In this month’s episode, we learn about Camp Woodland, a summer camp that existed in Phoenicia, NY from 1939-1962. Among many of the summer camp settings Pete visited during the 1940s and ‘50s, Woodland was a space Pete visited with regular frequency, and spent much time making music with campers over the course of several decades. As we go in depth with today, Pete’s time spent at Woodland would be uniquely impactful for many people, ranging from the Folk Festivals of the Catskills and song collecting to Pete learning Guantanamera from a Cuban counselor in 1962. To learn more about all this, we spoke with two former attendees of the camp, Bill Horne and Pat Lamanna.

In this episode I discuss my reactions to and thoughts about the recent film, A COMPLETE UNKNOWN. I focus on several elements, ranging from how effectively the characters were written, to the extent to which we get to see how Dylan is influenced by other people and other musicians, such as Suze Rotolo and Joan Baez. I also deconstruct what Dylan and Seeger really thought of each other, and what Pete’s reactions really might have been to Dylan’s electric set at Newport ‘65.

In our first episode of Season 2, we discuss Pete Seeger's participation in the civil rights movement between 1962 and 1965. We discuss his early involvements singing in Georgia, his affiliation with the Student NonViolent Coordinating Committee, and his We Shall Overcome concert at Carnegie Hall. We also evaluate Seeger's participation in Mississippi's Freedom Summer in 1964, and his attendance in the Selma march in 1965 along with his encountering of the folk process of the singing of Freedom Songs. We conclude with the internal racial shift that happens within the movement, and how that influences Seeger’s gradual separation from singing from SNCC and singing for civil rights.

Join us for this episode where I speak with Pete Seeger’s biographer, David Dunaway. We discuss David’s early connection to Pete Seeger and his music, and how he came to publish three editions of Seeger's biography. We also talk about the archive of Pete Seeger material David has produced for the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, as well Pete’s involvement with Folkways Records, the legacy of the Clearwater, and David’s perceptions of how Pete might be represented in the upcoming Bob Dylan biopic “A Complete Unknown”. We conclude by discussing David’s favorite Seeger records, in addition to what general message people should know about Pete Seeger now that we are a quarter of the way into the 21st century.

In this epsiode we examine several of Pete Seeger’s albums recorded and released after the period of the Blacklist. We discuss the Bowdoin College Concert and Live at the Village Gate, and his first Columbia albums - Story Songs, The Bitter and the Sweet, and Children's Concert at Town Hall. We also dissect Pete’s efforts to bring folk music to people through television, particularly the controversy over censorship surrounding the failed attempt to get Seeger to appear on the Hootenanny television show.

In this episode we delve into Pete Seeger's legal challenges in facing the House-Un American Activities Committee in 1955 and the impact of Seeger’s decision not to cooperate with them. We also investigate how Seeger’s status as a blacklisted artist resulted in the prolific amount of performing and music-making he did throughout the remainder of the 1950s into the early '60s. Specifically, we examine the multitude of his Folkways albums, live concerts and the musical foundation he worked towards establishing for other up-and-coming musicians and listeners.

In this episode we examine the quartet, The Weavers, the folk group Pete Seeger formed with Lee Hays, Fred Hellerman and Ronnie Gilbert in 1949-1950. We go into detail with the founding of the group, their musical style and approach, and their initial pop success with the songs "Tzena Tzena" and "Goodnight Irene". We then investigate how the FBI, Counterattack, and other opportunistic individuals and institutions conspired to cancel the group from show business by labeling them as Communists during the peak of the Blacklist in the early-mid 1950s.

This episode delves into the Peekskill Affair of August and September 1949. This concert, held in Peekskill, New York, functioned as a fundraiser for the Civil Rights Congress, where Pete Seeger opened for the baritone-bass singer Paul Robeson. The show was rescheduled due to violence that erupted at the first attempted concert in late August, and while this second performance did happen, hundreds of Anti-Communist Veterans in Westchester County organized a violent and sorrowful attack on the concert attendees in a fascist Labor Day weekend bloodbath.

In this episode we discuss Pete’s musical activities from 1942-1949. We focus on Pete's activities as a performer in the army during WWII, the additional records Pete made during this period, the founding of the People’s Songs organization after the war, and how that eventually came to a close.

In this episode we discuss Pete’s activities between 1940 and 1942 with the Almanac Singers. This episode will get into the founding of the group and its members, its political and musical direction, and the challenges the group faced in trying to continue playing and performing.