Music and oppression

Subject: Music and oppression
From: GUEST,Phil B
Date: 24 Jul 08 - 04:56 PM

In a week where I've just seen the Neil Young film of the CSNY tour and the fury that it invoked from modern republicans who were traditional CSNY fans and would have been youthful opponents of the Vietnam war I've just spent the evening at Exeter College in Oxford in the company of singer/songwriter Roger Lucey. He was an up and coming musician in South Africa whose increasingly anti-establishment material caused his career to be sabotaged by the authorities. They managed to prevent him from getting gigs and 'persuaded' his record company to drop him.

This from Wikapedia
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Roger Lucey (born 1954) is a musician, journalist, film maker, actor and educator who was born in South Africa. In the late 1970s and early 1980s his early career as a musician was destroyed by Paul Erasmus of the South African Special Branch, because the lyrics to Lucey's protest songs were considered a threat to the Apartheid State. Although already aware of his anti-apartheid songs, the South African Government's security apparatus only swung into action to destroy Lucey's career after he performed a radical song in a programme on Voice of America radio. The criminal methods used against Lucey formed part of the testimony given by Paul Erasmus in front of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
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Roger is over here makng a film about Desmond Tutu and has taken time out to join the creative writing course being run by close friends of mine at Exeter college. In a place where it is safe for us to make our political and social feelings known through music it is an honour to meet someone whose beliefs and integrity brought him that close to the line. I'm hoping to get him into the studio before he leaves these shores and record a few songs for a future project.

I'm not starting a discussion here, just reflecting on the relative values here where, for better or for worse, we're able to express ourselves as we see fit, rightly or wrongly. I always feel very much in awe of such people. Pete Seeger ( Whose band the Weavers was excommunicated during the Mcarthy era) Mauricio, Sergio, and Vladamir who all had to leave Chile where their lives were under threat during the Pinochet years.
Certainly makes me reflect!!

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: GUEST,Acorn4
Date: 24 Jul 08 - 04:59 PM

I think Jeremy Taylor had a similar experience with his songs in South Africa.

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: GUEST,Phil B
Date: 24 Jul 08 - 05:04 PM

Roger and Jeremy used to be mates and He'd like to track him down. Anyone have any info?

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: Acorn4
Date: 24 Jul 08 - 06:46 PM

The last I heard he was living in Wales but he now seems to be US based- he still does gigs every now and then.

Click here
One of the truly great writers and a great favourite of mine.

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 01:17 AM

Phil

Consider that in those countries where such expression as Roger is openly suppressed, the feelings go underground and simmer, eventually breaking out.

However in the so called 'free expression' countries, not many pay attention to such things: they are basically just ignored, the populace lulled, and thus the nasty guys can get away with more, for longer?


:-)

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: GUEST,Phil B
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 06:21 AM

Which, I suppose, opens the old debate, can music change anything?

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 06:37 AM

Has anyone heard of Volodymyr Ivasyuk? He was a violinist from the Western Ukraine and wrote dozens of popular songs which have become part of the Ukrainian identity. Chervona Ruta (Red Rue) is particularly well known. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iV_4XvldJw0 He championed Ukrainian language and culture and was massively popular, which is why the Soviet authorities saw him as a dangerous element. In 1979, he was found hanging from a tree. Suicide, officialy.

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 06:49 AM

I forgot this link. http://www.wumag.kiev.ua/index2.php?param=pgs20042/110

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 07:59 AM

Surely Mauricio, Sergio, and Vladi (as we know him) had all been involuntary guests of the bastard Pinochet

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: M.Ted
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 09:59 AM

Serendipitously, this thread has popped up--Lyr Add: The Ballad of Francois Villon, by East German poet/songwriter/activist, Wolfe Biermann, in which the Stasi burst into his apartment to interrogate him, and he blames his activism on his metaphorical roomate, Francois Villon---

Biermann was forbidden to record or perform by the East Germans in 1965, and was expelled in 1978, and continues to perform today.

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 02:49 PM

Protest singer Victor Jara was arrested following the coup in Chile instigated by Auguste Pinochet, Margaret Thatcher's friend.
He was herded into Santiago Stadium along with thousands of other protesters, where he was recognised by one of the guards, dragged aside and had his hands mutilated with an axe. He later became one of the many thousand (mainly young) 'disappeared'.
The date of the coup, which was supported by US agents working in South and Central America, was, somewhat ironically September 11th, - 9/11.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: Stringsinger
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 03:54 PM

I have written what I would consider "edgy" songs that deal with politics and the problem
we face today in our country. My songs have not been easily accepted. The content is
"hard hitting" as it was in the time when Woody Guthrie wrote his. In the Fifties, Woody
was considered to be too controversial and was not popular with many. Today, there is
a tendency for people to reject "uncomfortable" subject matter in songs although writers
such as Steve Earle (who in my opinion is close to Woody's tradition) do well.

Topical music today is receiving a resistance by a wearied public who would prefer
excursions into navel-gazing songs or a kind of quasi-pop-folk with acoustic guitar backup. I refer to this as "acoustic drivel".

One of the things that I liked about the old Sing Out! magazine format is that it didn't
try to squelch songs that criticized controversy. Often it was considered to be "didactic"
or "opinionated" from a Left perspective but in my view it made the magazine exciting
and thought-provoking. It wasn't a fanzine for folk. Ideas were presented which engendered disagreement. Commercialism in folk was questioned. Racism was addressed and anti-war songs with teeth found their way into the old Sing Out!

Today, songs need to be written about the oppression and torture of Guantanamo,
the needless deaths of military service people, the robbing of the American public
by greedy corporate interests, the stealing of elections, and the oppression of the
fundamentalist religious. Not all songs need to be about these issues but there is not
an abundance of good material today coming out.

