Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today

Subject: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Wesley S
Date: 03 May 00 - 08:57 AM

According to my newspaper - and they've been wrong before - Pete Seeger is 81 years old today. In my mind Pete is a natural resource like a great river or forest. We've been blessed to live in the same era as Pete Seeger. With his music he's exposed some of our greatest weaknesses and unearthed some of our most important strengths. God bless you Pete - and many more. What has Pete taught you??

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:39 AM

As far as music, and how to be as consistant as possible in an inconsitant world, he's taught me a lot. Happy B. Pete.

Rick

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: catspaw49
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:40 AM

Nicely said Rick....

Happy Birthday Pete.

Spaw

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Amos
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:48 AM

He taught me the words to "Last Night I had the Strangest Dream" -- one of the first times I realized that other people had those perceptions and feelings too -- I musta been about 8. He taught me that song is a great weapon for the betterment of life. He taught me to honor quiet heros like Authurine. HE taught me the Talking Union and a hundred or two other fine songs.

Every time I look around in my favorite early lessons, he's not far off. You hit it on the head, Rick -- we're lucky to have lived in his times.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:53 AM

Well, he and the Weavers got me into listening to folk music as well as just jazz and blues (and skiffle of course!)
I wish him many more productive years.
RtS

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:57 AM

Amos, (and Catspoo) we are SO lucky to have had him in our lives. He hates the cult of celebrity, and is embarrased at how much money royalties have brought him, but when you write songs like he does..there's not much you can do about it!

I think about younger folks who's heroes may be Bill Gates or Michael Jordan or one of the Backstreet Boys and I'm SO glad that I discovered Pete when I was 14.

Rick

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 May 00 - 10:01 AM

Not to mention some of the best childrens' songs ever! Happy bday, Peter the Greatest in MY book!

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Sean Belt
Date: 03 May 00 - 10:30 AM

I am happy and proud to say that I am what and who I am today because of Pete Seeger's influence on my early life, musically, politically, and humanly.

Happy birthday, Mr. Seeger. And a wish for many more to come.

- Sean

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: jeffp
Date: 03 May 00 - 10:31 AM

We all owe Pete a great debt of gratitude. A fitting tribute would be to sing someone a song. Happy Birthday Pete!

jeffp

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Mooh
Date: 03 May 00 - 10:38 AM

...and many, many more! The song is mightier than the sword! Peace, and Happy Birthday! Mooh.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: kendall
Date: 03 May 00 - 11:01 AM

he gave me my first clawhammer lesson back in 1969. The man is an angel on earth.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Peter T.
Date: 03 May 00 - 11:01 AM

As an environmentalist, I would like to say that apart from everything else he has done, he has been a stalwart for the Earth, and the Hudson River specifically. He was singing environmental songs, Malvina's and others, and doing something about it, long before anyone else much cared. Happy Birthday, Pete.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Mark Clark
Date: 03 May 00 - 11:08 AM

What has Pete taught me? Let's see...

In 1951, he taught me to sing "Goodnight Irene" and "On Top Of Old Smokey." Ten years later he taught me a lot about accompanying folks songs on guitar with his "Folksinger's Guitar Guide." He gave me my first introduction to playing the banjo, he gave me many hundreds of hours of enjoyable listining, he is a personal inspiration to us all, he reinforced a whole new value system for me, he taught us you don't have to compromise. He also demonstrated that one can fill a hall with thousands of people who don't know or care about each other and get them all holding hands and singing together inside of twenty minutes. I've never seen anyone with the sort of magnetic hold on an audience that Pete has. He is truly a national, no a WORLD treasure.

Happy birthday Pete.

      - Mark

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Wesley S
Date: 03 May 00 - 11:13 AM

Pete was "world music" before there was such a term.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Dani
Date: 03 May 00 - 01:04 PM

Can I make a humble suggestion? Let's all, as a birthday gift for Pete, find a way to celebrate that makes another ripple outside our Mudcat selves.

I pledge to make a gift of his recordings of songs for children to a special child care center in my town. I'd love for more kids to hear him tell AbiYoYo and sing about the Foolish Frog.

What say y'all?

