Pete Seeger

Pete Seeger--anti-war, pro-people, troubador of the twentieth century.

He died today after 94 years on this earth, singing folk songs that recalled America to her better self.  He performed with the Almanac Singers, the Weavers, and others.

His family held hands and sang at his bedside in New York Presbyterian Hospital, according to this report in the New York Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/29/arts/music/pete-seeger-songwriter-and-champion-of-folk-music-dies-at-94.html?hp&_r=0

Pete wrote "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" and "Turn, Turn, Turn" (taken from Ecclesiastes and performed by the Byrds) and co-wrote "If I Had a Hammer."

He was also committed to feminism, singing this song composed by his sister Peggy Seeger in 1970:   (Thanks to the blog feministing for reminding me.)

http://feministing.com/2014/01/28/rip-pete-seeger/?utm_source=hootsuite&utm_campaign=hootsuite

Steve Martin tweeted, "I bought his book How To Play the 9-String Banjo when I was 16.  American hero in so many ways."

Thanks to my husband, John Arthur, for reporting Steve's tweet and also reminding me that Steve "is a tremendous banjo player and won a Grammy last night."

John also sent me this YouTube video of Pete last November singing "Turn, Turn, Turn" with five verses composed by his wife for their young children in the early 1950s:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7pzic4mf7o

It's great--especially the verse about "a time for candles on the cake."

Pete sang for "Okies" fleeing the Dust Bowl and trying to get farm work in the San Joaquin Valley.  Later he sang for the United Farmworkers movement.  He cared about the homeless and hungry; he tried to lessen the gap between the wealthy and the poor.

See this obituary in the LA Times:

http://www.latimes.com/obituaries/la-me-pete-seeger-20140128,0,2122566,full.story#axzz2rjp6RC9u

In 1968 I had never heard of Pete Seeger.  The only music played at my house in the 1950s and 60s had been the jazz that my father loved and groups like the Beatles that were just emerging and scorned by father.

If my father ever thought of Pete Seeger, it would have been to condemn him for being a Communist.  He joined the Young Communist League at age 17 in 1936 but turned to other political expression by the mid-1950s.

When I was a junior in college, John invited me to attend a concert given by Pete Seeger, and I turned him down, hoping that another guy I liked might ask me out.  

What a mistake!  I never heard Pete Seeger in concert.