Headlines & Footnotes: Collection of Topical Songs

Pete Seeger | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 18, 1999)
• Original Release Date: May 18, 1999
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Smithsonian Folkways
• ASIN: B00000IWNA
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #124,593 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

For nearly 60 years Pete Seeger, with his banjo and 12-string guitar, has made music which inspires people to improve their lives and world. Selections on this anthology, culled from the hundreds Seeger recorded for Folkways Records between 1955 and 1999, include concert and studio recordings about prominent events and themes of the twentieth century: the Spanish Civil War, union organizing, and the civil rights and antiwar movements. Eleven previously unreleased tracks (one recorded in 1999). 74 minutes.

AWARDS
2000 Crossroads Music Awards Silver Star for Folk: Traditional

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An essential album by an essential artist., July 4, 2000

By 

"oldtimerocker" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Headlines & Footnotes: Collection of Topical Songs (Audio CD)

There are many albums out there by Pete Seeger, and this one is one of my favorites. It has songs written by Woody Guthrie and others, but also features many Seeger staples, such as "Guantanamera" "Bells Of Rhymney" "Wimoweh" and "Little Boxes." Seeger is an artist that needs to be heard and he is getting that respect by the release of this and other Seeger classics.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful collection of story songs, August 10, 2003

By 

Peter Durward Harris "Pete the music fan" (Leicester England) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Headlines & Footnotes: Collection of Topical Songs (Audio CD)

This may be considered as a companion volume to another fine Pete Seeger compilation, If I had a hammer - songs of hope and struggle, which I've already reviewed. Whereas that compilation was firmly focused on political songs, this one is billed as a collection of topical songs, but many of the topics on these songs are political anyway.

Of course, there are a few non-political songs, like The Titanic, perhaps the most famous sunken ship. It's not the only sunken ship to get a song here, but unlike the Titanic, the sinking of the Reuben James is a political story, as it was the first American ship torpedoed by the Germans in World War II.

Little boxes was inspired by urban sprawl. Its writer, Malvina Reynolds, had offered the song to several other folk singers and groups before it came to Pete's attention. Pete loved it immediately and it has become one of his most famous recordings. Sadly, it is even more relevant today than it was forty years ago, as urban sprawl continues to eat up the countryside. Unlike so many of Pete's political songs, Little boxes is a song that many people can relate to, whatever their political believes, because it merely states the problem and offers neither cause nor solution.

There are many other excellent songs here. All the essential Pete Seeger songs can be found here or on the other compilation, If I had a hammer - songs of hope and struggle.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The "Keeper Of The Flame" Struts His Stuff, April 8, 2009

By 

Alfred Johnson (boston, ma) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Headlines & Footnotes: Collection of Topical Songs (Audio CD)

That Old Devil Time

The name Pete Seeger has come up repeatedly in this space over the past few years as the transmission belt from the old 1930's and 1940's Depression and World War II era folk revival to the that of the one in the early 1960's. In other places in this space (check archives) I have mentioned my political differences, great and small, with Brother Seeger so there is no need to go into that here. I would note, however, that despite his folksy style he has always been driven by a political conception to his work. That is, that music, and in his case, folk music can be used to bring political "glad tidings" to the masses. One cannot fault that principle, although what effect music has in driving people to higher political consciousness is a very, very open question in my mind. Nevertheless putting topical subjects to music by the folk balladeer and troubadour alike has a long pedigree and needs no defense here. Moreover, in the capable hands of Pete Seeger, the compilation under review represents a very nice cross-section of that way of driving the political message home.

Everyone in the modern folk milieu owes a debt to Pete Seeger for playing "keeper of the flame" for the old time `talking blues' format of spreading political and social messages (and Woody Guthrie as well, who perfected the art form). This volume is ample proof of that. Good examples here that provide such messages without the drumbeat of heavy political analysis are the pro-women's liberation "There Once Was A Woman Who Swallowed A Lie" and, most dramatically (and relevantly, as President Obama right now works his way through the "Big Poppy Field" of Afghanistan) "Waist Deep In The Big Muddy" (ostensibly a tale about World War II but really about Lyndon Johnson's Vietnam War policy). For social commentary one cannot beat Malvina Reynolds' "Little Boxes" (almost self-explanatory about the deadening nature of upscale American suburban life) and The Claiborne's "Listen Mr. Bilbo" (about the simple truths of immigration in America, virtually an immigrant-created country).

Of course, no collection of Seeger efforts is complete without the Spanish Civil War song, "Viva La Quince Brigada", about the heroic Abraham Lincoln Battalion of the 15th International Brigade that fought valiantly there or to do a cover to commemorate an early heroic Cuban patriot, Jose Marti's "Guantanamera". For topical songs, a staple of the folk tradition since about the Middle Ages, try "The Titanic" (yes, that one that went down in 1912-and wasn't suppose to) and "The Sinking Of The Reuben James" ( an ode to the merchant marines in the early days of World War II). For left wing political struggles under adverse conditions, "Hold The Line", about a famous Paul Robeson concert at Peekskill, New York that was busted up by fascistic local red necks in the build-up to the `red scare of the 1940's and 1950's is a good exemplar. And so on. In short, for those who want to hear folk music with a historical sense as it was meant to be presented then here is your primer by one of your master singers of such works. Get to it.