Dani

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: BlueJay
Date: 03 May 00 - 01:24 PM

Good, Dani. Pete's music needs to be spread, and it doesn't take much special effort. Twenty years ago, i was playing Abi Yo Yo for my daughter. Recently, she approached me asking, "Dad, do you still have that old Pete Seeger album"? She wanted to play it for her own young son, especially Abi Yo Yo. Happy birthday Pete, wherever you are. That's good enough for me!
BlueJay

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Dani
Date: 03 May 00 - 01:36 PM

Done!

You can click on the dancing Mudcat and send a gift of music or words, and support the 'cat at the same time.

What are some other ways we can honor Pete?

Dani

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Doctor John
Date: 03 May 00 - 01:37 PM

Happy birthday Pete! Years ago via a 10" LP he indirectly taught me to play the banjo. I haven't progressed much since but I still enjoy trying. I've written to him a couple of times with queries, obtaining his adress from his "American Folksongs" book (he hadn't moved)- and he's always curteous enough to reply with all the help he can give. He helped me locate some long forgotten recordings a few years ago. Thanks, Dr John

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Hollowfox
Date: 03 May 00 - 02:49 PM

Back in the Pleistocene (Vietnam War era), I was thinking of moving to Canada. I'd just visited there on a camping trip with my grandparents, and liked what I saw. I was listening to the CBC radio station from Toronto regularly (lived far enough north to do this), and so heard a less USA-centric vwesion of the world news. There seemed to be All Kinds of reasons for me to move to a beter place. (The draft was not a factor, thank heavens) Then I read Pete's "Appleseeds" article in the (then) latest issue of Sing Out!. He pointed out that it was one thing to flee the country to save your life, but if you were just leaving because you didn't like the conditions in the place you were living, well, it was like moving to a new house because your current house was dirty, rather than cleaning up the mess. I started thinking about why I wanted to move, and although I still love Canada, I've stayed here, cleaning up what messes I can. IMHO, Pete is one of those few people in the world who are as good as their world, living by their principles, whether it's comfortable to do so or not. Right there with Francis of Assisi.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Sandy Paton
Date: 03 May 00 - 05:39 PM

Pete epitomizes integrity -- musical, political, personal. Think of the impact he has had on the popular culture of, not just the U.S., but of the world. Would that we all had his courage and his concern for others.

Sandy

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Rex
Date: 03 May 00 - 06:39 PM

What's it say on his banjo? "This machine surrounds hate and forces it to surrender." Happy Birthday Pete, keep the strings ringing.

Rex

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: DonMeixner
Date: 03 May 00 - 06:46 PM

Pete Seegar never taught me any music but his red banjo book helped me learn to play. I haven't always liked his stuff but I have always admired his musicallity. He never taught me politics or swayed me politically because we seldom agree completely. But I have watched him and listened to him for nearly 40 years and in doing so I have learned how to perform from him. I have learned to to study and to know my sources and to research completely. I have learned to see both sides and hear the others opinion , even if I didn't agree with it. But mainly I have learned integrity from him and thats what makes him a remarkable man.

Don

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 May 00 - 08:37 PM

"Sometimes it seems that we have to keep fighting the same battles over and over. But every now and then the mist does rise and we can see how far we have come...

"Each step forward came as the result of enornmous work and courage, some bloodshed, and mjhsic like tghis which kept people's spirits alive."

(From Pete's introduction to Carry it on! - a history in song and picture of the working men and women of America.)

Any time something happens that makes you want to give up on America - whether you're an American or not - think of Pete Seeger. It's like the story in the Bible where Abraham is bargaining with God to save Sodom and Gomorrah, and they get down to needing five righteous men to justify saving place. Pete Seeger would justify saving America on his own.

But the real hope is that, right across America and round the world, there are people essentially like him, and nobody knows about them - and that is what he would probably say if he was reading this thread.

Maybe he is. HAPPY BIRTHDAY PETE!!

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: GUEST,Pat Lamanna
Date: 03 May 00 - 08:45 PM

At last June's Gathering of the People's Music Network I sang a song I wrote eleven years ago and sang for the first time, coincidentally, on Pete's 70th birthday. I hadn't sung it in public for a long while, but I was encouraged when Charlie King, among others, praised it. I'll post the words here, if anyone cares, and you can e-mail me at [e-mail] if you'd like a copy with the music. I don't know if Pete ever heard the recording of the workshop where I sang the song (it was a workshop of "Songs of Pete Seeger," led by Ben Tousley), but maybe he'll see it if it's here. I hope he sees all the other wonderful wishes sent to him today. The title, "Keep Him Singing," refers to a button his supporters wore in the early 60's, when Pete was being interrogated by the House Un-American Activities Committee. He didn't take the Fifth Amendment, as many did, to protect him from self-incrimination. Pete invoked the First Amendment, Freedom of Speech, claiming that the Committee had no right to ask him those questions in the first place.

