Piece Description

Program II: Folk Songs and Ballads – Bringing Folk Music Alive

This program evokes the exciting folk music revival of the 1950s and ‘60s. It starts at Seeger’s first musical group, The Almanac Singers, who sang labor, peace songs and anti-Nazi songs in 1941. The story continues as Seeger formed the Weavers, a best-selling musical group in the 1950s, before being blacklisted. Throughout controversy, Seeger promoted folk music from many American traditions, a musical Johnny Appleseed. The musical emphasis here is ethnomusicological, on old-timey banjo tunes and on pop-folk crossover songs of the Weavers (“Kisses Sweeter Than Wine,” “Goodnight Irene”).

Program Highlights:

• Behind-the-scenes stories from Pete Seeger, Bess Lomax, and Lee Hays about The Almanac Singers and The Weavers
• Previously secret files reveal a history of FBI and CIA surveillance of the Hootenany crowd.
• Interviews with Don McLean, The Weavers