Peggy Seeger 2023 Interview Talking About Elizabeth Cotten And "Freight Train"

Peggy Seeger 2023 interview talking about Elizabeth Cotten and "Freight Train"

Hi! Your knowledge of folk is astounding, may i ask how long have you been into it/doing research on it?

I've always loved folk music! It's what my mom listened to as i was growing up, and my dad listeners to a lot of old country (I absolutely hated it at the time but i really like it now)

not to get too personal, but i went through something really traumatic 3 years ago, and i didn't have anything to depend upon. except for music. i would obsessively listen to folk-punk and socialist folk music to vent my frustration. folk-punk remains one of my favorite genres, but the history steeped in traditional folk made me gravitate towards that instead.

there's something so special and validating about hearing "radical, new, progressive ideas" from music from the 30s. it makes me feel like I belong in this world. So im just obsessed with it. I'm obsessed with the kindness and love and the radical ideas presented in these older songs.

i also just like archives in general, and I'm always doing research into something, whether it's documentation of intersex people throughout history, transgender newsletters, historical fashion of the late victorian era, Californian impressionism, old maps. I'm just a really curious person. folk music is just the culmination of all my favorite things.

-alternative music

-radical politics

-history between 1900-1960

combined with the fact that many archives have tons of yummy and plentiful information on this topic, and I get to listen to my favorite music while I do research. oh, and a lot of folk music relates to my favorite book, "The Grapes of Wrath," which I loved as a kid, so that's definitely part of it.

i guess I've been really into it for 5 years now?

Song of the day

(do you want the history of your favorite folk song? dm me or submit an ask and I'll do a full rundown)

"This Land Is Your Land" Woody Guthrie, 1940

the melody is originally based on "When the World's on Fire" by the Carter family, 1933, which was based on the older song and melody "What You Gonna Do When the World's on Fire" by the Birmingham Jubilee Singers, 1928

woody Guthrie's song was written in response to the song "God Bless America" by Irving Berlin in 1938 (the original version was written in 1918) and performed by Kate Smith. He was tired of hearing it on the radio.

Like many of Woody's songs, "This Land is Your Land" is explicitly pro-worker and anti-exploitation. You could even argue that it's explicitly anti-private property. As this song got sanded down for the mainstream, its more radical themes and messages were somewhat forgotten, and it became a general patriotic song for children and adults to enjoy, the very thing that Guthrie sought to criticize in the first place.

there are many covers of this song for many different countries, but my favorite version is the live one by Pete Seeger performed in 1976, where he talks about its history as a socialist song and invites the audience to sing along with him.

sorry its gotta be one of the faggiest pictures ive ever seen

Appalachian folk musician Jean Ritchie, known as the 'Mother of Folk' (1922-2015)

bob dylan and joan baez, june 6th, 1982