This space is dedicated to the proposition that we need to know the history of the struggles on the left and of earlier progressive movements here and world-wide. If we can learn from the mistakes made in the past (as well as what went right) we can move forward in the future to create a more just and equitable society. We will be reviewing books, CDs, and movies we believe everyone needs to read, hear and look at as well as making commentary from time to time. Greg Green, site manager
If I Could Be The Rain I Would Be Rosalie Sorrels-The Legendary Folksinger-Songwriter Has Her Last Go Round At 83
By Music Critic Bart Webber
Back the day, back in the emerging folk minute of the 1960s that guys like Sam Lowell, Si Lannon, the late Peter Paul Markin and others were deeply immersed in (and the former two never got over since they will still tell a tale or two about the times if you go anywhere within ten miles of the subject-I will take my chances here because this notice is important) all roads seemed to lead to Harvard Square, the Village down in NYC, North Beach out in San Francisco, and maybe Old Town in Chicago. That is where names like Baez, Dylan, Paxton, Ochs, and a whole crew of younger folksingers who sat at the feet of guys like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger.
But there was another important strand that hovered around Saratoga Springs in upstate New York, up around Skidmore and some other colleges. That was Caffe Lena’s where some of those names played but also where some upstarts from the West got a chance to play the small crowds who gathered at that famed (and still existing) coffeehouse. Upstarts like Bruce “Utah” Phillips (although he could call several places home Utah was key to what he would sing about). And out of Idaho one Rosalie Sorrels who just joined her long-time friend Utah in that last go-round at the age of 83.
The last time I saw Rosalie perform in person was back in 2002 when she performed at what was billed as her last go-round, her hanging up her shoes from the dusty travel road. She was on fire that night except the then recent death of another folk legend, Dave Von Ronk, who was supposed to be on the bill (and who was replaced by David Bromberg who did a great job) cast a pall over the proceedings. I will always remember her cover of Old Devil Time that night-yeah, give me one more chance, one more breathe. But I will always think of If I Could Be The Rain whenever I hear her name. RIP Rosalie Sorrels
The Trump Administration announced it has given Defense Secretary Jim Mattis the authority to determine troops levels in Afghanistan. It is widely believed that Mattis favors sending several thousand more U.S. troops to Afghanistan. Why? Perhaps to break the “stalemate” as described by the Commander of U.S. Forces in Afghanistan, Army General John Nicholson when describing the war to the Senate Armed Services Committee. In his June 13th testimony, Secretary Mattis told the same committee, “We are not winning in Afghanistan right now.”
Veterans For Peace calls for a different direction than more war. We call on Congress to stop funding war and demand a plan for a peaceful solution. We call on the President to immediately begin withdrawal of U.S. troops and take a new direction towards diplomacy and peace. And we call on the people of the U.S. to resist war and demand policies that foster peace and prosperity at home and in Afghanistan.
It should be clear after 16 years and the death of tens of thousands of people that no one is a winner in Afghanistan. There is no clear concept of what it means to win there. In fact, it is no longer clear why the U.S. continues to keep troops in Afghanistan and now is on the brink of increasing the number of men and women in harm's way.
The U.S. has claimed to be at war in Afghanistan to deny “terrorists” training and staging areas to attack the United States and to protect the people of Afghanistan. After this long period of war, what does the U.S. have to show for its military efforts?
Since the horror of September 11, 2001, the U.S. has been on a path of war, wreaking havoc on millions of people around the globe. Because of displacement, death and maiming of loved ones by U.S. wars, animosity towards the U.S. has increased and the world has become less safe. The animosity caused by the wars has created a larger pool of people willing to fight the U.S. In 2001 al Qaeda had limited influence and ISIL did not exist. Now Al Qaeda and ISIL have affiliated groups and sympathetic supporters around the globe.
The protection of the Afghan people has been a total failure. It has been widely reported that the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan found that there were 11,418 civilian casualties (3,498 deaths and 7,920 injured) between January and December 2016, an overall increase of 3 percent. An appalling number of those casualties were children – 923 deaths, and 2,589 injured – a 24 percent increase over record-high numbers from 2015. In addition, 3,535 coalition forces have died; three of which were recently killed as a result of an insider attack fire from an Afghan soldier. We must add to these losses all the people who are physically and psychologically broken and families torn apart.The human cost is immeasurable. But there is also a dollar cost to war. The U.S. has spent over $1 trillion in this failed and depraved effort in Afghanistan. These dollars represent lost opportunities to repair U.S. infrastructure, pay for healthcare, create jobs and address a host of human needs.
It is not too late for a different direction. War was always the wrong option. Perhaps it was not clear 16 years ago. It should be clear now more than ever!
Rosalie Sorrels Passes At 83 (2017)- The Long Labor Memory, Indeed- The Music Of Rosalie Sorrels and Utah Phillips
If I Could Be The Rain I Would Be Rosalie Sorrels-The Legendary Folksinger-Songwriter Has Her Last Go Round At 83
By Music Critic Bart Webber
Back the day, back in the emerging folk minute of the 1960s that guys like Sam Lowell, Si Lannon, the late Peter Paul Markin and others were deeply immersed in (and the former two never got over since they will still tell a tale or two about the times if you go anywhere within ten miles of the subject-I will take my chances here because this notice is important) all roads seemed to lead to Harvard Square, the Village down in NYC, North Beach out in San Francisco, and maybe Old Town in Chicago. That is where names like Baez, Dylan, Paxton, Ochs, Collins and a whole crew of younger folksingers who sat at the feet of guys like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger.
