RDB was a counter-tenor. He referred to himself as a Twentieth Century Minstrel,
like the early troubadours. My favorite rendition was his "The Bonnie Earl of Morey"
which was the best version of this song that I've heard. This is the song that spawned the term "Mondegreen".

"They took the Bonnie Earl of Morey and laid him (mondegreen) on the green."

Leadbelly was a fan of his.

His performance of John Henry was considered to be funny. It wasn't his style.

I think he had a beautiful voice in the tradition of the Early Music counter-tenors
such as Russell Oberlin and Alfred Deller. It's an acquired taste.

He ran a school of folk music in Aspen Colorado in the late Forties and Ray de la Torre
taught guitar there.

He may have been the folk stylist to first incorporate arpeggios ala Carcassi, (a classical guitarist) and I believe he was the first to integrate classical guitar into the folk song idiom.

William Clausen (I think that was his name) was a follower of Dyer-Bennet. They both presented formal concerts in tuxes. (I think for Columbia Artists but I'm not sure) Joan Baez owes him (perhaps unwittingly) for the arpeggiated guitar styles found in accompaniment to Anglo-American ballads by interpreters (not in the rough folk "tradition").

As I recall, Dyer-Bennet played a rosewood classical guitar and used classical technique for his accompaniments.

It would be unfair to compare his stylistic renditions with traditional folk singers. He was an interpreter (and quite musical, unlike many "folkies" you might hear today).

He was the last of that kind of singer like Susan Reed, Josh White and of course Burl Ives who had training in Schubert Lieder from a Metropolitan Opera vocal coach.

You might want to listen comparatively to John Jacob Niles and then Dyer-Bennet.
It's almost oranges and apples but oddly enough, the same concert approach was
employed.

Frank Hamilton