How Can I Keep From Singing? - for Pete Seeger's 105th birthday - Marc Nerenberg

How Can I Keep From Singing? - for Pete Seeger's 105th birthday - Marc Nerenberg - Live

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Ай бұрын

On the occasion of Pete Seeger's 105th birthday this past Friday, 3 May 2024, I opened the almost empty Yellow Door Hootenanny with the old song, How Can I Keep From Singing? - which I learned from the singing of Pete. It's a very recent addition to my repertoire, and when learning it, I found myself moving parts of it around, as well as adding a few bits of my own that enlarged upon what was already there in the lyrics.
The song itself, apparently an old Quaker song, is actually derived from an even older Baptist hymn. But while the Baptist hymn is clearly a religious song, with direct references to Jesus, the Quaker version is much more a song about social justice (and also about the power of song to change the world) and it comes from the time when Quakers were being jailed for their beliefs.
It's a song that, to me at least, feels as relevant today as ever.
I recorded and posted this song in a home studio version about a month ago, when I had just worked out this version. This live version has that extra spark that comes from having an audience present, no matter how small it may have been. And since I learned it from Pete Seeger, and it was the anniversary of his birthday that night, I made sure to play it on my Pete Seeger model banjo (which I once had occasion to lend to Pete himself, to perform with in the absence of his own banjo).
Aside from being played on a different banjo than my earlier (home) recording, this is also played here in different key and a different tuning. In this case, the banjo is tuned eDGBD (when the capo position is taken into account). This puts it into a G6 tuning, played in the key of G, using mostly old-time thumb-lead two-finger picking, with a few strategically placed brief bits of clawhammer style.

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@truebelieversnola Ай бұрын

May the spirit of Pete's music travel forward through time and ever find its way into the hearts of each new generation yearning for peace and for justice and for the joy of living.

@chuckjj5493 Ай бұрын

Well done,enjoyed your story about Pete Seeger,he was a great artist.

@marcnerenberg1 Ай бұрын

Thanks very much. He was indeed a great artist, and even more so, a great human being. It was a genuine privilege to have met him personally quite a few times in my life, starting as a little kid, when he came to our house since my father had been instrumental in bringing him to Montreal to perform when he was blacklisted in the U.S.

@chuckjj5493 Ай бұрын

@@marcnerenberg1 Cool.