Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger

Working Class Hero: Pete Seeger

Dylan and Seeger
Bob Dylan with Pete Seeger at the Newport Folk Festival (1963) two years before going electric at the very same venue

It is often said that to understand Bob Dylan, you must first listen to Woody Guthrie. There is, however, a musician that serves as a bridge between the Dust Bowlin’ Guthrie and the iconic Dylan. That musician’s name is Pete Seeger.

Pete Seeger, who died this week at the ripe age of 94, was an early champion of Dylan. He also hopped trains and shared songs with Guthrie. In essence, Seeger helped connect Dylan to the folk past that he desperately wished to emulate. Seeger, along with Joan Baez, helped introduce the young musician to an audience that went beyond the cafes of Greenwich Village. Seeger also provided a great foil to Dylan. When the darling of the 1960’s protest movement decided to go electric at the Newport Folk Festival, Seeger was there to complain about the crushing rock noise masking Dylan’s masterful lyrics. Dylan, however, declared that he “ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s farm no more!” and the rest is history.

Pete Seeger
Pete Seeger entertaining Eleanor Roosevelt (center), honored guest at a racially integrated Valentine’s Day party in then-segregated Washington, D.C. (1944)

Needless to say, Bob Dylan served as my entry way into the music of Pete Seeger. Once there, I discovered a man who led a full musical life. He sang for First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. He sang for President Barak Obama. And he sang for a bunch of ordinary folks in between. Seeger’s music touched the working class hearts of all who dared to listen. Recorded with the Weavers, his “If I Had a Hammer” is the perfect ode to the American worker and his need for a united political voice. It also inspired many other musicians to explore the needs of the working man. From John Lennon’s “Working Class Hero” to Bruce Springsteen’s “Ghost of Tom Joad,” musicians have followed Seeger’s lead when it comes to identifying economic injustice.

If I had a hammer I’d hammer in the morning
I’d hammer in the evening all over this land
I’d hammer out danger, I’d hammer out warning
I’d hammer out love between my brothers and my sisters
All over this land

If I had a bell I’d ring it in the morning
I’d ring it in the evening all over this land
I’d ring our danger, I’d ring out warning
I’d ring out love between my brothers and my sisters
All over this land

If I had a song I’d sing it in the morning
I’d sing it in the evening all over this land
I’d sing out danger, I’d sing out warning
I’d sing out love between my sisters and my brothers
All over this land

When I’ve got a hammer, and I’ve got a bell
And I’ve got a song to sing all over this land
It’s a hammer of justice, it’s a bell of freedom
It’s a song about love between my brothers and my sisters
All over this land

-If I Had A Hammer (Pete Seeger / Lee Hays)

Seeger’s other musical themes touched on everything form civil rights to nuclear disarmament. His tough talk on tough topics was also backed by action. Blacklisted at the height of McCarthyism, Seeger refused to name names. His opposition to authority helped influence many young musicians who would take up the very same posture in the name of Rock n’ Roll.

When the Red Scare cooled, Seeger reemerged championing folk music and connecting with the emerging counterculture of the 1960s. He helped make “We Shall Overcome” the anthem of the Civil Rights movement and inspired President Lyndon Johnson to use the phrase when addressing the U.S. Congress on the need for voting rights legislation. While Johnson’s speech satisfied many that the establishment was finally on board, Seeger continued to press for change on a variety of issues. Most famously, Seeger criticized LBJ and his Vietnam war policies in songs like “Waist Deep in the Big Muddy” and “Where Have all the Flowers Gone.” The war became so toxic for the once popular president that he refused to run for a second term in 1968.

“I feel most spiritual when I’m out in the woods. I feel part of nature . . . Because I think God is everything. Whenever I open my eyes I’m looking at God. Whenever I’m listening to something I’m listening to God.”

Seeger and the HudsonPete Seeger was an activist to the end. In fact, his greatest legacy may have little to do with music. His relentless environmental advocacy led to the cleaning up of the Hudson River. He united with local fisherman to reverse the damage done by countless polluters. Seeger tread new ground by refusing to rely on Washington lobbyists and Congressional glad-handing to get things done. Instead, he took to the river, sailed up and down its banks and created the blueprint for modern grassroots activism. It was a messianic effort that would have made Henry David Thoreau proud.

