Bonnie Koloc (born February 6, 1944) is an American folk music singer-songwriter. She was considered one of the three main Illinois-based folk singers in the 1970s, along with Steve Goodman and John Prine forming the "trinity of the Chicago folk scene". Her music continues to be recognized and valued by historians of Chicago folk music, as well as by her long-standing fan base in that area. But her voice, which may be considered crystalline in its clarity, is remembered as well.
Koloc was born in Waterloo, Iowa, to a working-class family. She told The Chicago Tribune, "I guess you could say we were poor; we lived in a cement block house outside the city limits of Waterloo, Iowa, and my dad worked in the John Deere factory. Money was very tight.[1]
The first of her family to attend college, she enrolled in the University of Northern Iowa, first majoring in drama, then art, paying her way by singing, but becoming increasingly dissatisfied with university life. She abandoned her studies to go to Chicago, where she became a fixture of the influential Earl of Old Town.
She had a minor hit with "Roll Me On the Water" from the 1974 album You're Gonna Love Yourself in the Morning, but never achieved the national recognition that many[who?] predicted for her. She has, however, maintained her iconic status in the Chicago area where she is considered, along with Steve Goodman and John Prine, to have been a quintessential influence in the development of Chicago folk music during the 1970s and later. Reviewing the 1977 album Close-Up in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981), Robert Christgau wrote, "This is where Koloc's modest, unmistakable intelligence—and voice—finally make a record work."[2]
Koloc lives in Iowa with her husband, the author Robert Wolf[3]
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