As a member of The Weavers, Seeger had a string of hits, including a 1949 recording of Leadbelly's "Goodnight Irene" that topped the charts for 13 weeks in 1950. He was formerly a member of the Communist Party of the United States of America and was a major contributor to folk and protest music in the 1950s and the 1960s.
Perhaps best known today as the author or co-author of the songs Where Have All the Flowers Gone, If I Had a Hammer, and Turn, Turn, Turn, songs that have been recorded by many artists both in and outside the folk revival movement and which are still sung all over the world. Flowers was a hit recording for The Kingston Trio (1962), Marlene Dietrich, who recorded it in English, German and French (1962), and Johnny Rivers (1965). "If I Had a Hammer" was a hit for Peter, Paul & Mary (1962) and Trini Lopez (1963), while The Byrds popularized "Turn, Turn, Turn" in the mid-1960s.
Early work
Seeger dropped out of Harvard (where he had been studying journalism) in 1939, and he took a job in Washington, D.C. at the Archive of American Folk Song in the Library of Congress. In that capacity, he met and was influenced by many important musicians such as Woody Guthrie and Leadbelly. He met Woody at a "Grapes of Wrath" migrant workers concert on March 3, 1940 and the two thereafter began a musical collaboration.
In 1948, Seeger wrote the first version of his now-classic How to Play the Five-String Banjo, a book that many banjo players credit with starting them off on the instrument. He went on to invent the Long Neck or Seeger banjo. This instrument is three frets longer than a typical banjo, and slightly longer than a bass guitar at 25 Frets, and is tuned a minor third lower than the normal 5-string banjo.
As a self-described "split tenor" (between an alto and a tenor), he was a founding member of the folk groups the Almanac Singers with Woody Guthrie and the Weavers with Lee Hays, Ronnie Gilbert and Fred Hellerman. The Weavers had major hits in the early 1950s, before being blacklisted in the McCarthy Era.
On August 18, 1955, Pete was subpoenaed to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) where he refused to name personal and political associations stating it would violate his First Amendment rights... "I am not going to answer any questions as to my association, my philosophical or religious beliefs or my political beliefs, or how I voted in any election, or any of these private affairs. I think these are very improper questions for any American to be asked, especially under such compulsion as this." Seeger's refusal to testify led to a March 26, 1957 indictment for contempt of Congress; for some years, he had to keep the federal government apprised of where he was going any time he left the Southern District of New York. He was convicted in a jury trial in March 1961, and sentenced to a year in jail, but in May 1962 an appeals court ruled the indictment to be flawed and overturned his conviction.
Seeger started a solo career in 1958, and is known for songs such as "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?," "If I Had a Hammer" (co-written with Lee Hays), "Turn, Turn, Turn," adapted from the Book of Ecclesiastes, and "We Shall Overcome" (based on a spiritual and later became the unofficial anthem for the civil rights movement). Seeger became influential in the 1960s folk revival centered in Greenwich Village. He helped found Broadside Magazine and Sing Out!. He was strongly associated with Moses Asch and Folkways Records. To describe the new crop of folk singers, many of whom were politically minded in their songs, he coined the phrase "Woody's children", alluding to his former bandmate Woody Guthrie, who by this time had become a legendary figure. He has often sung and is associated with the song "Joe Hill".
In the mid-sixties he hosted a regional folk music TV show called Rainbow Quest which featured folk musicians playing traditional folk music. Among his guests were Johnny Cash, June Carter, Mississippi John Hurt, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Roscoe Holcomb, The Stanley Brothers, Doc Watson, Tom Paxton, Judy Collins, Richard Fariña and Mimi Fariña, and many others. Thirty-eight hour-long programs were recorded at new UHF station WNJU's Newark studios in 1965 and 1966, produced by Seeger and his wife Toshi with Sholom Rubinstein.
An early advocate of Bob Dylan, Seeger was supposedly incensed over the distorted electric sound Dylan brought into the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, especially with the inability to clearly hear the lyrics. There are many conflicting versions of exactly what ensued, some claiming that he actually tried to disconnect the equipment. He is often cited as one of the main opponents to Dylan at Newport 1965, but claimed in 2005:
"There are reports of me being anti-him going electric at the '65 Newport Folk festival, but that's wrong. I was the MC that night. He was singing 'Maggie's Farm' and you couldn't understand a word because the mic was distorting his voice. I ran to the mixing desk and said, 'Fix the sound, it's terrible!' The guy said 'No, that's how they want it.' And I did say that if I had an axe I'd cut the cable! But I wanted to hear the words. I didn't mind him going electric.
