Episode Transcript
[00:00:10] Speaker A: This is the Nathan's and Roncast, the podcast about the songcraft and musicianship behind the songs we love. And today we're gonna talk with our friend, Spook Handy. Spook performed alongside Pete Seeger at festivals and concerts more than 50 times from 2003 to 2013, learning firsthand many of Pete's songs and the stories behind them. Spook is here today to talk about the classic Woody Guthrie song this Land Is yous Land, including Pete Seeger's contribution to the song.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: In part one of our conversation with Spook Handy, he talks about why he cringes when he and Pete Seeger are described as protest singers. He talks about how Pete Seeger helped make the song a secular anthem by getting the song published in the schools.
[00:00:53] Speaker A: And he talks about how Pete was actually excited when the Tea Party started using his music. Here's part one of our conversation with Spookhandy.
All right, we're here with Spookhandy, folk singer, song leader, and all around great fellow. Welcome to the Nathans and Roncast.
[00:01:12] Speaker C: Hey, Aaron. Mike.
[00:01:13] Speaker A: So recently I came across a blog post of yours. You've created a substack you're blogging, and they're really interesting pieces. I've read a few of them so far, but the one that really grabbed me was the one about this Land Is yous Land. And I know that you had had a friendship with Pete Seeger and that informed what you wrot in that blog post. Can you tell us how you. How you met Pete and how that blossomed into an ongoing friendship?
[00:01:36] Speaker C: Yeah. So my blog post is called Looking for America and it talks about the experiences I've had in the music world and in my life. And if you're going to talk about music in relationship to the ideal of what America is, a really great place to start is this Land Is yous Land because it contains in it one of the unwritten, at least not in the Constitution, but one of the most important principles, that this land was made for you and me. Now, I understand that there's all kinds of controversy about that with Native Americans, and I totally understand that. But the overriding principle is that basically we're to be treated as equals in this country. You know, all people were created equal. So I started learning about this because I had the great fortune of meeting and working with Pete Seeger. And that's another place if you're going to start learning about America through music. Pete Seeger, I met him because I accidentally wrote a hit song in the folk world called Vote and People who get to know me know that I'm a very slow learner. And I had no idea that the stuff that I was writing would be up Pete Seeger's alley in what I wrote in that song, primarily because Pete wasn't even on my radar. But, you know, one of the refrains of the song is, the world's made up of all kinds of people. And that's, like, right smack up Pete's alley. And so is the last verse where I say, looking at life cosmologically, all cells in the body of the Almighty. And with godlike nature, we create our own reality. But down here on Earth, that's a different ball of wax. We got to eat and pay all kinds of taxes and form governments to have laws to pass, because the world's made up of all kinds of people. So vote. And that was, you know, right up Pete's alley. And he heard the song, reached out to me. Let this be a good lesson for any songwriter. I wrote the song in 1992 on election night and thought it was a shelf life of 12 minutes, not realizing, hey, there's an election every year, every four years. And I recorded the song in 2001, and it got into Pete's hands in 2003, 11 years after I wrote the song.
[00:03:36] Speaker A: Oh, boy.
[00:03:36] Speaker C: Now, Pete was a very magnanimous person, and I am one of hundreds, if not thousands of otherwise unknown folk musicians that he invited right smack into the center of the universe of the folk music world, standing 10ft away from him on stage at a festival, singing my song with Pete singing harmonies and playing banjo.
[00:03:57] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:03:58] Speaker C: I mean, what a gift. What a way of turn. What a way of reaching back and. And giving a hand up to. To, you know, the next generation or two generations after.
[00:04:07] Speaker A: Where was that show?
[00:04:08] Speaker C: So Pete lived In Beacon, New York, 60 miles north of Manhattan on Beacon Hill, or Mount Beacon, I think it's called. So maybe as the crow flies, three quarters of a mile from the Hudson river, but the festival was right smack on the Hudson river in a park that is now called the Pete and Toshi Riverside park that 60 years ago was a waste dump. And because of his efforts, it was cleaned up and turned into a park where thousands of people converge several times a year for different festivals.
[00:04:33] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:04:34] Speaker C: So who. Folks who have an idea of who I am, you wouldn't be surprised that I didn't know much about Pete until I met him. And it might have turned out to be a gift, because I was certainly not starstruck. I was. Humanity struck. That I met this man who was one of the most magnanimous and full of wisdom. I mean, right off the bat, I recognized this guy was full of wisdom. And over the years, probably half of the pearls of wisdom I ever learned came out of his mouth.