But there was another important strand that hovered around Saratoga Springs in upstate New York, up around Skidmore and some other colleges. That was Caffe Lena’s where some of those names played but also where some upstarts from the West got a chance to play the small crowds who gathered at that famed (and still existing) coffeehouse. Upstarts like Bruce “Utah” Phillips (although he could call several places home Utah was key to what he would sing about). And out of Idaho one Rosalie Sorrels who just joined her long-time friend Utah in that last go-round at the age of 83.
Yeah, out there in the West, not the West Coast west that is different, where what the novelist Thomas Wolfe called the place where the states were square and you had better be as well if you didn’t want to starve or be found in some empty arroyo un-mourned and unloved. A different place and a different type of subject matter for your themes.
The last time I saw Rosalie perform in person was back in 2002 when she performed at what was billed as her last go-round, her hanging up her shoes from the dusty travel road. She was on fire that night except the then recent death of another folk legend, Dave Von Ronk, who was supposed to be on the bill (and who was replaced by David Bromberg who did a great job) cast a pall over the proceedings. I will always remember her cover of Old Devil Time that night-yeah, give me one more chance, one more breathe. But I will always think of If I Could Be The Rain whenever I hear her name. RIP Rosalie Sorrels
CD REVIEWS Every Month Is Labor Month The Long Memory, Indeed
The Long Memory, Rosalie Sorrels and Utah Phillips, Red House Records, 1996
The first paragraph here has been used in reviewing other Rosalie Sorrels CDs in this space. “My first association of the name Rosalie Sorrels with folk music came, many years ago now, from hearing the recently departed folk singer/storyteller/ songwriter and unrepentant Wobblie (IWW) Utah Phillips mention his long time friendship with her going back before he became known as a folksinger. I also recall that combination of Sorrels and Phillips as he performed his classic “Starlight On The Rails” and she his also classic “If I Could Be The Rain” on a PBS documentary honoring the Café Lena in Saratoga, New York, a place that I am also very familiar with for many personal and musical reasons. Of note here: it should be remembered that Rosalie saved, literally, many of the compositions that Utah left helter-skelter around the country in his “bumming” days.” That said, what could be better than to have Rosalie and Utah on the same CD (although not together) singing and telling stories about the old days in the labor movement, mainly the labor movement of the American West that was instrumental in creating the Industrial Workers Of The World (IWW, Wobblies). Listen to Rosalie on the story of Aunt Molly Jackson and the National Miners’ Union (NMU) (a Stalinist ‘third period’ “red union” that took over when John L. Lewis’ UMW left the miners in the lurch-sound familiar). Or the saga of a mill closing in an earlier version of runaway factories (then mainly to the south of this country) in “Aragon Mills”. A nice story told by Utah is that of the genesis of soap box oration as is his singing of his classic “All Used Up”. Utah here pays tribute to the heroic exploits of Mother Jones, one of our early real militant labor leaders (by example, I should add). And also notes what happens when there are no (or few, as today) militant unions to fight for decency and justice in “No More Reds In The Union”. I give special attention here to “Nevada Jane” a song that Utah wrote based on stories told to him in Butte, Montana about the legendary “Big Bill” Haywood , probably the best labor leader, pound for pound, produced by the American labor movement I the 20th century and his wife Nevada Jane. Whether the stories were true and the song has it right about the relationship between the pair is separate question but I still like it. While Utah and I had a very wide political gap between us we shared one thing in common- a long, long memory about the fate of the international labor movement. Adieu, Utah. If I Could Be The Rain-"Utah Phillips"
Yeah, That Long Hot Summer-With Paul Newman and Joanne
Woodward’s Film Adaptation of William Faulkner’s Work In Mind
By Film Critic Emeritus Sam Lowell
“Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, have things gone to hell
in a handbasket now that old Will Varner has gone to meet his maker, has gone
to the shades, the shades of hell most likely” shouted Jefferson Baker out
across the length of Varner’s General Store where he was the manager of just
one of the late Will Varner’s enterprises in the holy of holies town of
Frenchman’s Bend, which might have well have been called Varner’s Bend since
every civil institution, and some not so civil like Minnie Littlejohn’s high
class whorehouse on the edge of town, had the Varner brand attached to it some
which way. (That whorehouse by the way Varner’s most lucrative business after
the cotton fields, after that best 28,000 acres of sweet Mississippi bottomland
in the great state of Mississippi and run by Minnie, his sweetie before he
passed away although they never did get married like she was always badgering
him to do, so everything was on the up and up except maybe the whores).
Jefferson Baker was doing all that confounded yelling in the
direction of one Johnny Hodges from the American
Literary Gazette who was in Frenchman’s Bend to do a story on the Varner
legacy since Varner had been the real life redneck landowner model for some of
the short stories that his old friend William Faulkner had done before he had hung
up his shingle. (Between themselves ever since undergraduate days at Oxford,
Oxford, Mississippi the home of the state university not the other one over in
England or someplace like that they were Will and Hod but here William and
Johnny will do.). Johnny was looking for background about how a low-rent
redneck like Will Varner was able to hoodwink everybody in that part of the
state, in that bottomland blessed county into acknowledging him as the leading
figure. The leading figure as against what he, Varner, and maybe William too
when he was creating his off-beat oafish characters, the “decaying gentry” that
had run the county and state since about Robert E. Lee’s surrender.