I'll tell you of a man, Pete Seeger is his name, His music and folksinging have earned him much fame. And I'll tell you a story 'bout the life that he's led The road that he's taken, few may dare to tread,

Chorus: So keep him singing, keep him singing, Keep that old guitar and banjo ringing. He hears our voice, he sings our song, Keep him singing by singing along.

In this land of the free he took many a bold stand, And found himself in prison, from stage and TV banned. But still he never wavered from the course he felt was right, He kept his light shining like a beacon in the night,

Chorus

Like a redwood in the forest, he stands so proud and tall, For peace, love, justice and dignity for all. Now some songs come and go, and some you outgrow, But his songs, like the rive, through our lives will ever flow,

Chorus

First verse, except last line: The road that he's traveled, we all may dare to tread.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Little Neophyte
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:14 PM

I would say Pete Seeger's teachings are timeless because I am just beginning to learn everything Pete has to offer.
He is a guiding light for me into a world of music I want to know everything about.
Happy Birthday Pete,

Little Neo

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Billy the Bus
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:23 PM

Amen to all the above, To Pete - and all the Seeger family

Sam

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: JedMarum
Date: 03 May 00 - 11:48 PM

Happy B-day Pete, and thanks for years of great music!

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Frank McGrath
Date: 04 May 00 - 12:01 AM

Happy Birthday Pete Seeger.

The day you came into the world was a very special day. It is a day we all celebrate.

FMcG

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 May 00 - 01:23 PM

"It is a day we all celebrate."

Pete Seeger Day, on the 3rd of May. I like it! (Someone check it's accurate could you? Then we can all send each other cards and greetings and have events...

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: L R Mole
Date: 04 May 00 - 01:39 PM

Pete showed me how powerful music can be when commenting on the older and powerful...now if I could only absorb his grace and generosity toward the young, I might be somewhere. Happy Seeger Day, all.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: pastorpest
Date: 04 May 00 - 01:41 PM

"Hard Hitting Songs for Hard-Hit People" recently republished by the University of Nebraska Press (about $16 US: what a bargain!) contains a great afterword by Pete Seeger entitled "Aferword 1999". For his consistent loyaly to justice, to folk music and folk musicians Pete Seeger is a model to follow. I agree with use the word "integrity" about him.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Amergin
Date: 04 May 00 - 02:30 PM

Pete taught me the value of history, of standing up to social injustice, of what it means to be a citizen of this planet. Happy belated birthday, Pete, don't know what we would have done without you.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 04 May 00 - 04:49 PM

Sandy, wouldn't Pete be SOOOOOO embarrassed by all this? He'd be out lookin' for a log to chop before any of us got into our second sentence!

Don't matter though. I LOVE that man. He's contributed so much to my life, I wouldn't even know where to start.

So have you Sandy. (now go chop a log!!)

Rick

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 May 00 - 04:52 PM

Here's a link to The Mudcat Cafe Biography of Pete Seeger - and since that says May 3rd 1919, that's good enough for me.

So May 3rd is Pete Seeger Day. I've marked it in my diary from now on.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Wesley S
Date: 04 May 00 - 05:01 PM

We would probabally have to wait until after Pete is gone but wouldn't it be nice if we would get large or small groups of people together on this day to sing songs together? The kind of songs that Pete sang and spent his life spreading around the world?