Later work
Seeger achieved some notoriety in 1967 and 1968 for his song "Waist Deep in the Big Muddy", about a captain—a "big fool"—who drowned while leading a platoon on maneuvers in Louisiana during World War II. Seeger performed the song on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour after some arguments with CBS about whether the song's lyrics were objectionable. Although the song was cut from the Smothers Brothers show in September 1967, Seeger returned in January 1968 and sang the entire song. It was clearly an allegory about the U.S. under the leadership of Lyndon Johnson which was in over its head in the Vietnam War.
Another slight against Lyndon Johnson can be heard in his singing of Len Chandler's seemingly juvenile song, "Beans in My Ears" from his 1966 album Dangerous Songs!? in which he accuses "Mrs. Jay's little son Alby" (Alby Jay is meant to sound like LBJ) of having beans in his ears, or of not listening to the people.
In 1998 a double-CD tribute album was released - "Where Have All the Flowers Gone: the Songs of Pete Seeger". It contained contributions from Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne, Ani DiFranco, Billy Bragg, Eliza Carthy, Bruce Springsteen, Roger McGuinn, Judy Collins, Indigo Girls, Dick Gaughan, Martin Simpson, Odetta and others.
Pete Seeger still performed occasionally in public until his death, and for a number of years appeared at the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough Tennessee to tell stories, mostly children's stories such as Abiyoyo. He performed at MerleFest April 27-30, 2006 in Wilkesboro, NC.
On March 16, 2007, the 88-year old Pete Seeger performed with his siblings Mike Seeger and Peggy Seeger, and other Seeger family members at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., where he had been employed as a folk song archivist 67 years earlier.
In April 2006, Bruce Springsteen released a collection of songs associated with Seeger or in Seeger's folk tradition, We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions. Bruce Springsteen performed a series of concerts based on those sessions, to sellout crowds. Springsteen had previously recorded one Seeger favorite, "We Shall Overcome," on the 1998 "Where Have All the Flowers Gone" tribute album.
Seeger lived in the hamlet of Dutchess Junction in the Town of Fishkill, NY and remained very politically active in the Hudson Valley Region of New York, especially in the near-by City of Beacon, NY. He and Toshi purchased their land in 1949, and lived there first in a trailer, then in a log cabin they built themselves, and eventually in a larger house. Seeger joined the Community Church (a church practicing Unitarian Universalism), is considered a famous Unitarian Universalist, and often performed at functions for the Unitarian Universalist Association.
Seeger died in 2014 of natural causes.
Awards
Seeger has been the recipient of many awards and recognitions throughout his career, including:
A Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award (1993)
The National Medal of Arts from the National Endowment for the Arts (1994)
Kennedy Center Lifetime Achievement Honor (1994)
The Harvard Arts Medal (1996)
Induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (1996)
Grammy Award for Best Traditional Folk Album of 1996 for his record "Pete" (1997)
Boll Weevil
Pete Seeger Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
'Bout that little boll weevil - he done been there and gone;
Lookin' for a home - lookin' for a home.
Boll weevil he's a little black buck from Mexico they say,
Came all the way to Texas lookin' for a place to stay;
Lookin' for a home - just a-lookin' for a home, home, home.
The next time I seen the boll weevil he had his whole damn family there...
Well, the farmer took the boll weevil, he put him in a cake of ice,
The boll weevil said to the farmer, "This is mighty cool and nice..."
Well, the farmer took the boll weevil, and he put him in the hot sand,
The boll weevil said, "This is mighty hot but I'll stand it like a man..."
The boll weevil said to the farmer, "You better leave me alone,
"I ate all you cotton, now I'm satert in on your corn..."
The farmer said to his missus, "Now what do you think of that,
The boll weevil's gone and ate a hole in my best Sunday hat..."
The farmer said to the merchant, "I ain't made but one bale,
Fore I give you that one, I'll fight and go to jail,
I'll keep my home..."