That part of the story, that fly-catching the old staid
rabble gentry was not some much what interested Johnny since William had pretty
much covered those bases in his works wand which when all was said and done was
a pretty straight story of a grizzled upstart grabbing those decaying gentry by
the balls and squeezing them in the only way they understood trading their
lands for leisure time money, but about the guy who inherited all those acres
and the town’s major enterprises. That would be one Ben Quick who had had the
sense to marry Will’s schoolmarm daughter, Miss Clara always called Miss Clara
even long after she was married. Had by guile and wit shut out Will’s
legitimate son, Jody, who was essentially an emotional cripple who couldn’t
keep up the pace that Will and later as Ben took over more and more of the day
to day running of the operations were able to keep up. Didn’t have that
merciless mercenary take no prisoners and let the devil take the hinter post as
he himself in his more candid if increasingly drunken moments would weep out to
anybody who would listen, including his disgusted father.
The mention of the name Ben Quick, now his boss, by Johnny sent
Jefferson Baker into spasms of shuttled speech, “That barn-burner, that bastard
barn-burner and son of a barn-burner taking over is the end, is the end of
whatever Will Varner had put together. You know Ben’s old man, Shep Quick, got
killed one reckless night when he got caught with a can of kerosene going after
Bill Monroe’s barns when Bill wouldn’t give him some payment for some service
that he had never provided. If you interview Ben don’t tell him I told you what
happened to the old man. Don’t tell him that it was Will Varner, and a lot of
the rest of us acting as his posse, sent him to the shades, shades of hell,
maybe Will and Shep will meet there. Kind of some kind of justice when you
think a minute. That was long ago and Ben’s wife, Miss Clara, you know Will’s
schoolmarm daughter, told me one time when she was helping me with inventory
that Ben had told her one night when he had been unjustly accused of being an
active barn-burner that Ben’s father, Shep, just up and left, maybe with a
woman, maybe with just a jug of fuel, never to return leaving a wife and seven
kids to be cared for. That won’t add anything to your story and I and every
other person in town who either knew, or was there when they shot him down like
a rabid dog will deny that story was true. So just know that maybe longing for
his long lost old man or something like that, you with your book-learning may
know what ailed him better than I do, was part of what made Ben tick, made him
hungry to get out from the rushes.”
Johnny told Jefferson that he would not betray a confidence
and that he, Johnny had a feeling that Ben’s rise had a lot more to do with him
being a chip off of old Will Varner’s block, a ruthless wheeler-dealer and
cutthroat artist than any misanthropic gasoline genes his old man left him.
Jefferson continued, “You know it was Jody Varner, Will’s
legitimate son and ne’er do well who kept Ben in Frenchman’s Bend, kept a known
barn-burner known far and wide by anybody paying attention from across the
county on our doorsteps. Will had been away in Jackson the first time they
found cancer in his bloated festered body and Jody had been left in charge when
Ben came walking up to the door looking for a place to work. Smartass Jody
figured the guy looked like he was from hunger, looked like a million other
drifters when it came right down to it and offered him a shack as a tenant
farmer for the Varner estates. Ben accepted although he probably already had a
good idea that this Jody was a light-weight, maybe a mommy’s boy from the look
of it all dressed up like a sportsman and displacing him would be merely a
matter of time and circumstances. When the old man, when Will got home, home
amid all this damn fanfare like he was the Pharaoh back in Egypt times he blew
his top at Jody. Made him feel about two inches tall in front of his wife, this
lustrous Eula who I will talk about more later and his big sister Clara, you
know the schoolmarm, the local ice queen if you wanted to know the truth back
then.”
“But I will say this for Will, a contract’s a contract even
if Jody and Ben only shook on it and he let Ben stay on after he sized him up.
Maybe that sizing up time is what made him think about advancing Ben’s future.
The whole thing got a little mixed up probably because Will was flying by the
seat of his pants. See that cancer business, that dying business when it came
right down to it since that cancer eventually did get him scared Will silly.
Got him suddenly looking for heirs, grandkids who would keep the Varner name
going to infinity in Mississippi and maybe beyond you never know with these
wheeler –dealer types. So Clara not being married and with no grands kids in
the background he was placing his bet, maybe a series of bets, on this Ben
Quick. You might ask about Jody at this point. Jody and that hot little number
of a wife of his, that Eula who had the sweetest walk this side of the
Mississippi if you know what I mean.” Baker insinuated with the beginning of a
big ass leer like guys get when their thoughts turn to luscious little pieces
of the Sunflower state, maybe anywhere, any state.
Putting that leer aside when Johnny formally failed to
recognize lecherous look Baker continued, “One day she just showed up with Jody
after he had gone to Jackson on some family business and he told the old man
that he/they had gotten married. The old man for a while was tickled pink, was
expecting to see those grandchildren and his legacy pushed forward. But I guess
Jody for all his sexual appetites and playboy manners was shooting blanks, had no
spunk, maybe really was a mommy’s boy in all departments although it would not
have suited Will Varner to have his boy called a “sissy,” maybe be light on his
feet and so nobody called him anything but Will Varner’s boy to his face or
behind his back. But you can see where a young blue-eyed stud like Ben Quick,
barn-burner pedigree or not, came prancing around that Will started to get ideas,
started planning something.”
