Bruce Springsteen honors Pete Seeger at his 90th birthday

Pete Seeger turned 90 on Sunday, May 3, 2009, and a huge birthday celebration was held at Madison Square Garden. Bruce Springsteen was one of the headliners. He had this to say about Pete Seeger's legacy.
 

As Pete and I traveled to Washington for President Obama's inaugural celebration, he told me the -- he told me the entire story of "We Shall Overcome," how it moved from a labor movement song and, with Pete's inspiration, had been adopted by the civil rights movement.
 
And that day, as we sang "This Land Is Your Land," I looked at Pete. The first black president of the United States was seated to his right. And I thought of -- I thought of the incredible journey that Pete had taken. You know, my own growing up in the '60s, a town scarred by race rioting, made that moment nearly unbelievable. And Pete had thirty extra years of struggle and real activism on his belt. He was so happy that day. It was like, Pete, you outlasted the bastards, man. You just outlasted them. It was so nice. It was so nice.
 
At rehearsals the day before, it was freezing. It was like fifteen degrees. And Pete was there, he had his flannel shirt on. I said, "Man, you better wear something besides that flannel shirt!" He says, "Yeah, I've got my long johns on under this thing." I said -- and I asked him, I said, "How do you want to approach 'This Land Is Your Land'?" as it'd be near the end of the show. And all he said was, "Well, I know I want to sing all the verses. You know, I want to sing all the ones that Woody wrote, especially the two that get left out, you know, about private property and the relief office." And I thought, of course, you know, that's what Pete's done his whole life: he sings all the verses all the time, especially the ones that we'd like to leave out of our history as a people, you know?
 
At some point -- at some point, Pete Seeger decided he'd be a walking, singing reminder of all of America's history. He'd be living archive of America's music and conscience, a testament of the power of song and culture to nudge history along, to push American events towards more humane and justified ends. He would have the audacity and the courage to sing in the voice of the people.
 
Now, despite Pete's somewhat benign grandfatherly appearance, you know, he is a creature of a stubborn, defiant and nasty optimism. He carries -- inside him, he carries a steely toughness that belies that grandfatherly facade, and it won't let him take a step back from the things he believes in.
 
At ninety, he remains a stealth dagger through the heart of our country's illusions about itself. Pete Seeger still sings all the verses all the time, and he reminds us of our immense failures, as well as shining a light towards our better angels in the horizon, where the country we've imagined and hold dear, we hope, awaits us. And on top of it, he never wears it on his sleeve.... The song that... Tommy Morello and I are about to sing, I wrote it in the mid-’90s... [I]ts last verse is the beautiful speech that Tom Joad whispers to his mother at the end of The Grapes of Wrath. It says, "Wherever there's a cop beating a guy, wherever a hungry newborn baby cries, wherever there's a fight against the blood and the hatred in the air, look for me, Mom. I'll be there." Well, Pete has always been there.

 
 
The full text of Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land," including the two verses Springsteen refers to.

I’ve roamed and rambled and I followed my footsteps
To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts
And all around me a voice was sounding
This land was made for you and me.
 
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood Forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
 
In the squares of the city, under shadow of the steeple
At the relief office, I saw my people
As they stood there hungry, I stood there whistling
This land was made for you and me.
 
A great high wall there tried to stop me
A great big sign there said private property
But on the other side it didn’t say nothing
That side was made for you and me.

 
More, including some video, at Democracy Now.

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