When celebrated folk musician and political activist Pete Seeger died in 2014 at the age of 94, he left us not only with music that continues to resonate with listeners, but feeling inspired to make the world a better place by his fearless commitment to social justice and environmental issues.
In honor of Seeger’s 100th birthday on May 3, early celebrations are taking place all over the country, including here in the Pioneer Valley.
On Saturday, March 2, at 7 p.m., a free sing-along of Seeger’s music will be held at the Ashfield Congregational Church, 429 Main St. in Ashfield. Then on Thursday, March 7, at 7:30 p.m., acclaimed folk singer John McCutcheon will perform at the Mount Toby Friends Meeting House, 194 Long Plain Road in Leverett. McCutcheon is on tour in support of his recently released album, “To Everyone in All the World: A Celebration of Pete Seeger.”
The Wisconsin-born, Georgia-based McCutcheon is a celebrated folk singer who has received widespread recognition for his work, including six Grammy nominations. Last month, he released his 40th album (the Pete Seeger celebration), which is stylistically diverse and features many guest musicians including Steel Wheels, Hot Rize, BeauSoleil and Suzy Bogguss. The new disc has been extremely well received.
“It was great fun to do it and I think that showed,” McCutcheon said in a recent phone interview. “Plus, it’s Pete’s 100th birthday this year and I think a lot of people are missing Pete these days. People think of him as a singer-songwriter or a banjo player, but he was way, way more than that. Whatever honors are coming his way this year are well deserved.”
Tickets for the March 7 concert are $25 to $30 and are available at mttobyconcerts.wordpress.com.
McCutcheon’s connection to Seeger goes back to his childhood when, at the age of 11, his mother made him watch the March on Washington on television.
“The year was 1963 when I discovered folk music. Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and Peter, Paul and Mary were singing at the March on Washington,” McCutcheon recalled. “Peter, Paul and Mary sang, ‘If I Had a Hammer,’ which is a Pete Seeger and Lee Hays song, and the thing that got me about the song was that as the camera was panning the crowd, everyone was singing. Everyone knew all the words, like they were singing Happy Birthday or something.”
McCutcheon would later teach himself guitar from a Woody Guthrie songbook, and that was the beginning of his career in folk music — a career that frequently brought him in touch with Seeger, whom he considered a friend and mentor. Their paths crossed at various music festivals and — being that McCutcheon is also a strong activist — at a number of demonstrations.
“The thing with Pete is that he treated me like a peer from the moment that we met, which was ridiculous, because he was my elder in every way that word can be used,” McCutcheon said.
The two shared the stage many times, which proved to be a great learning experience for McCutcheon.
“I think anybody who is a performer studies Pete,” he said. “He transformed what a concert was, and he put new songs and new language in our mouths at the same time he was putting new ideas into our heads.”
“When you are a musician, you take notes when you go to other people’s concerts, and you are watching and learning,” he added. “Pete was the Jedi Knight of performance skills in folk music. He even affected people like Bruce Springsteen.”
McCutcheon, who is as much a storyteller as he is musician, knows how to put on an entertaining, yet thoughtful show. He is a talented multi-instrumentalist especially known for his work on the hammer dulcimer.
He has performed Seeger songs at his shows before, but now he is enjoying touring an entire album of his songs. “To Everyone In All the World: A Celebration of Pete Seeger” features songs like “If I Had a Hammer” and “Turn, Turn, Turn” that McCutcheon learned or heard before he was 20.
In 2012, McCutcheon released a tribute album marking Woody Guthrie’s 100th birthday. He followed that in 2015 by honoring the 100-year anniversary of the death of human rights activist Joe Hill.
“At that time, I asked myself, ‘What’s next on the horizon?’ And with Pete’s 100th birthday approaching, it then occurred to me that Pete was the third leg on that stool,” McCutcheon said.
The goal in making the album was not to do a museum piece, but to show how wide a range Seeger’s music had, and that these songs have meaning and relevance today. The many guest musicians are a group that McCutcheon has worked with in the past and they were all eager to participate in the project.
“I have found since touring this album that the singing in the audience has been spectacular,” McCutcheon said. “I’ve always done sing-alongs — it is one of the things that I learned from Pete, but this is different. In this fractured world we have now, to get into a room when you don’t know anything about the person next to you, except that they are there and chose to come, suddenly you are depending on each other. You are singing together. It’s a lesson in life.”
There will be plenty singing of Seeger’s songs in Ashfield this weekend, too, when the annual Pete Seeger sing-along takes place at the Ashfield Congregational Church. The Saturday show is being organized by Sarah Pirtle of Shelburne Falls who, like McCutcheon, knew and admired Seeger and found him to be a huge supporter of her work.
Pirtle has been organizing these yearly sing-along events every year since Seeger died.
“The first day I got the news in 2014, I called up lots of local folk singers who knew and loved Pete, and we performed that night,” Pirtle said. “This set up a pattern of having a company of over a dozen people, each taking turns and creating a real camaraderie.”
The songs will be led by a group of local singer-songwriters, many of whom also knew Seeger.
Lorre Wyatt, a well-known Greenfield folk singer, knew Seeger for more than 50 years and collaborated with him on his last recording of 16 songs called “A More Perfect Union.” He and Michael Nix will perform two songs that Wyatt co-wrote with Seeger. Other participating musicians include Peter Blood, Charlie King, Annie Hassett, Ben Grosscup, Sue Kranz, Yosl Kurland, Michael Nix, Ernie Hansche, Ben Tousley, and the brother and sister duo of Elias and Rosa Stegeman.
“This is a time for Pete’s spirit and songs to renew us and bind us together with songs he wrote and songs he loved to sing,” Pirtle said of the event.
Donations are welcome and will benefit the Carry It On Fund, which Seeger helped to start, and which supports Seeger concerts and other progressive causes. Doors open at 6:30 p.m.
Sheryl Hunter is a music writer who lives in Easthampton. Her work has appeared in various regional and national magazines. You can contact her at soundslocal@yahoo.com.