“Hey, I said I would mention Eula and I will now. Like I
said that young Jody Varner picked her up out of some whorehouse or something
on one of his sprees to Jackson, maybe I have it wrong and it was New Orleans.
Get this though they were for public consumption they were prancing her around
as a product of Miss Farmer’s Boarding School over in Vicksburg. Everybody who
got one look at her, one watch through of that divine ass walk knew she hadn’t
been within ten miles of a boarding school except maybe to give the boys a
treat or two. For a while things were okay, Jody and Eula I heard spent most of
their time up in their bedroom. Will was pleased as punch assuming that they
were sweating on the satin sheets, on his satin sheets, enough to produce that first
grandson Will forever dreamed of to insure what he called his immortality. I
wish I could convey the way he dragged that word out like it was a feast day
celebration. But I guess Jody was shooting blanks because after a while Eula
never produced the bump associated with child production. That is when the
young boys started showing up in the heat of the night calling her name and
driving Jody to distraction. Before long word started seeping around, hell I
learned about it from my son who claimed he had been one of her victims, that
Eula was taking the youngsters out back after Jody went to bed and showing them
what was what. “Playing the flute” my son said she called it so you know she
was well-versed in all the sexual arts probably did do some time in a finishing
school, some high-end whorehouse. Will found out about it from the guys hanging
around the porch of the Varner General Store but by then he had given up on
Jody’s prowess to produce an heir, had always thought that his late wife Emma
had turned Jody into a mommy’s boy anyway, and had moved on in his planning to
Miss Clara, to his ice cold but smoldering inside daughter to grab some young
stud and do his magical work for him.
“Of course getting an ice queen off her high moral and
idealistic horse long enough to take the measure of a man, to take what a man
was built to give, was no simply chore, especially since for some reason she
had since high school lammed onto Alan,
Alan Winter, the son of what Will always laughing called one of the “decayed
gentry” family without a pot to piss in who had been living off parsimony since
Grant came through on his way to Vicksburg town and some Winter freed all his
slaves shaking in his boots that he would be executed by the Yankees if he
didn’t. So the story went. Will had this Alan figured as more than just a
mommy’s boy, had him figured as “light on his feet,” a fairy and that Miss
Clara, Sister his pet name for her was wasting her time pursuing a guy who
probably was sneaking off to New Orleans to see what the young studs were up to
when they came into port off the ships and freighters.
“Then almost out of the blue, almost like manna from heaven
tainted, threadbare, bedraggled Ben Quick came waltzing down the road after
having been thrown out of more towns in the county than you could shake a stick
at. Sometimes for just lighting a cigarettes if the town fathers were a bit
high strung and nervous. But Will saw something, correctly saw something in Ben
like himself. A young man from hunger.”
Johnny knew from his own observations around that time what
those hungers meant to a lot of young men freshly back from the war, from World
War II, after they had had their paths altered for a while, or twisted a bit.
At just that moment he wished that he could converse with the “ghost” of
William who could tell him what it was like for guys like Will Varner to come
out of the mud and slime sometime after the First World War and stake claim to
whatever they could stake claim to. Then he might get a handle on what Will had
seen in Ben’s steely-blue eyes. Maybe it was something in the genes and he
could then just sit at William’s feet and get the lowdown on Will and transfer
those qualities to Ben. What he sensed of Ben from Jefferson’s description of
the rise of one Ben Quick in the local scene was that whatever hurts he had
received from knowing what his father was, from being a barn-burner’s son, and
a fair one himself that what really drove him was the fact that he was a lot
smarter, street smarter, than guys like Jody, or that faggot Alan whom he had
to turn Miss Clara against if he was to make his way in the world. If he was to
consume any of that unspent energy he had powerfully stored to make something
of himself.
Not having William around and depending on what Baker could
tell him he was able to piece together what a new son of the South, a new
Mississippi boy looking to make good, could do. Of course this New South, this
new Mississippi was all about white Mississippi boys, blacks of any persuasion
did not count for jack, were hoers and carriers under the strict precepts of
Mister James Crow and nothing more, as William would say, need be said about
those who were in the shadows, what didn’t count except to be of no
account.
Jefferson picked up the thread of the conversation, “It was
not long after Jody contracted for Ben’s tenancy that Will and Ben had had
their conversation and the next thing anybody knew Ben was in turn selling
untamed horses for the old man to his neighbors and had been brought into the
general store to show what contempt Will had had for Jody since Jody had
assumed he was the king of the store. It was around this time as well that
rumors began to spread that Eula was going by the store more frequently when
Jody was travelling to get goods and she was teaching Ben how to “play the
flute” as they say (as if he needed any such instruction). Rumors or not, true
or not, Ben knew, Will knew, as well, that some misbegotten dalliance with Eula
was not going to go anywhere not matter how sweaty she got those sheets. So Ben
took dead aim at Miss Clara.
“Like I said this Miss Clara while pleasant enough to talk
to as long as you were not interested in grabbing some hay with her was a
serious ice queen, didn’t want to get involved with any of the local studs who
would have been glad to give her tumble if only to spite Will for some
grievance done to them by him. She only had eyes for this Alan, this mommy’s
boy and so Ben had his work cut out for him. Those steely-blue eyes, muscular
body and wavy hair wouldn’t be enough against Miss Clara’s expectations. At
least that was what the speculation was after Ben Quick had foolishly spent his
whole month’s pay in order to have a Miss Clara-prepared luncheon at the Sunday
church social. He had outbid that sissy Alan and got to have that dainty lunch.
