Margaret "Peggy" Seeger (born June 17, 1935) is an American

folk singer Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be c ...

. She has lived in Britain for more than 60 years, and was married to the singer and songwriter

Ewan MacColl James Henry Miller (25 January 1915 – 22 October 1989), better known by his stage name Ewan MacColl, was a folk singer-songwriter, folk song collector, labour activist and actor. Born in England to Scottish parents, he is known as one of the ...

until his death in 1989.

First American period

Seeger's father was

Charles Seeger Charles Louis Seeger Jr. (December 14, 1886 – February 7, 1979) was an American musicologist, composer, teacher, and folklorist. He was the father of the American folk singers Pete Seeger (1919–2014), Peggy Seeger (b. 1935), and Mike Seeger ( ...

(1886–1979), a folklorist and musicologist; her mother was Seeger's second wife, Ruth Porter Crawford (1901–1953), a modernist composer who was the first woman to receive a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

. One of her brothers was

Mike Seeger Mike Seeger (August 15, 1933August 7, 2009) was an American folk musician and folklorist. He was a distinctive singer and an accomplished musician who played autoharp, banjo, fiddle, dulcimer, guitar, mouth harp, mandolin, dobro, jaw harp, ...

, and

Pete Seeger Peter Seeger (May 3, 1919 – January 27, 2014) was an American folk singer and social activist. A fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s, Seeger also had a string of hit records during the early 1950s as a member of the Weavers, notably ...

was her half-brother. Poet

Alan Seeger Alan Seeger (22 June 1888 – 4 July 1916) was an American war poet who fought and died in World War I during the Battle of the Somme, serving in the French Foreign Legion. Seeger was the brother of Charles Seeger, a noted American pacifist ...

was her uncle. One of her first recordings was ''American Folk Songs for Children'' (1955). In the 1950s, left-leaning singers such as

Paul Robeson Paul Leroy Robeson ( ; April 9, 1898 – January 23, 1976) was an American bass-baritone concert artist, stage and film actor, professional football player, and activist who became famous both for his cultural accomplishments and for his p ...

and

The Weavers The Weavers were an American folk music quartet based in the Greenwich Village area of New York City originally consisting of Lee Hays, Pete Seeger, Ronnie Gilbert, and Fred Hellerman. Founded in 1948, the group sang traditional folk songs fro ...

began to find that life became difficult because of the influence of

McCarthyism McCarthyism is the practice of making false or unfounded accusations of subversion and treason, especially when related to anarchism, communism and socialism, and especially when done in a public and attention-grabbing manner. The term origin ...

. Seeger visited Communist China and as a result had her US passport withdrawn. In 1957, the US State Department had opposed Seeger's attending the

6th World Festival of Youth and Students The 6th World Festival of Youth and Students was held from 28 July to 5 August 1957 in Moscow, capital city of the then Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The festival attracted 34,000 people from 130 countries. This became possible after the po ...

in Moscow (where the CIA had monitored the US delegation), and was vigorously critical about her having gone to China during that trip, against official "advice".Cox, Peter
''Set into Song: Ewan MacColl, Charles Parker, Peggy Seeger and the Radio Ballads''
"Chapter 8 – Muck Shifting – Song of a Road". Labatie Books, 2008, p. 73. , . The authorities had already warned her that her passport would be impounded, effectively barring her from further travel were she to return to the US. She therefore decided to tour Europeand later found out that she was on a blacklist sent to European governments. Staying in London in 1956, she performed accompanying herself on

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

. There she and

fell in love. Previously married to director and actress

Joan Littlewood Joan Maud Littlewood (6 October 1914 – 20 September 2002) was an English theatre director who trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, and is best known for her work in developing the Theatre Workshop. She has been called "The Mother of M ...

, MacColl left his second wife, Jean Newlove, to become Seeger's lover. In 1958, her UK work permit expired and she was about to be deported. This was narrowly averted by a plan, concocted by MacColl and Seeger, in which she married the folk singer Alex Campbell, in Paris, on January 24, 1959, in what Seeger described as a "hilarious ceremony". This marriage of convenience allowed Seeger to gain British citizenship and continue her relationship with MacColl. MacColl and Seeger were later married (in 1977), following his divorce from Newlove. They remained together until his death in 1989. They had three children: Neill, Calum, and Kitty. They recorded and released several albums together on

Folkways Records Folkways Records was a record label founded by Moses Asch that documented folk, world, and children's music. It was acquired by the Smithsonian Institution in 1987 and is now part of Smithsonian Folkways. History The Folkways Records & Service ...