Pete Seeger was a folk troubadour. He was a working class hero, a contentious objector,  and a national treasure. Pete Seeger, above all else, was a great American.

Best Lines: Post Script: Pete Seeger (Alec Wilkinson)

Happy Birthday: The Mac @ 30!

It’s amazing that the Mac is now 30 years old!  I will never forget my first Mac. It was a  lime green iMac and it replaced an old Mac Performa I inherited from my Dad. It went with me everywhere.  From my Appalachian State apartment to my job at the photo lab to vacations at the beach.  It was so portable.

lime imacThat lime green iMac out hustled the PC my photo lab boss and his ditzy wife had built prior to me showing up. Some computer geek convinced them to spend untold amounts of money just so he could build a computer. Problem was the stupid thing never printed true color.  It was probably the first time I ever said those immortal words, “shoulda bought a Mac.” I’ve said it countless times ever since. From that point on, I hauled my iMac in to the photo lab everyday. Photoshop ran smoother and I never had a problem printing any of my digitally restored photos again.

Clinton Library MacsThe practicing of taking my Macs with me on the go continued with what I considered to be the best iMac ever made. I received a beautiful white flat panel iMac as a college graduation gift from my Dad. Not wanting to leave it behind on my study abroad trip, I actually had it shipped to Keele University in England. While it may have not been the most economical decision, it did help me make friends fairly quickly. Everyone was impressed with its design and the ground breaking OS X software that made Windows look like stale bread. From my 3 A.M. listening of the infamous Duke-Carolina game where Coach Doughtery threatened fisticuffs to my endless ripping of CDs for all my dorm-mates, that iMac helped me settle in quite nicely. I’ll also never forget explaining to one of the network engineers at the Keele library how I got my Mac to work with their backwards Internet protocol. He responded in a toasty English accent, “I’ve never seen a Mac before!” Makes me laugh to this day. That and the fact that I saw that very same iMac model enshrined at the Clinton Library in Little Rock.

These days, I carry a Macbook Pro everywhere I go. While it’s not the same as strapping in an iMac with a seatbelt, my new Retina model packs way more punch than those old CPUs. While I hope to write a full review someday of my new machine, for now I’ll just say it represents the most seamless computing experience I’ve ever had.

Funny thing is, all my family’s old Macs still work. My Granddad inherited my lime green iMac but he now prefers to work off an old MacBook Pro my Dad gave him. I’ll never forget him showing me the Baltimore Orioles homepage and asking me if I had ever seen it before. The man loves baseball and that computer brought it right into his living room. My brother still has an old bondi blue iMac and G4 tower that have yet to breathe their last breaths.  The white flat panel iMac I mentioned is operating in my office and it can still kick out a jam or two.  Best of all, my Dad’s old MacPlus still works to this day. You can even insert his MacPaint floppy disk and make cool retro art!

MacPlus

What a great 30 years of computing. And according to MacWorld and the Apple Executive team, the Mac is here to stay.  Check out their article, Apple executives on the Mac at 30: ‘The Mac keeps going forever.’  What else is there to do but say, “Thank you Steve Jobs! Thank you Apple.”

 

 

1968: The Year the Country Broke

D-Day InvasionMy appreciate for all things history comes naturally. I’ve always been drawn to stories from the past. Perhaps it stems from the tales my Granddad often shares from his World War II days. The fact that I can draw a straight line from his surviving the Battle of the Bulge to my own upbringing mystifies me to this day.  Looking back at history also requires one to have an opinion. My Granddad is never shy to give his viewpoint about what was right and wrong about that war.  From his admiration of Eisenhower to his disdain for Patton, he emphasized the need to go beyond simple glorification for those that called the shots and sent young men to die. For instance, he is often critical of the senseless brutality of the D-Day invasion. Too many historians take for granted the lives that were permanently disrupted in that first wave of Nazi gunfire. In doing so, my Granddad argues, they offer very little counterpoint to the operation’s necessity.

