“In the mid 1990s I was raising money for the film about Bread and Puppet which I made with Tamar Schumann. I sent a request for funding to Pete. Practically in the return mail, he sent a check for $100, signed by both him and Toshi. He drew a little banjo next to his signature. I never had the heart to cash it and have it still.”
In it I’d weave the bravery
Of women giving birth
And in it I would weave the innocence
Of children of all the earth, children of all the earth
Pete played on songwriter Tom Pacheco’s album There was a Time. “About nine months later he called me up to sing and play on his Seeds III album,” says Pacheco. “What makes that evening and afternoon of the recording session really stand out was, it was the very day it came on television, breaking news of the Shock and Awe campaign in Iraq. Pete was doing a new version of “Bring ‘Em Home,” among other songs, and both of us walked out of the studio at Scott Petito’s and were watching the bombing in Baghdad. 70 percent of all Americans were in favor of that war at that time, and Pete looked at me and both of us were shattered.” Pete was going to have to pick up the hammer again.
“I was at his house the following October and Toshi came over with a huge basket of laundry and asked Pete if he would hang up the laundry and I gave him a hand, in his back yard where he had a clothesline. Pete lived on a mountain facing the Hudson River. So I’m hanging up laundry, he’s hanging up laundry, and I realize I’m hanging up Pete Seeger’s old long johns. We were talking politics and folk music, I’m asking him questions about Cisco Houston, who died about 1960. The wind was blowing and we’re just hanging up clothes. It was a precious moment in my life.”
Show my brothers and sisters my rainbow design
I would bind up this sorry world
With hand and my heart and mind
Hand and heart and mind
Woodstock banjo legend Bill Keith began studying the instrument from Seeger’s book, How To Play The 5-String Banjo, in 1957, “one of the early editions with the yellow cover,” he says. And though he knew Seeger well, from early Newport Folk Festivals and that they kept in touch, he says, “There was only one time when I had a chance to play music with him…at the Albany Airport. He was with his grandson Tao, andI was on my way to Detroit…So here I am walking through the security line and I notice two long neck banjos sticking up in the air. We got through security and ended up at the same gate for the same flight. Of course they gave him permission to carry his banjos on. Here we were at the gate and he whips out his banjo and Tao gives me his and we just played some.
He bought a set of four tuning pegs for a banjo he was giving to someone, and I said, these are on the house, and he said, no, no, I want to pay. So he sent me a check for $50, and I still have the check…”
Manna Jo Greene, an unswerving peace and environmental activist who’s now an Ulster County Legislator, worked as the Environmental Director for the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater. In a statement, Manna Jo said, “What was so special about Pete Seeger was that in a time of discord and pollution, he had the vision to understand that, if we all work together, we can create a world that works for everyone — where people live in harmony with each other and the environment…In the late 1960’s, when the Sloop Clearwater was built, the river was a fouled from one end to the other with raw sewage and industrial waste. In the early 1970’s, Pete and his friends sailed up and down the river, using the power of song to draw people to the river and inspire them to action…Whether it was workers rights, civil rights, world peace or environmental protection — right through to calling for a ban on fracking — Pete Seeger was at the forefront of every major movement for social justice and the environment in the past 75 years. His contribution is of global proportions and we were very blessed to have had him living and working right here in the Hudson Valley as he championed these many causes. Now that he has passed, it is up to all of us to be sure his legacy continues.”
Oh, had I a golden thread
And a needle so fine
I I would weave a magic strand
Of rainbow design, of rainbow design