Although just that moment she was fuming since she had wanted and expected Alan
to be her lunch partner.
“Something, nobody is quite sure what, but something happened
between Ben and Miss Clara when they went off by themselves to have the contents
of that expensive luncheon basket. All anybody had heard was the pair in loud
angry indecipherable shouting, then silence, then more. Somebody said it was
all about Ben swearing that he was going to have Miss Clara no matter what,
pursue her to the end times and her blowing his talk off as hot air. Alan, ever
the gallant as good manners amount the decayed gentry dictated, went to fetch
Miss Clara back from the clutches of this low-life. A short time later Miss Clara appeared. Alone.
Ever after that nobody any longer saw Miss Clara together. A couple of months later though I noticed
that Miss Clara was coming around the store more often to talk to, but mainly
to stare, at Ben Quick. I heard that one night after I had gone home for the evening
and Ben had shut up the store that Ben and Miss Clara had gone in that back
room for a quick round of love-making.
“Whether that was true or not, about six months later Ben and
Miss Clara were married right in the main hall of the Varner mansion with half
the town in attendance. What a time, what a time. About a year later the first
of the five Quick boys arrived. Shortly after the arrival of that last boy Will’s
cancer did him in and ended one chapter of the Varner story. I still can’t
believe that a damn barn-burner grabbed whatever there was to grab around these
parts and now nobody does anything but pay hat homage to Benjamin Quick, owner
of half of Frenchman’s Bend. Damn.”
In
Honor Of Our Class-War Prisoners- Free All The Class-War Prisoners!-David
Gilbert http://www.thejerichomovement.com/prisoners.html A link above to more information
about the class-war prisoner honored in this entry.
Make June Class-War Prisoners Freedom Month
Markin comment (reposted from 2010) In “surfing” the National Jericho Movement
Website recently in order to find out more, if possible, about class- war
prisoner and 1960s radical, Marilyn Buck, whom I had read about in a The Rag
Blog post I linked to the Jericho list of class war prisoners. I found
Marilyn Buck listed there but also others, some of whose cases, like that of
the “voice of the voiceless” Pennsylvania death row prisoner, Mumia Abu-Jamal,
are well-known and others who seemingly have languished in obscurity. All of
the cases, at least from the information that I could glean from the site,
seemed compelling. And all seemed worthy of far more publicity and of a more
public fight for their freedom. That last notion set me to the task at hand.
Readers of this space know that I am a longtime supporter of the Partisan
Defense Committee, a class struggle, non-sectarian legal and social defense
organization which supports class war prisoners as part of the process of
advancing the international working class’ struggle for socialism. In that
spirit I am honoring the class war prisoners on the National Jericho Movement
list this June as the start of what I hope will be an on-going attempt by all
serious leftist militants to do their duty- fighting for freedom for these
brothers and sisters. We will fight out our political differences and
disagreements as a separate matter. What matters here and now is the old
Wobblie (IWW) slogan - An injury to one is an injury to all. Note: This list, right now, is composed of
class-war prisoners held in American detention. If others are likewise
incarcerated that are not listed here feel free to leave information on their
cases in the comment section. Likewise any cases, internationally, that come to
your attention. I am sure there are many, many such cases out there. Make
this June, and every June, a Class-War Prisoners Freedom Month- Free All
Class-War Prisoners Now!
*From The Archives- Rosalie Sorrels Passes At 83-A Rosalie Sorrels Potpourri-Idaho, Cafe Lena, Childhood Dreams and Such
If I Could Be The Rain I Would Be Rosalie Sorrels-The Legendary Folksinger-Songwriter Has Her Last Go Round At 83
By Music Critic Bart Webber
Back the day, back in the emerging folk minute of the 1960s that guys like Sam Lowell, Si Lannon, the late Peter Paul Markin and others were deeply immersed in (and the former two never got over since they will still tell a tale or two about the times if you go anywhere within ten miles of the subject-I will take my chances here because this notice is important) all roads seemed to lead to Harvard Square, the Village down in NYC, North Beach out in San Francisco, and maybe Old Town in Chicago. That is where names like Baez, Dylan, Paxton, Ochs, and a whole crew of younger folksingers who sat at the feet of guys like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger.
But there was another important strand that hovered around Saratoga Springs in upstate New York, up around Skidmore and some other colleges. That was Caffe Lena’s where some of those names played but also where some upstarts from the West got a chance to play the small crowds who gathered at that famed (and still existing) coffeehouse. Upstarts like Bruce “Utah” Phillips (although he could call several places home Utah was key to what he would sing about). And out of Idaho one Rosalie Sorrels who just joined her long-time friend Utah in that last go-round at the age of 83.
