We Need a New Song at the Ball Game

After the attacks on our people on 9-11-01, all our major sporting events not only include our National Anthem, they included Irving Berlin's patriotic music: "God Bless America" or Bates/Ward's "America the Beautiful".We sing them at most big events- and just before "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" during the 7th inning stretch. These are great songs, they inspire national pride and cohesiveness. I don't take anything away from this classic bit of Americana. But there is another song we ought to consider. It too is a classic bit of American culture. It was written in the wake of the Great Depression, by a man who traveled the dusty back roads of America. He lived with the real people of our country. I'm referring to Woody Guthrie's "This Land is Your Land".

Music historians tell us that Guthrie wrote this song in direct response to "God Bless America". Guthrie believed that Berlin's lyrics were "nationalistic-complacent-exclusionary and unrealistic". Guthrie's travels and experiences taught him that America was in the hands of the privileged, and the country rightfully "was made for you and me".

Gutherie is our most important Folk Music writer because he was able to capture, in music, the spirit of a country that has the highest ideals, but often falls short in living up to them. His music isn't all glory and flag waving, proudly proclaiming the favor of God. His music and its message is about the real struggle of common people- the folk. That is, after all, the essence of "folk' music. His music, and the work of others like photographer Dorothea Lange, resonate in the soul of a people-and change minds. I hope you'll  research the life of Gutherie and look at the photographic work of Dorothea Lange. You will recognize her iconic photos of the Great Depression, just as you know the music and "folk" spirit of Woody Guthrie. Their contributions to the American culture actually changed policies and lives.

It is so unfortunate that we seem to be re-living the events of Great Depression. The rich and powerful accumulated too much wealth at the expense of the working class back then as they are now. They inflated their own holdings fraudulently as they do now; and when the bubble broke it was the "folk" who suffered then as now. High unemployment doesn't touch the top 2%- it hits the middle class and the poor the hardest now, as it did then.

It is no wonder we never see musicians writing songs that glorify credit swap derivatives; or songs that celebrate the wonder of investment bankers; or tell of our cultural enrichment at out-sourcing jobs; or Wall Street bonuses; or our greatness because we have removed collective bargaining rights from teachers. Those songs will NEVER be written- because we know deep in our collective heart that the things we are seeing now (as a reaction to fear) do not lift us as a people. They don't give us hope- they embed cynicism and they will eventually diminish us and send our national spirit back to the dust bowl days of the Depression. Our parents and grandparents, and their ancestors fought the robber-barons of their day for social and economic justice. We can not stand by while greed has us fighting that same battle again. We're better than that.

What would it feel like if we rose from our seats in the middle of the seventh and sang "This Land is Your Land"? What would it do for our national spirit to sing the populist anthem Guthrie gave us-the one that says "this land belongs to you and me"? I'd sing that song. That's my Different Thought for today. Thanks for looking in.