Oh, the boll weevil's got half the cotton and the merchant's got the rest,
Didn't leave the farmer's wife but one old cotton dress,
And it's full of holes...
Now, if anyone should ask you, "Who was it made this song?"
Tell him a poor old farmer, he done been there and gone.
He ain't got no home...
Pete Seeger's song "Boll Weevil" tells the story of the infamous boll weevil, a tiny insect who wreaked havoc on the cotton industry in the Southern United States in the early 20th century. The first verse introduces the listener to the latest song about the boll weevil who has been searching for a new home. The second verse provides some background information on the boll weevil, describing it as a little black buck from Mexico who came all the way to Texas looking for a place to stay. The chorus emphasizes that the boll weevil is just looking for a home.
The subsequent verses describe the farmer's attempts to get rid of the boll weevil, first by putting it in a cake of ice and then in the hot sand, only for the boll weevil to remark on the temperature extremes. The boll weevil ultimately declares that it has eaten all the cotton and now it's moving on to the farmer's corn. The last verses describe the boll weevil's impact on the farmer, leaving them with little cotton and an old torn dress. The song ends by noting that the song's creator, a poor old farmer, has passed away without a home of his own.
Overall, Pete Seeger's "Boll Weevil" presents a clever and engaging narrative about the impact of the boll weevil on Southern agriculture. Through the character of the boll weevil, the song speaks to the larger themes of environmental disturbance and the resilience of farmers in the face of adversity.
Line by Line Meaning
Have you heard the latest, the latest of the song,
Have you heard the latest story, about the boll weevil who caused destruction?
'Bout that little boll weevil - he done been there and gone;
It's about the infamous little boll weevil who already caused damage and then left.
Lookin' for a home - lookin' for a home.
He was just trying to find a place for himself.
Boll weevil he's a little black buck from Mexico they say,
They say the boll weevil is a little black beetle from Mexico.
Came all the way to Texas lookin' for a place to stay;
He traveled all the way to Texas seeking a new home.
Lookin' for a home - just a-lookin' for a home, home, home.
All he wanted was a place to call home.
The first time I seen the boll weevil he was settin' on the square,
The first time I saw the boll weevil, he was just sitting somewhere.
The next time I seen the boll weevil he had his whole damn family there...
The next time I saw him, his entire family was with him.
Well, the farmer took the boll weevil, he put him in a cake of ice,
So the farmer put the boll weevil in a cake of ice.
The boll weevil said to the farmer, 'This is mighty cool and nice...'
And the boll weevil said to the farmer that he found it quite refreshing and pleasant.
Well, the farmer took the boll weevil, and he put him in the hot sand,
The farmer then put the boll weevil into hot sand.
The boll weevil said, 'This is mighty hot but I'll stand it like a man...'
The boll weevil said that it was really hot, but he would just have to suck it up and deal with it.
The boll weevil said to the farmer, 'You better leave me alone,
The boll weevil warned the farmer to back off.
'I ate all you cotton, now I'm satert in on your corn...'
He revealed that he had eaten all the cotton and now he was going for the corn.
The farmer said to his missus, 'Now what do you think of that,
The farmer then turned to his wife and asked for her thoughts on the matter.
'The boll weevil's gone and ate a hole in my best Sunday hat...'
He complained about how the boll weevil had eaten a hole in his best hat.
The farmer said to the merchant, 'I ain't made but one bale,
He told the merchant that he had only made one bale of cotton.
Fore I give you that one, I'll fight and go to jail,
He insisted that he would rather fight and go to jail before giving up his only bale.
I'll keep my home...'
He was determined to protect his home at all costs.
Oh, the boll weevil's got half the cotton and the merchant's got the rest,
Unfortunately, the boll weevil ended up with half of the cotton and the merchant got the other half.
Didn't leave the farmer's wife but one old cotton dress,
Because of this, the farmer's wife was left with only one old cotton dress.
And it's full of holes...
To make matters worse, her dress was also filled with holes from the boll weevil.
Now, if anyone should ask you, 'Who was it made this song?'
Finally, if anyone asks who wrote this song...
Tell him a poor old farmer, he done been there and gone.
Let them know it was made by a poor farmer who had already suffered the boll weevil's destruction.
He ain't got no home...
A sad ending to the story, the poor farmer ultimately lost his home.
Contributed by Hannah R. Suggest a correction in the comments below.