Arlo Guthrie ‘Gone Fishing” and no longer performing

One of the Berkshires all-time favorites Arlo Guthrie announced that his performing and touring days are over. Arlo has long been a favorite of the Berkshires, living many years in Washington Mass, the countless number of shows he performed locally.

Arlo has a tremendous body of work but it was the iconic story of that faithful Thanksgiving Day in 1965 in Stockbridge that involved a half-ton of garbage, shovels, rakes and implements of destruction that was penned into Arlo’s most famous song “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree.” The church made famous by the song was the home of Alice’s Restaurant in Great Barrington and was later purchased by Arlo and converted to the Guthrie Center.

Arlo’s career followed in the footsteps of his legendary folk singer dad Woody Guthrie. Like his dad, Arlo not only wrote great folk songs but songs of protest against social injustice. I saw Arlo perform over a dozen times in his 50-year touring career. Often playing with Pete Seger, a friend of his dad’s and a folk hero in his own right.

After more than 50 years of entertaining the Berkshires and beyond, world renowned folk singer/songwriter Arlo Guthrie has decided to no longer do stage shows or to take to the road for touring.

Guthrie explained in a lengthy Facebook post on Friday afternoon title "Gone Fishing" that he had never thought much about getting older and not doing the thing that he loved and had done most of his life… singing and playing. In the post, Guthrie said that on April 1st of 2016 he became dizzy while in the parking lot of a hotel and began to see - as he described it - as if he was looking through a kaleidoscope. According to Guthrie’s post, he later found out that he had suffered a mini stroke. Arlo went on to say that he continued touring over the next for years, and then he had another occurrence of all days on Thanksgiving Day of last year.

To read Arlo's complete 'Gone Fishing" post on Facebook click here.