Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Happy Birthday, Pete Seeger!

When I was a kid, the Kingston Trio hit it big. (I have some comments here.) Another group I liked a lot was the Weavers (Seeger is second from the right in the group's photo on the left). I loved their big hit "Goodnight, Irene" in the early '50s when I was just a kid, and later I got their live double LP, which is still in my closet even now. One of the Weavers was, of course, Pete Seeger, who had already been singing for years, including a stint in the Almanac Singers with Woody Guthrie. Seeger was a huge influence on the Kingston Trio, and thousands of others. He's 87 today, and I wish him well.

4 comments:

Cap'n Bob said...

Man, I thought he was dead. Glad to know I was wrong. I loved the documentary made about The Weavers, "Wasn't That a Time."

mybillcrider said...

There's a great story about Seeger in the August 17 issue of The New Yorker.

Anonymous said...

Hang down your head, Tom Doooolleeeeey! Hang down your head and...

Anonymous said...

Good to see you chose that All the Weavers photo, with young Bernie Krause, the last slot-filler after Seeger quit the band (and the mildly-talented Erik Darling and the rather better Frank Hamilton had come and gone). Lee Hays and Fred Hellerman are dead, unfortunately (Hays, of course, not long after the WASN'T THAT A TIME documentary was completed), but as far as I know the rest are still with us. I note that the Wikipedia entry has persistently misspelled Darling's name, despite having a link to his website...I might take the time I shouldn't from work to go fix that soon...