The last time I saw Rosalie perform in person was back in 2002 when she performed at what was billed as her last go-round, her hanging up her shoes from the dusty travel road. She was on fire that night except the then recent death of another folk legend, Dave Von Ronk, who was supposed to be on the bill (and who was replaced by David Bromberg who did a great job) cast a pall over the proceedings. I will always remember her cover of Old Devil Time that night-yeah, give me one more chance, one more breathe. But I will always think of If I Could Be The Rain whenever I hear her name. RIP Rosalie Sorrels
A Folk Holiday Tradition
An Imaginary Christmas In Idaho, Rosalie Sorrels & Friends, Limberlost Books&Records, 1999 The first paragraph here has been used in reviewing other Rosalie Sorrels CDs in this space. “My first association of the name Rosalie Sorrels with folk music came, many years ago now, from hearing the recently departed folk singer/storyteller/ songwriter and unrepentant Wobblie (IWW) Utah Phillips mention his long time friendship with her going back before he became known as a folksinger. I also recall that combination of Sorrels and Phillips as he performed his classic “Starlight On The Rails” and Rosalie his also classic “If I Could Be The Rain” on a PBS documentary honoring the Café Lena in Saratoga, New York, a place that I am also very familiar with for many personal and musical reasons. Of note here: it should be remembered that Rosalie saved, literally, many of the compositions that Utah left helter-skelter around the country in his “bumming” days.” I do not usually do Christmas holiday-oriented CD reviews but I am on something of a Rosalie Sorrels streak after getting, as a Christmas gift, a copy of her “Strangers In Another Country”, her heart-felt tribute to her recently deceased long time friend Utah Phillips. Thus, in the interest of completeness I will make some a couple of comments. I will skip the obvious Christmas-oriented material here, although the spirit of anti-Christmas at least as the CD unfold is ‘in the air’ on this CD, including a little send-up of the old yuletide season by the above-mentioned Brother Phillips (“Jingle Bells’- Phillips style). The core of this presentation is the alternative take on the various traditions of Christmas out in Idaho (“The Fruitcake” and “Christmas Eve” , out in Minnesota (“Just A Little Lefse”)and among those who live a little closer to the edge of society (“Winter Song” and Grandma”), like Rosalie and her friends. I need not mention Rosalie’s singing and storytelling abilities. Those are, as always, a given. I have noted elsewhere that Rosalie and the old curmudgeon Phillips did more than their fate share of work in order to keep these traditions alive. Old Utah handled the more overtly political phase and Rosalie, for lack of a better expression, the political side as it intersected the personal phase. That is evident here, especially in her recitation of a note and poem written by a Native American woman in response to the lingering death of her grandmother. Powerful stuff, at Christmas or anytime, and a rather nice way to come to terms with the tragedy of death that we all sooner or later face. Listen to this fine piece. A special note to kind of bring us full circle. My first review of Rosalie’s and Utah’s combined works together mentioned a spark of renewed recognition kindled by long ago PBS documentary about the famous folk coffee house “The Café Lena” in Saratoga Springs, New York whose owner, Lena Spenser, sheltered them at various times from life’s storms. Lena, from all reports, was something of a 'fairy godmother' to many later famous folk singers and artists when they were either down on there luck or just starting out (or both). I have my own strong ties to Saratoga, its environs and Café Lena but Rosalie’s tribute to her late friend here, “Bufana and Lena”, about the Italian version of the Santa Claus myth can stand as the signpost for what this CD has attempted to do, and what that long ago folk revival that Lena represented was trying to do as well.
*In
Honor Of Our Class-War Prisoners- Free All The Class-War Prisoners!-Patrice
Lumumba Ford http://www.thejerichomovement.com/prisoners.html A link above to more information
about the class-war prisoner honored in this entry.
Make June Class-War Prisoners Freedom Month
Markin comment (reposted from 2010) In “surfing” the National Jericho Movement
Website recently in order to find out more, if possible, about class- war
prisoner and 1960s radical, Marilyn Buck, whom I had read about in a The Rag
Blog post I linked to the Jericho list of class war prisoners. I found
Marilyn Buck listed there but also others, some of whose cases, like that of
the “voice of the voiceless” Pennsylvania death row prisoner, Mumia Abu-Jamal,
are well-known and others who seemingly have languished in obscurity. All of
the cases, at least from the information that I could glean from the site,
seemed compelling. And all seemed worthy of far more publicity and of a more
public fight for their freedom. That last notion set me to the task at hand.
Readers of this space know that I am a longtime supporter of the Partisan
Defense Committee, a class struggle, non-sectarian legal and social defense
organization which supports class war prisoners as part of the process of
advancing the international working class’ struggle for socialism. In that
spirit I am honoring the class war prisoners on the National Jericho Movement
list this June as the start of what I hope will be an on-going attempt by all
serious leftist militants to do their duty- fighting for freedom for these
brothers and sisters. We will fight out our political differences and
disagreements as a separate matter. What matters here and now is the old
Wobblie (IWW) slogan - An injury to one is an injury to all. Note: This list, right now, is composed of
class-war prisoners held in American detention. If others are likewise incarcerated
that are not listed here feel free to leave information on their cases in the
comment section. Likewise any cases, internationally, that come to your
attention. I am sure there are many, many such cases out there. Make
this June, and every June, a Class-War Prisoners Freedom Month- Free All
Class-War Prisoners Now!
If I Could Be The Rain I Would Be Rosalie Sorrels-The Legendary Folksinger-Songwriter Has Her Last Go Round At 83
By Music Critic Bart Webber
Back the day, back in the emerging folk minute of the 1960s that guys like Sam Lowell, Si Lannon, the late Peter Paul Markin and others were deeply immersed in (and the former two never got over since they will still tell a tale or two about the times if you go anywhere within ten miles of the subject-I will take my chances here because this notice is important) all roads seemed to lead to Harvard Square, the Village down in NYC, North Beach out in San Francisco, and maybe Old Town in Chicago. That is where names like Baez, Dylan, Paxton, Ochs, and a whole crew of younger folksingers who sat at the feet of guys like Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger.