[00:04:58] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:04:58] Speaker C: Very intelligent and definitely always saw the big picture. And the part of the big picture is that music can be a tool.
[00:05:05] Speaker A: To make the world a better place right now. I mean, that's been part of your songwriting over the years too, right? I mean, he reached out to you, probably. I mean, I don't know if that one song was all he heard about you, but of course I'd heard you. The first time you and I met was at Solar Fest, I think it might have been 2005, I want to say. And I could tell at that point you're a very socially conscious writer. Does that come naturally to you? Are you politically active? Why does that kind of songwriting speak to you?
[00:05:33] Speaker C: Well, it's interesting. I would agree, that I am a socially conscious songwriter. And it's not by intention, it's not by design. And in fact, I had written a whole ton of socially conscious songs before anybody accused me, hahaha. Of being socially conscious. I was like, oh, really? No, it's just, you know, you just write what you see, you know, and I write what I see. And I know that what I see is my perspective. It's not necessarily correct. But I've also learned that it's really important to tell the truth. And once again, my perception of the truth is subjective to who I am, and I'm aware of that too, and that's part of the truth. But I report what I see in the world as honestly as I can, and it turns out that there's controversy about these things, and so they become socially conscious or political songs or whatever you want to call them. I cringe at being called a protest singer.
[00:06:29] Speaker A: Why do you cringe when people call you a protest singer?
[00:06:31] Speaker C: Because there's a question that's in one of Pete's songs, and it's in the Old Testament of the Bible, and it's actually a question, but says there's a time to build up and a time to break down. And I think that over the last 50 years, we've done a fantastic job of breaking things down and a terrible job of building. Building things up. And right now there are so many people who are happy to break things down and to tear down the system and protest against this and all that stuff. And even if I concur with some of Those viewpoints. There's not enough voices out there to build things up, to celebrate the wonderful things that we have in this world and to celebrate the tools that we have to celebrate the principles upon which this nation was founded. We need to be reminded of that. So, yeah, there might be a song or two I sing that's against something. Might be against some political movement or something like that, but I would hate. I cringe when someone thinks that. That's what I do. And I also cringe when I hear Pete Sigurd described as a protest songwriter or song singer. Because I feel the same thing about him. He was really about building common ground, celebrating our common history, our common culture, our common landscape, our common values, and, yes, our common struggles. But a very small percentage of the songs were against stuff. And that brings us to Woody Guthrie. I would say that this Land Is yous Land is the model song for how to write a song of social conscience, or if you prefer to call it a protest song. That's how you do it. Because I learned that song in kindergarten and there was nothing of protest about it. And that's because Woody Guthrie wrote six verses to the song. And the first three verses celebrate our landscape. The ribbon of highway, the desert, the skyway. He's celebrating the wheat fields, waving. He starts off by singing about all these things that we all, you know, all, quote, unquote, all cherish, that we all value, that we all enjoy and that we all share. And then not until the fourth verse does he sing about some of the struggles that in addition to this, there are some people who are at the relief office because economy is not absolutely perfect and some people are being left behind. And in another verse, he sings about private property and the challenges with that. So how did that song get into the school books? It's because Pete sent in only the first three verses. And because those three verses are something that everybody can agree on.
[00:08:51] Speaker A: That's funny. I hadn't thought of that.
[00:08:53] Speaker C: Yeah. And what I wanted to back up about why Pete was such an effective protest song singer, even though I would put that very low on the list of who he was, it's because he built so much common ground. People of all persuasions, ethnicities, religions, backgrounds, and even politics agree with so much of the stuff that. That he says that when he does speak up against something, he's already got their ears. He's already got an audience that listens. And so he has credibility. Same thing with Woody Guthrie. We probably would not have known who Woody Guthrie is or was if it Was not for this land is your land. And we probably would not have known that song if it didn't start off with singing about our common heritage or common landscape.
[00:09:33] Speaker B: You know, one of the things that I've always felt that folk music does is it gets people from different places, different mindsets, different opinions into the same room. And they would never be in that room if it wasn't for us musicians performing. And once you find that people like what you're doing and they respect you and your opinion, your truth, your songwriting, they're more willing to listen. And I feel like the idea of protest music or anything is like, I'm against this. I love the idea of building it up rather than tearing it down, because people can agree on making things better. People tend to disagree on tearing stuff up and then starting from scratch. You know, to me, that's a terrible idea. If I lose my whole music project and I have to build it up from scratch again, you know, like, it's. There's visceral feelings about that type of thing. So I like the idea that we folk musicians help bring people together and have a conversation, whether they intended to start having a conversation or not.
