Finding Pete Seeger

The brain seems to work in some very random ways at times. I say “the brain” because we don’t actually know where our thoughts come from. And the level of success you achieve at getting things done is largely dependent on your ability to dismiss those random thoughts.

Friday morning a random thought slipped past that instructed me to hear the song ‘Down By the Riverside’. An old classic gospel tune that everyone likes. And the motivation to hear that song would not go away the entire day. A music ear worm without hearing the music.

Fast forward to Friday night and I can’t put it off anymore. The brain must be appeased. After a minute of searching on YouTube, I find several versions of ‘Down By the Riverside’. One in particular stands out because of the grainy black & white TV show footage.

 Can honestly say I was captivated by the pure simplicity of the TV show and wished there was something like this today. Everything in modern times is over-produced and a big spectacle. When all that is really need is a few musicians sitting around a table playing and telling stories about the music.

In this case, there were three. Pete Seeger, Brownie McGhee, and Sonny Terry. After a few scans of Wikipedia, I see that Seeger is is someone I would have like to have talked to.  To my dismay, he passed away in January of this year and I had no idea who he was.

I’ve been missing out, and I’ll have to make up for lost time in the upcoming years when it comes to Pete Seeger.


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