Pete Seeger
Pete Seeger
Peter "Pete" Seegerwas an American folk singer and social activist. A fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s, he also had a string of hit records during the early 1950s as a member of the Weavers, most notably their recording of Lead Belly's "Goodnight, Irene", which topped the charts for 13 weeks in 1950. Members of the Weavers were blacklisted during the McCarthy Era. In the 1960s, he re-emerged on the public scene as a prominent singer of protest music...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionFolk Singer
Date of Birth3 May 1919
CityNew York City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
Not everybody has to sing the melody.
I have come to the conclusion that there is nothing good that doesn't have bad consequences and nothing bad that doesn't have good consequences.
Some folklorists just collected dead bones from one graveyard, only to bury them in another, their library.
To everything there is a season.
But I decline to say who has ever listened to them, who has written them, or other people who have sung them.
Work in nightclubs was interesting. There were interesting people and places, but by and large, the commercial music experience.
Way back in the old days, say in Europe of the Middle Ages, you had an aristocracy, and they could afford to pay for musicians. The kings and queens had musicians in the castles, and that developed into symphony orchestras and what we call "Classical music" now.
All songwriters are links in a chain.
The real meaning of courage was the personal sacrifice of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King.
You'd be surprised how many stupid mistakes I've made. I make stupid mistakes all the time, and some of them have been very big stupid mistakes.
There is an old Arabic proverb, 'When the king puts the poet on his payroll, he cuts off the tongue of the poet', so throughout the ages, people in power have liked to control music, they used to throw songwriters in jail throughout history, and were assassinated.
A productive mistake is: (1) made in the service of mission and vision; (2) acknowledged as a mistake; (3) learned from; (4) considered valuable; (5) shared for the benefit of all.
I was never enthusiastic about being somebody who was supposed to be silent about being a member of something.
Throughout history, the leaders of countries have been very particular of what songs should be sung. We know the power of songs.