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: GUEST,Beachcomber
Date: 04 May 00 - 05:24 PM

When I first heard tell of Pete Seeger, in London back in the early 60s, I was amazed at the way he wound a philosophy into his songs and I, ve always admired him for that, he taught me, a young irishman abroad finding still some prejudice in the remnants of Imperial Britain that those attitudes could be confronted and "overcome" . He is a great man. But the biggest thing I've learnt from him was to love my own culture and never again to hear it ridiculed or denigrated. Funny, nearly all the people who loved his type of songs, in the London of those years, had the same philosophy too. Beannacht Day ort, fear ghal.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Peter Kasin
Date: 05 May 00 - 02:47 AM

He taught me to love folk music. When I was five, my mother took my sister and I to one of his free children's concerts at Live Oak Park in my hometown of Berkeley. Each successive time we went to see him, mom would buy us a ten-inch Folkways album of him, or a compilation with him on it. Those albums and concerts were a part of my upbringing. Kids being kids, I thought his name was "Pete Singer."Many years later, I learned that he was doing those park concerts at a time when he was blacklisted from performing in many concert halls. He has the greatest knack for getting people to sing and not feel self-conscious about it, another influence on me.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: georgeward
Date: 05 May 00 - 03:32 AM

Another real original - a one-of- his-kind artist whose name pops up in these threads - once said to me (almost out of nowhere, as I recall it), "The easiest thing in the world would be to become a parody of myself."

Pete has never done that. At eighty-one he is still soaking up and spinning out ideas, shaping them into songs, bringing audiences together, living his ideals (and being willing to accept the consequences -good or bad - of having those ideals), being -sometimes-outrageously playful. He's still engaged in engaging US.

I picked up my NY Times Thursday, and there he was, first page of the arts section in the weekend-events banner, doing a free concert at Cooper Union in NYC on Saturday. My bet is that he will find a deft way to snap those who go seeking nostalgia into whatever present presently has him fired up. He usually does.

And, best I can tell, his discomfort with his own celebrity is absolutely real. A Pete Seeger Day is a great idea - at least in a grass-roots, informal way. But I'd fully expect to find Pete far from the center of it, deep in a discussion of the need for action on an issue, or starting a spontaneous jam someplace, picking up the trash or picking up a new idea (leading us, by example, to do the same). That, come to think, is something I've learned from him.

"Oh! Had I a golden thread..." Peter, you have. If you haven't bound up this whole sorry world...well...neither has anyone else. But you have taught us the importance of trying.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: kendall
Date: 05 May 00 - 09:26 PM

I've had the pleasure of meeting so many great people in my life, I'm really grateful. Among them are Pete Seeger, and George Ward..I love your song "You gotta talk my language." You may not remember me, we met at Indian Neck back in the mid-70's..or was it Niskuna?

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: kendall
Date: 05 May 00 - 09:28 PM

you gave me the words to Matt McGinns, Grig a lee, which I recorded on one of Gordon Boks February tapes.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Bluebeard
Date: 05 May 00 - 11:08 PM

It is an honour to wish Pete Seeger a Happy 81st Birthday! I discovered Mr Seeger when I was 14 too. He was an inspiration, THE folk singer whose book helped me learn the banjo. He is a very special person, God Bless him.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: georgeward
Date: 06 May 00 - 03:48 AM

Kendall, I do indeed remember you. Niskayuna it was, maybe Indian Neck, too. And I share your gratitude for this web of music, friendship, ideals and BS that binds us all together. We're a privileged lot to know one another, that's certain. Glad you're still a part of it all!

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Sorcha
Date: 06 May 00 - 04:14 AM

What did/has Pete taught me? everything, mon, everything.Not in the least, like my friend Herb(88) that growing old doesn't stop being young......wish Pete could see this thread, and know that there are people who understand his aversions.........Happy Birthday Peter, and may those that come be as well recieved as this one. Hard to believer you're 81, my friend.

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: Jeri
Date: 06 May 00 - 07:39 AM

Pete would be someone I looked up to whether he was famous or not. There are many lesser-known heroes who are celebrated in their own neighborhoods. It's just when your job involves singing in front of millions of people over the years, you tend to get well known. Pete's neighborhood is just really big.

Pete truly loves people; he has principles and sticks to them, and has done everything within his power to make the world a better place. He has taught people that they have a voice, and the right to use it.

To a good friend and neighbor I've never met - Happy Birthday!

Subject: RE: Pete Seeger's Birthday - 81 today
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 May 00 - 06:06 PM

If you don't let red-baiting break you up,
If you don't let stool-pigeons break you up,
If you don't let vigilantes break you up,
And if you don't let race hatred break you up -

You'll win - what I mean is, take it easy - but take it.

Still as true as ever, and we still need to learn it by heart.