Hammer Songs

We have three songs on this concert program that use a hammer as a central image. And there are more folk songs about hammers, like the Lead Belly classic “Take This Hammer”:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQxXtXondhw

Were Pete Seeger and Lee Hays thinking partly of John Henry when they chose a hammer to be the tool of justice in “If I Had a Hammer”? Maybe–they’re certainly talking about work that needs doing. It’s work that you can do all morning, all evening, and all over this land. Part of the reason the song has been so successful and has spread so far over the world (with versions in many different languages) is its lack of specificity. It requires something of the listener; it requires that we fill in the blanks: where do you see injustice that needs to be hammered out? What dangerous developments should you be calling attention to? What actions can you take to strengthen the love that binds us together so we can do our common work?

I first learned of Steve Earle’s friendship with Pete Seeger when I heard him singing “Bring Them Home” as the credits rolled in the Pete Seeger documentary, “The Power of Song.” Since most of us don’t have Pete Seeger’s work ethic, the vision in “Steve’s Hammer (for Pete)” of laying the hammer down seems appealing, especially if he’s laying the hammer down because the struggle is through and things have improved.
“When there ain’t no hunger and there ain’t no pain, I won’t have to swing this thing. When the war is over and the union’s strong, I won’t sing no more angry songs. When the air don’t choke you and the ocean’s clean and the kids don’t die for gasoline . . . one of these days I’m gonna lay this hammer down.” Earle covers a lot of ground in this song, and he traces this social justice work directly to the work of John Henry. Maybe it’s not just that he’s imagining John Henry’s work as having been on behalf of everyone and on behalf of justice but also that he’s entreating us to work as hard as John Henry worked (well, almost as hard, being mindful of our heart health).

News

“Midnight Special”

TrainLightLong

My original plan was to program “Midnight Special” last fall with our other train songs, since the Midnight Special is, well, a train. But as I thought about the words more, I started to like the idea of moving it to this spring, with our focus on social justice. Read more

News

“John Henry”

 

John_Henry

David Bromwich writes in the New York Review of Books, “Let me start with a proposition: the great social calamity of our time is that people are being replaced by machines” (“Trapped in the Virtual Classroom,” July 9, 2015). Read more

News

Sing, People, Sing! This Saturday at Uptown Bill’s

Our third Sing, People, Sing! session will be this Saturday, May 14, at Uptown Bill’s from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. We’ll be exploring the middle of the new songbook, Rise Again, with chapters on Healing and Letting Go, Home and Roots, Hope and Strength, Jazz and Swing, Love, Lullabies, Millennial Songs, and Motown and R & B.

The last two sessions in our Sing, People, Sing! series will be:

Session 4: Saturday, June 11, 3:00 to 5:00, at Uptown Bill’s
Musicals, Old-Timey & Bluegrass, Outdoors, Peace, Play, Pub Songs, Rich & Poor, Rock Around the Clock

Session 5: Sunday, June 26, 3:00 to 5:00, at the Senior Center
Seas & Sailors, Sing People Sing! Struggle, Surfin’ USA, Time & Changes, Travelin’, and Work

You can see a list of Rise Again songs by chapter by following this link:

https://www.riseupandsing.org/songs/lists/chapters

News

Sing, People, Sing!

Sing, People, Sing! Join us for a celebration of community singing as we welcome a new book, Rise Again, to the Rise Up Singing family. The Family Folk Machine will host a series of sing-alongs to introduce the new songbook and its almost 1200 songs. Come to one or come to all, look through the new book and pick out something you’d like the group to sing!

To help us get to know the new book better, we’ll assign a few chapters to each session and concentrate on those chapters.

Session 1: Saturday, April 9, 3:00 to 5:00, at Uptown Bill’s (part of Bill’s Birthday Bash)
Ballads & Old Songs, Blues, British Invasion & Rock, Country, Dignity & Diversity, Dreams & Mystery, Earthcare, and Faith

Session 2: Sunday, April 17, 3:00 to 5:00, at the Senior Center
Family, Farm & Prairie, Freedom, Friendship & Community, Funny Songs, Golden Oldies, Good Times, Gospel & Spirituals

Session 3: Saturday, May 14, 3:00 to 5:00, at Uptown Bill’s
Healing & Letting Go, Home & Roots, Hope & Strength, Jazz & Swing, Love, Lullabies, Millennial Songs, Motown and R&B

Session 4: Saturday, June 11, 3:00 to 5:00, at Uptown Bill’s
Musicals, Old-Timey & Bluegrass, Outdoors, Peace, Play, Pub Songs, Rich & Poor, Rock Around the Clock

Session 5: Sunday, June 26, 3:00 to 5:00, at the Senior Center
Seas & Sailors, Sing People Sing! Struggle, Surfin’ USA, Time & Changes, Travelin’, and Work

We’ll keep records of people’s requests and comments, and we’re planning to base our fall FFM program on songs from this book.

You can see a list of Rise Again songs by chapter by following this link:

https://www.riseupandsing.org/songs/lists/chapters

News

Press-Citizen column introducing FFM spring session

Press-Citizen

Published in the Press-Citizen on January 4, 2016: Songs carry new meaning over time

I hope that 2016 will be a year of raucous enthusiasm for live music in Iowa City. Every time I attend a show, it changes my life a little bit: hearing old songs made new, hearing brand new sounds, seeing people who love playing together. And there’s nothing like having that sort of learning, growing experience in the company of an enthusiastic crowd of your neighbors and friends. With young kids at home, it’s sometimes hard to make the effort to get out in the evening. If you’ve ever had that desire to stay on your couch, I hereby encourage you to get out and take in some live music.

We are lucky in Iowa City to have the Englert, a fantastic venue with a fantastic staff who know how to bring excellent artists to town. I love that the Englert brings us such big names but also hosts many free concerts throughout the year, and as the director of a community ensemble I have experienced the support that the Englert offers to community groups. Once the new Hancher building opens, we will have an even wider range of live music options to enjoy.

When Arlo Guthrie performed at the Englert this fall, he talked about the resonance a song acquires as it’s sung by different people in different situations through the years. Programming concerts for the Family Folk Machine gives me a reason to investigate the history of folk songs and the uses to which they have been put. A song like “O Mary, Don’t You Weep” comes down to us with many layers of meaning. It’s one of several spirituals that uses the Israelites’ escape from slavery in Egypt as a beacon of hope for the slaves in the United States who originally sang it. That message of hope brought the song forward into the Civil Rights movement, where it was used by movement singers. The song’s text provided the title for James Baldwin’s Fire Next Time, and the tune lent itself to new versions like “If You Miss Me from the Back of the Bus.”

In our upcoming session, the Family Folk Machine will be learning songs from the Civil Rights movement, songs about unions and the dignity of work, songs about hard times and the “rigged economy,” songs about peace in our towns, and songs about taking a stand and making your voice heard. Our focus coordinates with the University of Iowa’s theme semester on social justice. We can imagine “O Mary, Don’t You Weep” resonating with the memory of all the different situations in which it was sung in the struggle for justice; other songs bear witness to songs of struggle that have come before them. Steve Earle, in “Steve’s Hammer (for Pete),” sings “One of these days I’m gonna lay this hammer down . . . when there ain’t no hunger and there ain’t no pain, I won’t have to swing this thing . . . when the war is over and the union’s strong, I won’t sing no more angry songs.”

News
1 … 8 9 10 11 12 … 18