Williams classroomOn this Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I am again thinking about history and that line I can trace backwards. As a teacher I enjoyed helping students discover the historical line that connects them to the nation’s past.  Unlike my Granddad, I kept my opinions out of the classroom conversation in favor of giving the students the forum to say what needed to be said. I never put bumper stickers on my car or let them know my political leanings. As a teacher, I felt it was necessary to allow students to test the waters of critical thinking without my interference.  Besides I always found that, with a little prodding and devil’s advocacy, students would cover all the angles when debating historical issues and events.  From the timing of the Emancipation Proclamation to the dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima, my students always gave their all to prove a point.

Only once did I break my class rule about the brokering of opinions. It came in an ad-libbed discussion of 1968.  A year that opened with the Tet Offensive and the mounting failure of Vietnam. It was a year when political protests turned violent and Chicago’s Democratic National Convention was cracked open with police bully clubs. The year Richard Nixon was elected by one of the thinnest margins in American history. And most importantly, 1968 was the year that brought an end to the much-needed leadership of Dr. King and Robert F. Kennedy.

Put simply, I told my students that 1968 was the most pivotal year in United States political history. It represented a fork in the line. The country could have gone in one direction but instead events on the ground forced it to choose another. I talked about what both men stood for. I talked about King’s Poor People’s Campaign and his discussion of issues, like Vietnam, that went beyond his advocacy for racial justice.  I talked about Kennedy’s platform for President.  How it sought, in its own way, to mediate the impending crises that were about to rock the nation.

I am today announcing my candidacy for the presidency of the United States. I do not run for the presidency merely to oppose any man, but to propose new policies. I run because I am convinced that this country is on a perilous course and because I have such strong feelings about what must be done, and I feel that I’m obliged to do all I can.” -Robert F. Kennedy

AR 7993-B (crop)I told my students that their deaths ensured that the nation would stay on the more perilous course.  A course we can all trace our current national upbringing back to. And while their martyrdom has inspired many to look beyond themselves and ask how they might be of service to the nation’s greater good, their deaths represent the fact that we have lost a portion of our moral center.

That moral center was firmly established in our addressing the nation’s ills head on. We combatted the Great Depression by striking at the heart economic injustice. We helped preserve democracy during World War II by leading the world against tyranny. This made our nation a beacon of light for the world to see and, in turn, emulate. We then expanded on that light when our nation took up the struggle against segregation and enshrined an individual’s civil and political rights into law. That light, however, became more fleeting with the deaths of Dr. King and Robert Kennedy. I told my students our country has searched for its moral center ever since. On occasion, we find it. We do the right thing. It seems, however, that center doesn’t quite hold any more.

Booby and Ethel Kennedy. MLK Funeral.At the tail-end of my diatribe, I caught myself. I paused. I had let myself do too much of the talking. I had let my opinions flow as freely as my Granddad does during our Sunday get-togethers. I must admit it felt good.

It was then that I decided to return the stage back to the history makers themselves. I asked my students, “Did you know Robert Kennedy delivered the eulogy at Martin Luther King’s funeral?” They responded that they had not.  I told them I was an admirer of the speech but that I preferred the unscripted words Kennedy spoke the night he found out about the assassination. It reveals him to be a remarkable and poetic man. I played them the YouTube clip (an amazing teacher tool) of that lonely night’s remarks. My students were captivated. They saw the fleeting light I spoke of Kennedy’s fatigued face, a man truly devastated by the news. They then heard the echoes of that light in his conciliatory and heart-felt words.

“What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness, but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice towards those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black” – Robert F. Kennedy

MLK monumentOn this day of  Martin Luther King remembrance I choose to trace myself back to that moment in 1968. The moment encapsulated by those words. They serve as a challenge to us all to remember that we need not be divided. A reminder that we can rediscover our moral center by working together. By loving one another. It may seem fleeting at times, but we can still connect with others despite our perceived differences. It is the hallmark of union. Jefferson, Lincoln, King, Kennedy (and many others) improved this country by focusing on the promise of togetherness and equality. We can, too. All one has to do is trace the historical line backwards that connects them to the men and women that populate the past. We should all be inspired by the progress that they have made on our behalf. With inspiration as our guide, we should in turn add our own contribution to the national timeline, helping it move forward as we on occasion look back.