But there was another important strand that hovered around Saratoga Springs in upstate New York, up around Skidmore and some other colleges. That was Caffe Lena’s where some of those names played but also where some upstarts from the West got a chance to play the small crowds who gathered at that famed (and still existing) coffeehouse. Upstarts like Bruce “Utah” Phillips (although he could call several places home Utah was key to what he would sing about). And out of Idaho one Rosalie Sorrels who just joined her long-time friend Utah in that last go-round at the age of 83.
The last time I saw Rosalie perform in person was back in 2002 when she performed at what was billed as her last go-round, her hanging up her shoes from the dusty travel road. She was on fire that night except the then recent death of another folk legend, Dave Von Ronk, who was supposed to be on the bill (and who was replaced by David Bromberg who did a great job) cast a pall over the proceedings. I will always remember her cover of Old Devil Time that night-yeah, give me one more chance, one more breathe. But I will always think of If I Could Be The Rain whenever I hear her name. RIP Rosalie Sorrels
HONOR THE MEMORY OF JULIUS AND ETHEL ROSENBERG-SOLDIERS OF THE REVOLUTION
COMMENTARY
THEY WERE NOT OUR PEOPLE-BUT, THEY WERE OUR PEOPLE
Eisenhower, Stalin, the Cold War, the Korean War, atomic bombs, atomic spies, air raid shelters, the “Red Scare”, McCarthyism and the Rosenbergs- in the mist of time these were early, if undigested terms, from my childhood. Ah, the Rosenbergs. That is what I want to write about today. Out of all of those undigested terms that name is the one that still evokes deep emotion in these old bones. For those who have forgotten, or those too young to remember, the controversy surrounding their convictions for espionage in passing information about the atomic bomb to the now defunct Soviet Union and their executions defined an essential part of the 1950’s, the hardening of the Cold War period in American history. Their controversial convictions and sentencing evoked widespread protests throughout the world. Thus, those who seek to learn the lessons of history, our working class history, and about justice American-style should take the time to carefully examine the case and come to some conclusions about it.
Frankly, I had not read, until recently when I read The Rosenberg File by Ronald Radosh and Joyce Milton (originally written in 1983 with a second edition in 1997 taking advantage of the opening of some archives in the post-Soviet period), any books on the case in a long while. Thus one of my tasks is to re-read the old material, read the new post-Soviet material, and make some suggestions about what to look for in trying to understand the history of the case. This commentary will thus express my own thoughts on the Rosenbergs more than answer the questions raised by the scholarship on the case.
And what questions drive the scholarship on the case? Was their trial a frame-up in classic American-style against leftist political opponents of the Cold War and American foreign policy? Were they, individually or collectively, “master spies” at the service of the Soviet Union? Were they innocent, if misguided, progressives caught up in the turmoil of the American “red scare” of the post-World War II period? Did the government through its FBI and other security agencies, its attorneys, its judges stumble into a case which would make many reputations? Did the American Communist Party, itself under severe scrutiny and persecution, betray the Rosenbergs? Did the various international campaigns on behalf of the couple work at cross purposes with their various demands for a new trial, reduction of sentence and clemency? What kind of people were these Rosenbergs? In short, were the Rosenbergs heroic Soviet spies, martyrs, dupes or innocents? Those are the questions thoughtful readers are confronted with and I will deal with at least some of them in due course in latter blogs.
My own evolution on the case goes something like this. In my young left-liberal and social democratic days I believed, based on my reading of the trial evidence and a belief then in the basic fairness of the American justice system, that unlike Sacco and Vanzetti the Rosenbergs were guilty of the charges but as an opponent of the death penalty they should not have been executed. As I moved left, closer to Marxist politics, I still believed they were ‘guilty’. However, I came to believe that the question of guilt or innocence was beside the point and their actions on behalf of the Soviet Union made them heroes of the international working class. That, dear reader, is still my basic position.
And what is the basis of that position. At one time I was ‘in the orbit’ of the American Communist party, a fellow traveler of Stalinism, if you will. One of the criteria posed by that position was the question of defending the gains of the Russian Revolution, as I then understood it. And that meant defense of the interests of the Soviet Union. I saw the Rosenberg case as part of that same continuum, those who could actively aid the Soviet cause, by any means necessary, were kindred spirits although other than spreading pro-Soviet propaganda I personally never did anything materially to aid the Soviet Union.
Those who have read this space over last year know that I am an ardent supporter of the work of Russian Bolshevik warrior Leon Trotsky. As one should also be aware there was, and is, a river of blood, including the physical destruction of the Trotskyist Left Opposition inside the Soviet Union and elsewhere and Trotsky’s own assassination by a Stalinist agent in 1940, between those two concepts of socialist society. Nevertheless to his dying breath Trotsky defended the Soviet Union against foreign and internal counterrevolution. Thus, despite that political divide the Rosenbergs’ action, according to their lights, was not affected by my change of political orientation. Nor should it have changed.
