smiles knowingly.

    The proud-prowed tugboats ply their course along the
inlet, and Raffi remarks how much he likes them. Reminded that
they depend on fossil fuels, he smiles ruefully. "I know, I
know," says the man in the child. Then the child in the man, who
has given pleasure to millions of others, asks, "Ah, when will
I understand it all?"