 

Thank You Doctors Without Borders

I recently wrote about my family’s tradition of charitable giving.  As an addendum to that article, I’d like to share a letter/ video Doctors Without Borders sent to me via email. It basically covers the impact of their efforts, all made possible by the kindness of others.

It is my hope that we will see less conflict in the coming year, but the prospects for that already appear grim. It is heartening to know that my contributions are helping reduce the pain of those who find themselves in harm’s way.

I count my lucky stars that I am blessed with a supportive network of loving family and terrific friends. The crises I have had to live through are small in comparison to what some people on this Earth face. For this reason, I do not measure my fortune in terms of dollars and cents.  I have won the lottery in my life countless times over.  I have great parents, one really awesome brother and some really great friends and colleagues.

My ultimate lottery winnings, however, center around what I come home to every night.  A loving wife and a beautiful baby boy.  With that in mind, I will always count myself as a member of the fortunate ones.  I will continue to celebrate my terrific luck by loving those I’m with and giving to those who are without.

Here is the thank you message I referred to at the top of the page.  Each doctor, nurse and support staff member who works with the patients in the video are a verifiable blessing to humanity. May God watch over and protect them in the coming year:

Thank you.

In 2013, you helped our doctors, nurses, logisticians and other staff have a powerful impact in the lives of people all over the world, many of whom had nowhere else to turn.

I hope you’ll watch this short video to see just how far your support has gone.

It is only because of independent support from donors like you that we are able to be in so many places where others cannot go – from the most remote islands of the Philippines to the frontlines in Syria and South Sudan. In these places and in more than 70 countries around the world, the medical care you make possible has meant the difference between life and death for hundreds of thousands of people.

I know our teams will be tested by new crises and challenges in the months to come and I couldn’t be more grateful to have you at our side as we do whatever it takes to bring lifesaving care to the people who need it most.

On behalf of our entire staff, I wish you health and happiness in 2014, and thank you once again for everything you do to support our efforts to save lives and end suffering.

Gratefully,

Sophie Delaunay, Executive Director

Sophie Delaunay
Executive Director

Foreverly Everly

In 1986 the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducted 10 of rock’s most influential musicians into its inaugural class: Chuck Berry, James Brown, Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Fats Domino, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, Elvis Presley and . . . The Everly Brothers.

everly-brothers

Phil Everly, the younger brother of the influential Everly music duo, passed away yesterday.  The vocal group has had far-reaching influence ranging from other singing duos like Simon and Garfunkel to the harmonizing style of Rock and Roll acts like The Beatles.  The Everlys took the clean instrumentation of Nashville and turned it on its head with teenage themes and early rock arrangements.  Their music has a timeless quality and their greatness can still be heard to this day. While they produced countless hits like “Wake Up Little Susie,” “Bye Bye Love” and “All I Have to Do is Dream,”  they also produced whole albums of brilliant and captivating songs.

ForeverlyI was recently reminded of this brilliance with the surprise re-recording of the Everly classic, Songs Our Daddy Taught Us, by Norah Jones and Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong. The new album, Foreverly, manages to please the ear at every turn.  While Jones has long been known to have multi-genre vocal chops, Armstrong’s deviation from the comfort zone of his punk garage-rock scream is a true revelation.  He has a natural croon that blends masterfully with Jones’s smoky feminine sound. The album’s arrangement and instrumentation are different from the Everly’s original recording.  The record does, however, stay true to the Everly’s singing sound. The masterful harmonizing of Jones and Armstrong really sets the record apart from other cover albums. With so much music being overproduced and auto-tuned to death, it is refreshing to hear real singers singing real music, uncompromised. The album serves as a touching coda to The Everly Brothers body of work as yet another generation of musicians discovers their contribution to Rock and Roll.

So if you have time today, give thanks for the songs the Everlys taught us.  Their music is for the ages. From one younger brother to another, thanks Phil!