There has been a precedence for this kind of writing in the past with Tom Paxton,
Pete Seeger, Utah Phillips, and now Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson. We see this
in the songs of Steve Earle, today.

I think that Dylan turned his back on this kind of writing if he ever really did it.
He wanted to be more "mainstream" and didn't continue along these lines because
it was not commercially viable. I think he wanted to be accepted more as an Elvis Presley.

The real oppression is coming from the music industry, today, which found a way to
make a formula for the music of the Sixties and sell it. The music corporation is analogous to the corporate takeover of our media and government.

Frank Hamilton

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: M.Ted
Date: 25 Jul 08 - 11:15 PM

I think that one of the most amazing things that has happened(but not in a good way) is the way that the 60's "protest" music (another term I dislike, but use for lack of anything better) disappeared from our nostalgia obsessed media culture--

You'll see the headbands and love beads, Peter Maxx and the cover of Sgt. Pepper, but you won't hear "Eve of Destruction" or "The Times they are a Changin'", and all you'll hear of Dylan is "Knocking on Heaven's Door", and Joan Baez is a one hit wonder who sang "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down"--

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: Suffet
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 01:02 AM

Re: Today, songs need to be written about the oppression and torture of Guantanamo, the needless deaths of military service people, the robbing of the American public by greedy corporate interests, the stealing of elections, and the oppression of the fundamentalist religious. Not all songs need to be about these issues but there is not an abundance of good material today coming out.

I beg to differ. There certainly is an abundance of such good material coming out today. Wonderful material, in fact. Have you ever heard the songs of David Rovics? Or of Sue Jeffers? Evan Greer? Pat Humphries and Sandy Opatow? Holly Near? Kristen Lems? Joel Landy? Ethan Miller and Kate Boverman? Patricia Shih? Luci Murphy? Joe Jencks? Anne Feeney? Ruth Pelham? Judy Gorman? Charlie King? Dean Stevens? Jay Mankita? Tom Nielson? Bev Grant? Jon Fromer? Spook Handy? Or our own Mudcatter Lorcan Otway?

If not, it's because most of them have been given short shrift by many folk music clubs, societies, and festivals. They struggle to be heard, not because of lack of talent, but because what they have to say hits very hard, apparently too hard for booking committees who wax ecstatic over the battles of 50, 60, or 100 years ago, by who shy away from any controversy today.

Enough said. Go and listen to some of the singers I mentioned and you will understand what I mean.

--- Steve

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 01:12 AM

"you won't hear "Eve of Destruction" or "The Times they are a Changin'""

... and you won't get out alive if you try to perform those songs "in yer local flok club"...

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: Suffet
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 10:59 AM

... and you won't get out alive if you try to perform those songs "in yer local flok [sic] club"...

Exactly my point! But you won't have any rotten tomatoes tossed your way, figuratively or literally, if you sing a song about an 1882 coal miners' strike or a song bemoaning fate of the poor lads conscripted into Queen Anne's War. It's only songs about contemporary oppression and injustice that raise their ire.

Which is why in the USA there has slowly but surely been developing a network of venues friendly to contemporary political folk music, as well as to other kinds of muisc. The oldest among them is the Peoples' Voice Cafe in New York City. Others include the Vox Pop in Brooklyn, one of NYC's outer boroughs; the the Good Coffee House, also in Brooklyn; Howland Cultural Center in Beacon, New York; the Echo Lake Coffee House in Leverett, Massachusetts; the Circle Coffee House in Boston; the Folk Factory in Philadelphia; and I believe also the Freight and Salvage in Berkeley, California.

Most of these venues also present non-political music. For example, the Good Coffee House host an old-time and bluegrass festival each September. Nevertheless, they are place where a political folk musician can feel welcome, not just tolerated -- or worse.

--- Steve

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: bankley
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 11:36 AM

first of all it takes balls.... then the skill to pull it off, a certain proficiency with not only the lyric but the music as well.. so that the listener is engaged at different levels... there are a lot of people doing this but they are rarely heard in the 'mainstream'... Buffy Ste-Marie is still beating the drum.. she's one of the better known... Dixie Chicks stumbled into controversy with on-stage remarks about the Prez.. That made them personas non grata in Nashville, but also expanded their audience.. a good site to check out is Justice Through Music Project out of DC.. www.JTMP.org    a lot going on there, and of course Pacifica Radio.. one of my favorites is Jim Page from Oregon... anyhow, I think that it's still important that Truth not only speaks to Power, but sings as well.... , more than ever with what's going on in the world.....

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: Suffet
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 01:35 PM

.... then the skill to pull it off, a certain proficiency with not only the lyric but the music as well.

The people I mentioned above -- and the list is by no means complete -- are all performers with immense talent and achievement. I challenge anyone to tell me that Joe Jencks, Pat Humphries and Sandy Opatow, Jay Manikita, Bev Grant, etc. lack the requisite level of musical proficiency. That's not the issue. The problem is the graylist.

Unlike the blacklist of yore, the graylist bans certain topics rather than individual performers. I have even heard of singers who were told they could have a major booking, provided they stuck to traditional songs, or included at most one or two contemporary topical songs on "safe" issues such as the environment or equal pay. At the same time they were told point blank to steer clear of anything about current labor struggles, police brutality, the Iraq war, torture, Israel and Palestine, or gay and lesbian rights.

--- Steve

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: bankley
Date: 26 Jul 08 - 02:32 PM

I'm not familiar with these people.., Steve, so wasn't commenting on their talent.... I will keep an eye and ear out for them down the road...as I said there are many who are actively engaged and largely ignored...   bless them all.... R.

Subject: RE: Music and oppression
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 27 Jul 08 - 08:53 AM

"graylist bans certain topics"

So now we have, not 'pinko people', but 'pinko topics'?

:-)