Woody Guthrie at 100: The New York Times Tells us to Feel Guilty Because We’re No Longer good Leftists
And of course, Downes loves Ry Cooder, the brilliant guitarist who — since his trips to Cuba — has become even more ultra-left-wing and who has a new album coming out blasting “Mutt Romney.” Mr. Downes likes these “bitter” songs, because he claims “someone has to sing them.”
So yes, Guthrie was a Red, but what Mr. Downes and others don’t get is that Woody’s music, like all good music, transcends its origins. He may have written “This Land” because he didn’t like Kate Smith singing “God Bless America”, but it too has become –rightfully so — a patriotic anthem to all Americans precisely because it is not narrowly political. For some years, it was even sung at the Bradley Awards ceremonies, presented yearly at the same Kennedy Center where it will once again be sung.
As for Guthrie himself, contrary to those who say he was only “sympathetic” to the Communists, he was himself a card-carrying member.
The late Sis Cunningham and Gordon Freisen, who edited Broadside in the early ’60s, told me he was a member of the same Greenwich Village club as they were, and that he along with them were regularly assigned to sell The Daily Worker on street corners.
If you have any doubts, here’s what Woody himself wrote in an essay called “This Thing Called Socialism”:
The job to be done is to get this thing called socialism nailed and hammered up just as quick as we can. I believe this just as much as I believe my own name, and lots more. We’ve got to pay whatever it costs us to get socialism in here just as early as we can. This is that big job … Socialism is the only job worth wasting any time on or strength on. … The biggest thing that ever happened to me in my whole life was back in 1936 the day that I joined hands with the Communist Party. I’ll stick to my words, don’t you worry your head one minutes about that. (my emphasis)
Joining up with the CPUSA is what, if I may be frank, ruined his later work. There are scores of artists assigned to writing music to the lyrics in Guthrie’s archives that he never made up tunes for. You can listen to some of them in the two CDs out a few years ago with Billy Bragg and others. Does anyone really think that a song about the Communist Stetson Kennedy or the attempt of the U.S. to deport a real Soviet agent, which Guthrie objects to, is a work of art or that anyone else would ever sing them?
Balanced, fair, and revealing about those radical entertainers of today who are less consistent than Woody Guthrie. His picture (with his famous guitar sign is here along with the lyrics to one of his best songs, on deportees. I always found this moving. See http://clarespark.com/2010/09/29/stephen-colbert-goes-to-washington/.
There are scores of artists assigned to writing music to the lyrics in Guthrie’s archives that he never made up tunes for. You can listen to some of them in the two CD’s out a few years ago with Billy Bragg and others.
Several months before the fall of the Berlin Wall, I bought used Billy Bragg cassette. Among other songs, Billy Bragg sang “The Internationale-”the first time I had ever heard “The Internationale” sung. Ironic that several months after I first heard “The Internationale,” the Berlin Wall fell, confining “The Internationale” to the dustbin of history.
I also like Woody’s songs without adhering to the ideology behind the songs, perhaps because some of my relatives were Dust Bowl refugees. What he wrote in the 1930s still has some validity:
Except that thanks to years of leftists in power, California is not the paradise it used to be. But you still need the Do Re Mi.
I gave the Billy Bragg settings of Woody Guthrie’s lyrics half-a-listen and then gave up. They are awful. The beauty of the classic Guthrie songs is that they are based on, or in the best Socialist spirit, appropriate folk melodies.
Years ago I met Peggy Seeger (Pete’s half sister) and asked why she didn’t sing Woody Guthrie songs. She said she felt they lost so much without his beautiful Texas accent.I wish Mr Bragg had been so fore-bearing.
You got me interested in how rich the Boss is – http://bit.ly/Nj7ueC
pweh…… what a lot of tiresome ol’ droners………
Gonna listen to Justice, Don’t know their political persuasion, but I like their iconography……’)………
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y1_SCfLxLFA&feature=related
See: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704240504574585881108040134.html
Excellent, straightforward article about the last honest folkie. Strange about Arlo, though. Are you sure that’s right? Last guy I’d figure for a Republican.
Arlo has made it clear he hasn’t moved too far from the fold. Obviously, in response to the Downes article in The NY Times, he just posted the following on his website:
Here Comes The Kid
by adg on Thu Aug 23, 2012 3:06 am
“The statement that I have previously refused to join any union is completely false. As a matter of fact I belong to more than one local of the musician’s union – 802 in New York, and local 1000, the traveling musician’s union. Although I have disagreements with particular unions at times, I remain a union guy from head to toe. Although I am a registered Republican, it does not follow that I endorse or condone the ridiculous positions the Republican party has taken as of late. I have written extensively on many subjects as noted and will continue to speak out for a world where we can work together with anyone willing to put aside ideology for a practical reality – where government works for all the people equally. I am not one of those people who believes that government works best when it serves those with the most. I am out to fight that kind of absurd anti-Americanism with the songs I sing and the life I live.” – Arlo Guthrie
“I have written extensively on many subjects as noted and will continue to speak out for a world where we can work together with anyone willing to put aside ideology for a practical reality – where government works for all the people equally.”
Very sensible person, but entirely deluded to think that he can find a person on the left that can put aside ideology any more than they can live without breathing.
His Father was the perfect useful idiot…
Guthrie’s political delusions are nothing compared to his great songs.
To JF Sanders: The only reason that I would not call W. Gurthrie a useful idiot is that he knew what he was doing. Idealists who joing front groups and think world peace will result from Americans burning their draft cards useful idiots. A guy selling the Daily Worker is a Communist.