And who were the Rosenbergs? In the headline above I called them soldiers of the revolution and I would add here, as they saw it. I think that is a fair assessment and one that I hope they would have agreed with despite our divergence political perspectives. I like the picture in my mind of Julius Rosenberg standing up for the almost forgotten labor martyr Tom Mooney in the early 1930’s at City College of New York. I also like the picture of the ‘premature’ anti-fascist Ethel Rosenberg singing in Times Square in 1936 to raise money for the Spanish Republicans when damn few others raised their heads. They made, seemingly, every mistake in the spy book. They may have not been the natural leaders of a socialist revolution in America. However, no revolution can be made without such dedicated rank and filers, who stood up when it counted. They did not cry about their fate. And they did not turn into governmental informers to save their skins. Yes, my friends, those are indeed my kindred spirits. They were not our people-but, they were our people. And they should be yours. Some day when there is a lot most justice in the world than there is now a really fitting memorial to their memory will be in order in the socialist society of the future. In the meantime- Honor the Rosenbergs-Soldiers of the Revolution.
The 50th Anniversary Of The Summer Of Love, 1967-On The Late Dennis Hopper’s “Easy Rider”
Zack James’ comment June, 2017:
You know it is in a way too bad that “Doctor Gonzo”-Hunter S
Thompson, the late legendary journalist who broke the back, hell broke the
neck, legs, arms of so-called objective journalism in a drug-blazed frenzy back
in the 1970s when he “walked with the king”’ is not with us in these times. In
the times of this 50th anniversary commemoration of the Summer of
Love, 1967 which he worked the edges of while he was doing research (live and
in your face research by the way) on the notorious West Coast-based Hell’s
Angels. His “hook” through Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters down in Kesey’s
place in La Honda where many an “acid test” took place and where for a time the
Angels, Hunter in tow, were welcomed. He had been there in the high tide, when
it looked like we had the night-takers on the run and later as well when he saw
the ebb tide of the 1960s coming a year or so later although that did not stop
him from developing the quintessential “gonzo” journalism fine-tuned with
plenty of dope for which he would become famous before the end, before he took
his aging life and left Johnny Depp and company to fling his ashes over this
good green planet. He would have “dug” the exhibition, maybe smoked a joint for
old times’ sake (oh no, no that is not done in proper society) at the de Young
Museum at the Golden Gate Park highlighting the events of the period showing
until August 20th of this year.
Better yet he would have had this Trump thug bizarre
weirdness wrapped up and bleeding from all pores just like he regaled us with
the tales from the White House bunker back in the days when Trump’s kindred one
Richard Milhous Nixon, President of the United States and common criminal was
running the same low rent trip before he was run out of town by his own like
some rabid rat. He would have gone crazy seeing all the crew deserting the
sinking U.S.S. Trump with guys like fired FBI Director Comey going to Capitol
Hill and saying out the emperor has no clothes and would not know the truth if
it grabbed him by the throat. Every day would be a feast day. But perhaps the
road to truth these days, in the days of “alternate facts” and assorted other
bullshit would have been bumpier than
in those more “civilized” times when simple burglaries and silly tape-recorders
ruled the roost. Hunter did not make the Nixon “hit list” (to his everlasting
regret for which he could hardly hold his head up in public) but these days he
surely would find himself in the top echelon. Maybe too though with these thugs
he might have found himself in some back alley bleeding from all pores. Hunter
Thompson wherever you are –help. Selah. Enough said-for now
DVD Review
Easy Rider, starring Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson, directed by Dennis Hopper, 1969
In the recent Associated Press obituary for the late actor and director, Dennis Hooper, is quoted as believing that, for him, the 1969 counter-cultural classic motorcycle film that he directed, “Easy Rider”, was more a statement about the political landscape of the times than a male-bonding biker “road” movie. I agree with him, or at least that is how I have always viewed the film. The subjects of drugs, using and selling, dressing for “hippie" success, the hard road of rural communal living (or urban communal living, for that matter), and trying to cope with the “squares” and “rednecks” were all in a day’s work back in the days for those of us committed to “seeking a newer world.”
In that sense “Easy Rider” is a very, very different road trip from that of the literary one in Jack Kerouac’s 1957 “On The Road” (although the “action” of that book actually took place in the late 1940s). That small generational difference in time probably in cultural time was a matter of different epochs. The action of “On The Road” speaks to an almost subterranean escape from the bleakness of American conformity in the immediate post-World War II period behind the backs of the "squares". The bikers, Fonda and Hopper (Wyatt and Billy, alright), in “Easy Rider” are up front and public about their “making and doing” , as reflected the change in mores of their times as they confronted their version of American conformity in the 1960s. In the end they lost that very public battle, and we have been fighting a rearguard series of “culture war” battles ever since. But watch this film to get a slice of 1960s Americana. (Did we really wear that stuff and get all crazy like that? Yes, we did. Although under oath I will plead the 5th.) And if you are too young to know some of the references just ask mother and father (or the grandparents, ouch!). They WILL know.
Note: The late Doctor Gonzo”, journalist Hunter Thompson, rather eloquently in HIS countercultural classic, “Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas”, mentioned toward the end of that fearsome saga that sometime in the late 1960s he could almost see the high tide of the movement ebbing before his eyes signaling the end of all those fierce dreams that we had of that “newer world” and the beginning of the approach of the “night of the long knives.” “Easy Rider” is the cinematic take on that proposition
