Politics and Social Justice Songs

Subject: Politics and Social Justice Songs Suggestions Pls
From: RS
Date: 25 Feb 99 - 10:13 PM

Hi to all,

I have been asked to songlead for a women's group evening of "prose & poetry readings and music", on the theme of "Politics and Social Justice". Your suggestions for songs to include would be most appreciated. If you have references to the sources, that would also be very helpful. (e.g. on DT? other web address? or easily available songbook? etc.)

Thanks in advance!

- RS

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 03:33 AM

"Bread and Roses" is in the DT. It's from the Lawrence textile workers strike before World War I (was it 1912?). Another recent song about the women in the textile mills is Bob Coltman's "Weaver's Reverie," based on some words written by Harriet Farley, a mill girl, in the Lowell Offering, a newspaper published by the mill workers. You can hear the song on For All the Good People, a CD from Folk-Legacy, with Ed Trickett singing the lead and others joining in on the chorus. Great song!

Then you might consider exploring songs by Sarah Ogan Gunning like "Dreadful Memories" and "Girl of Constant Sorrow," songs from the struggle to organize the miners in Kentucky and West Virginia. I assume you are particularly interested in songs by or about women. You'll be getting a lot of fine suggestions from the Mudcatters!

Sandy

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 04:56 AM

I think you'll have no problem finding plenty in the DT, but a couple come to mind right away. "Black Waters" by Jean Ritchie tells of the strip mine destruction and the loss of mineral rights so common in the Appalachians and their foothills. Reasonably well known is Woody's "Deportees" which is still topical today, dealing with migrant workers and illegals. Both are in the DT.

catspaw

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: Wally Macnow
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 07:21 AM

If your looking for recordings, there's a great set entitled "Songs For Political Action" on the Bear Family label. 10 CDs and a 200+ page hardcover book covering the muisc of the American left during the period from 1926 to 1953.

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: Bert
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 09:05 AM

Search DT for [Tom Paxton]

Bert.

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: Peter Fisher
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 09:15 AM

Three collections of songs come to mind. RISE UP SINGING, put out by the folks at Sing Out in Bethlehem PA 1-800-493-7464, has words to 1200 songs including sections on freedom, ecoology, peace, struggle, unity, women and work. Includes a discography and chords for each song. Then there's Pete Seeger's book "Carry It On!" (Simon and Schuster) and Edith Fowke and Joe Glazer's "Songs of Work and Protest."

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 09:21 AM

A forum search should yield bounty if you look under "hardship and oppression" - I had a similar need last year which got lots of help from this great place!

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 09:40 AM

Well, this is a new song but done in a folk style. I really believe that one of the greatest challenges in the "Social Justice" category is the lack of personal responsibility for our actions. We've turned ourselves into a society of rationalization...whatever happened, "It's NOT my fault." And I don't run across many new songs that take the attitude that we all make our own beds, which is why I find this one so great. Check out "Prayer in Open D" by Emmylou Harris. It's lyrics are on several sites and I'd be happy to give them to you, but I can't seem to pull them up now for some reason...the main one being that I'm a computer idiot. On the Info Superhighway, I seem to have taken the first exit. When I figure it out, I will post here.

catspaw

Subject: Lyr Add: HERE'S TO YOU ROUNDERS (Don Lange)^^^
From: Art Thieme
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 10:32 AM

just a bit askew from your actual topic would be a fine song by Don Lange, still a fine singer but now making exceptional wine out in Oregon, called "Here's To You Rounders". Don allowed me to record it on my first LP for Kicking Mule,(KM-150), __Outright Boldfaced Lies__, even before he did that himself. Priscilla Herdman did it later and several others that don't come to mind right away. Don's version was on Flying Fish.

Chorus) Here's to you rounders and here's to you railroad bums,
Hopin' that you make it home soon,
And yhere's to the women who married for love,
And lived with the man in the moon.

I never knew my grandad, he was always on the bum,
Every September he'd grab him a southbound and he'd ride,
Then along about Christmas me and my brother, we would get a few coins in the mail,
But we couldn't spend 'em, it was all he could send, from the Mexico City jail.

Back in the '30s, when the going got tough, old grandad , he hit the road,
Mother was young then and only remembers his name,
Then granny got work in the old canning factory and she took in some wash on the side,
She promised herself that she'd never forgive him, a promise she kept 'til she died.

One time near the end he rolled into town, he was riding the Greyhound line,
I guess he got old and those boxcars got harder to climb,
He dropped his last dime in a call to my granny, but "NO" was her only reply,
She hung up the phone, and she cussed him in German but I saw the pain in her eyes.

I never knew my grandad, he was always on the bum,
The Salvation Army, they wrote us a note when he died,
Now me and my brother, we carry the memory of a face we never did see,
Like some foreign coin layin' cold in the pocket of a young boy's dirty blue jeans.

Social justice, huh? Art

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 12:07 PM

Nice song Art...I'll have to check it out.

And now I'll give you my best shot at the lyrics for Emmylou's "Prayer in Open D".......Here goes.

catspaw

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 12:11 PM

Well that ain't it...back to the drawing board. Wish I could figure out what that was though...Hey,uh, Wolfgang!!!

catspaw

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: jo77
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 01:49 PM

.. life can be cruel.... I could not even begin to sing that song Art. Used to be if you wanted the truth you could read the news then they got to lyin ...next you could listen to a folk singer ...then along came the Record Companies and their d****ed executives. Now the only place for truth is out here on the net.

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: Bert
Date: 26 Feb 99 - 02:36 PM

Jo77, You've almost got yourself a song there.

Bert.

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: Ferrara
Date: 27 Feb 99 - 04:43 AM

Take a look at "The Jute Mill Song," by Mary Brookbank. RUS p. 256. It's very singable and very moving. It's in the DT with tune. However. The tune as Brookbank wrote it is different for every verse, which is how Dick has entered it, but most people sing it the same in each verse. (I like it the way she wrote it.) The tune in the DT is about 90% accurate and may need tinkering. If you fall in love with the song I could fax you the sheet music, which Bruce O. gave to me some years ago.

Another very moving and singable song is Judy Small's "Mothers, Daughters, Wives," a feminist anti-war song, thereby covering two fields of protest at once. RUS p.162. Couldn't find it in the DT. A beautiful song.

Let us know what you sing and how it goes.

Subject: RE: Politics and Social Justice Songs
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 01 Mar 99 - 11:45 PM

I should have mentioned the song that Sounds Celebrating Resistance described (in a review) as a radical music anthem: Mudcatter Rick Fielding's "Voices of Struggle" on his fine Folk-Legacy CD, Lifeline (CD-123). You'll need to get the tune from some 'Catter who can do that sort of thing (Barbara?), but I'll bet we can talk Rick into posting his words. (Rick?) Of course you could order his CD, and that would be nice, too.

But let me also urge those of you who can afford it to go to Wally's Camsco Music web site and order the Bear Family boxed CD and Book set that he mentions above. It's an excellent collection of now quite rare recordings representing the history of our modern (past sixty years or so) songs of political action. Well worth the money!

Sandy