[00:10:34] Speaker C: Absolutely. So I've been touring for many, many years. Took a big break during the pandemic, But I would often return home on the day before election day. In 2010 was the year that the Tea Party won a lot of congressional seats and governorships and stuff like that. And I'm not a Tea Party guy and I'm not a fan of their philosophy, but in that one week leading up to that election, I played in concerts in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland, and the western part of Maryland and North Carolina, and each time, eastern Ohio. And each time after the show, I was invited to sing at Tea Party rallies.
And it's because I'm singing the songs of W. Guthrie and Pete Seeger and my own songs that fit in with that. And to take it a step further, after Election Day, three days later, I was up in Beacon, New York, at the Beacon Sloop Club monthly meeting. And Pete was there. And I said to Pete, I said, pete, you know, the Tea Party folks love your music. And he was so excited, he went running across the room. Toshi. Toshi. That's his wife. Toshi. Toshi, did you hear that? The Tea Party likes my music. And, you know, it's like, if you're known as a lefty and you're known as a protest songwriter and you have lefties that love you, well, that's nice. But if you have people on the opposite side of the political spectrum that also like your music. That says a lot. So Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger really reach beyond those political boundaries or whatever you want to call them.
[00:12:15] Speaker A: So, Spook, are you able to tell us anything about the genesis of the song, about what Woody was doing when he created it?
[00:12:21] Speaker C: Yes. He left from California and arrived in New York City sometime in late February 1940. The song in his songbook is dated February 23, 1940. And then it says New York, New York, New York. And it kind of chronicles his trip from the Diamond Desert from California out to New York City and what he saw along the way. Now, when he wrote the song in 1940, supposedly, as far as I know, I've heard 1945, 1948 was the first time that anybody ever heard the song performed in public. So it's one of those songs that he didn't recognize as a hit and it had time to mature. So when he first wrote the song, about two weeks or one week before he met Pete Seeger. Now, Woody Guthrie was born in 1912. So at this time he's 27 going on 28. Pete Seeger was born in 1919, so Pete is 20 going on 21. There's a big difference in age. Pete's really just getting started. And Woody is pretty well established. And the two met at a concert in New York City. Before Pete heard the song, Woody had originally written. This land is your land, this land is my land. From California to Staten island from the redwood forest to the Gulf Stream waters God blessed America for me. And that was the first verse. When Pete eventually heard the song, he suggested to Woody a couple of things. He said, first of all, Staten island is a real place, but nobody knows where it is.
But if you say the New York island, well, that's not a real place, but everybody knows where that is. So he changed the words from California orientated in New York Island. He also suggested that saying God blessed America for me could turn a bunch of people off. That's a whole topic in itself, because Pete was no atheist. He was not averse to using the word God, but he thought you should be careful when you use it. And he also felt not just that America was made for me, but it was made for you and me. So he made these suggestions to Woody. He also suggested that, as I said, that was the first verse. He suggested that you make that a chorus and you sing it between all of the other verses. So that's pretty much the genesis of it. And Woody wrote the song because as he was traveling, this is the story I heard. There's probably many stories, but as he was traveling, he stopped at a diner somewhere to eat and they were playing the song God Bless America. And what I heard was he didn't think it was a bad song, but he didn't think it told the whole story. It told only about what a great country we had and did not mention the issues of poverty and capitalism. And what were some of the issues as a result of capitalism, like the privatization of property.
[00:14:58] Speaker B: In part two of our conversation, Spook talks about this land as your land. Since my family group Ronstadt generations, recorded an EP of American songs in 2012, done in Mexican styles, we'll share our version of this Land Is yous Land, featuring lead vocals by Michael J. Ronstadt. That's my dad, Michael G. Ronstadt. That's me, My brother Petey Ronstadt, our friend David Damian Figueroa, who created this project, and Mary Lou Fulton. We also worked with the late great Francisco Gonzalez, who was a founding member of Los Lobos on the album. We did not record all six verses in this version.
[00:16:08] Speaker D: 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 As I was walking that ribbon of highway I saw a bug of me that endless skyway I saw below me that golden valley this land was made for you and me I roamed and rambled and followed my footsteps to the sparkling sands of the diamond deserts and all around me a voice was sounding this land was made for you and me when the sun came shining and I was strolling and the wheat fields waving the dust cloud rolling, the fog was lifting A voice was chanting 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 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 this land was made for you and me Me.
