Courtesy
of the Boston Public Library, Print Department
A member of the Community Church of New York, Pete Seeger
was born to a musicologist and a music teacher, both faculty
members of the Juilliard School in New York, NY; as a Philadelphia
Inquirer reporter later wrote, it was a family "whose
chromosomes fairly burst with music." Music and activism blended
naturally for Seeger, who at sixteen saw a performance that
has since directed his life.
As Seeger recalled: "In 1935 I was sixteen years old, playing
tenor banjo in the school jazz band. I was uninterested in
the classical music which my parents taught at Juilliard.
That summer I visited a square dance festival in Asheville,
North Carolina, and fell in love with the old-fashioned five-string
banjo, rippling out a rhythm to one fascinating song after
another." Whereas most popular music seemed sappy or trivial
to Seeger, these songs seemed frank, straightforward, honest.
Folk music's new convert was to become its greatest proselyte.
"I liked the rhythms," Seeger said. "I liked the melodies,
time tested by generations of singers. Above all, I liked
the words."
Courtesy of the
Boston Public Library Print Department
Seeger returned to boarding school at Avon Old Farms in Avon,
Connecticut, where he dabbled in Marxism, music, and journalism,
doing well enough in his studies to matriculate at Harvard
in 1936. Harvard's sociology department proved a weaker attraction
than the life of a traveling musician; Seeger left college
in the middle of his sophomore year, setting out to absorb
American folk music straight from its roots in communities
across the country. Helater explained that he got too interested
in extracurricular activities to remain in school, commenting
that if he were at Harvard, he would study languages, anthropology,
and geography.
However, like Edwin Land and Bill Gates,
Seeger did quite well with just half of a Harvard College education.
Swapping watercolor paintings for food and shelter, Seeger traveled
all around the United States, learning "a little something from
everybody" as he sought to master the five-string banjo and
internalize the folk traditions he'd come to love. On the road
Seeger met Woody Guthrie and Huddie Ledbetter, who both became
strong influences and collaborators in Seeger's early career.
In addition to churches, migrant camps, and everything between,
Seeger made his way to the Library of Congress, where he fortified
his background in folk music as an assistant in the Archive
of American Folk Song.
A
dove of peace returns to Pete Seeger's hand at a New
York Theater Guild peace rally in 1969. Courtesy
of the Boston Public Library, Print Department
Seeger, Guthrie, and others formed Seeger's first group,
the Almanac Singers, in 1940. Seeger and Guthrie traveled
throughout the United States and Mexico as singer-activists,
bolstering labor movements with song as they blended activism
and folk music. In 1942, Seeger joined the Army, where he
continued to play and sing, performing for his fellow soldiers
and picking up "soldier songs" as he could.
Discharged a corporal in 1945, Seeger founded
People's Songs, Inc., a musicians' union through which he hoped
to bind labor movements and folk music in a relationship that
would advance both. People's Songs eventually grew to 3,000
members, and Seeger remained involved in politics, campaigning
for 1948 Progressive candidate Henry A. Wallace and helping
to establish the musical side of labor organizing.
In 1948 Seeger co-founded The Weavers,
a folksinging quartet with which he recorded such classics as
"If I Had a Hammer," "Kisses Sweeter than Wine," and "On Top of
Old Smoky." Seeger also toured extensively on his own, helping
to establish the Newport (Rhode Island) Folk Festival and selling
out such venues as Carnegie Hall.
Courtesy
of the Boston Public Library, Print Department
His position in mainstream music was stifled by blacklisting,
however, as controversy surrounding his ties to the Communist
Party led major television networks to keep him off the air.
The House Committee on Un-American Activities called Seeger
to hearings in 1955; instead of citing the Fifth Amendment as
grounds for silence, Seeger cited the First, a move for which
he was sentenced to a year in jail for contempt of court. Citing
his unconditional willingness to share his music regardless
of supposed political alliances -- Seeger even offered to play
a song for the court. Needless to say, the committee declined.
Although his sentence for contempt was soon overturned, Seeger
remained blacklisted by many organizations -- briefly including
even his alma mater, which finally invited him to Cambridge
when students protested this prohibition. Nonetheless, he remained
firm in his love of sharing music. "I'd sing for the John Birch
Society or the American Legion, if they asked," he said. "So
far they haven't."
Courtesy
of Emilio Rodriguez
Seeger continued playing in spite of political controversy,
recording such hits as "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?"
and "Turn, Turn, Turn." His clear and catchy singing and his
mastery of the five-string banjo -- as well as steel drums
and several other instruments -- have won him tremendous popularity.
As Seeger wrote to his Harvard classmates in 1990: "Have been
a traveling, performing singer and songwriter for fifty years,
in every state of the union and thirty-five foreign countries.
Fortunate to have a family that stuck by me, even when I traveled
too much, or got into political hot water." "Life has been
easier on me than any lazy person like myself has the right
to expect."
The musician's work has since extended to environmentalism
and folklorist studies of America's music. Among other projects,
Seeger has helped to organize the Hudson River Sloop Restoration,
Inc., for which he raised over $60,000 to build a genuine
Hudson River sloop, Clearwater. Clearwater now
spearheads "sloop festivals," at which residents of the Hudson's
banks collaborate to address pollution in the River and elsewhere.
Whether in songwriting, musicology, or activism, Seeger has
enjoyed a life dedicated to music and to humanity, winning
thousands of admirers and greatly influencing folk music and
activism alike. He currently lives on the Hudson River with
his wife of nearly sixty years, in a cabin the couple and
some friends constructed decades ago, enjoying his surroundings
and still performing from time to time.