, along with Seeger's solo albums and other collaborations with the Seeger Family and the Seeger Sisters. Seeger was a leader in the introduction of the concertina to the English folk music revival. While not the only concertina player, her "musical skill and proselytizing zeal ... was a major force in spreading the gospel of concertina playing in the revival." The documentary film ''A Kind of Exile'' was a profile of Seeger and also featured Ewan MacColl. The film was directed and produced by John Goldschmidt for ATV and shown on ITV in the UK.

Two social critics

Together with MacColl, Seeger founded

The Critics Group The Critics Group, also known as The London Critics Group, was a group of people who met to explore 'how best to apply the techniques of folk-music and drama to the folk revival' under the direction of Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger, with some par ...

, a "master class" for young singers performing traditional songs or to compose new songs using traditional song structures (or, as MacColl called them, "the techniques of folk creation"). The Critics Group evolved into a performance ensemble seeking to perform satirical songs in a mixture of theatre, comedy and song, which eventually created a series of annual productions called "The Festival of Fools" (named for a traditional British Isles event in which greater freedom of expression was allowed for the subjects of the king than was permitted during most of the year). Seeger and MacColl performed and recorded as a duo and as solo artists; MacColl wrote "

The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face" is a 1957 folk song written by British political singer-songwriter Ewan MacColl for Peggy Seeger, who later became his wife. At the time, the couple were lovers, although MacColl was still married to his ...

" in Seeger's honour (and did so during a long-distance phone call between the two, while Seeger was performing in America and MacColl was barred from traveling to the US with her due to his radical political views). None of the couple's numerous albums use any electric or electronic instrumentation. Whilst MacColl wrote many songs about work and against war and prejudice, Seeger (who also wrote such songs) sang about women's issues, with many of her songs becoming anthems of the

women's movement The feminist movement (also known as the women's movement, or feminism) refers to a series of social movements and political campaigns for radical and liberal reforms on women's issues created by the inequality between men and women. Such iss ...

. Her most memorable was "I'm Gonna Be an Engineer". There were two major projects dedicated to the

Child Ballads The Child Ballads are 305 traditional ballads from England and Scotland, and their American variants, anthologized by Francis James Child during the second half of the 19th century. Their lyrics and Child's studies of them were published as ''T ...

. The first was ''The Long Harvest'' (10 volumes 1966–75). The second was ''Blood and Roses'' (5 volumes, 1979–83). She visited the

Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp was a series of protest camps established to protest against nuclear weapons being placed at RAF Greenham Common in Berkshire, England. The camp began on 5 September 1981 after a Welsh group, Women for Life on ...

, where protests against US

cruise missile A cruise missile is a guided missile used against terrestrial or naval targets that remains in the atmosphere and flies the major portion of its flight path at approximately constant speed. Cruise missiles are designed to deliver a large warhe ...

s were concentrated. For them she wrote "Carry Greenham Home". Seeger also ran a record label, Blackthorne Records, from 1976 to 1988. Page at the discogs website.

In recent years

After the fall of the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

, US authorities began to soften their attitude towards Seeger. She returned to the United States in 1994 to live in

Asheville Asheville ( ) is a city in, and the county seat of, Buncombe County, North Carolina. Located at the confluence of the French Broad and Swannanoa rivers, it is the largest city in Western North Carolina, and the state's 11th-most populous cit ...

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

. Seeger has continued to sing about women's issues. One of her most popular recent albums is ''Love Will Linger On'' (1995). She has published a collection of 150 of her songs from before 1999. In 2011, Seeger edited ''The Essential Ewan MacColl Songbook''. Her introduction gave a detailed account of her life with MacColl. She expressed some difference of political perspective between her and Ewan. In 2006, Peggy Seeger relocated to

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

, Massachusetts, to accept a part-time teaching position at

Northeastern University Northeastern University (NU) is a private university, private research university with its main campus in Boston. Established in 1898, the university offers undergraduate and graduate programs on its main campus as well as satellite campuses in ...

. In 2008, she began producing music videos pertaining to the Presidential campaigns, making them available through a YouTube page. After 16 years of living in the United States, Seeger moved back to the United Kingdom in 2010 to be nearer to her children — since 2013 she has been living in

Iffley Iffley is a village in a designated Conservation Area in Oxfordshire, England. It lies within the boundaries of the city of Oxford, between Cowley and the estates of Rose Hill and Donnington, and in proximity to the River Thames (Isis). A nota ...

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

. In 2012, she collaborated with experimental dance producer Broadcaster on an album of her songs set against dance beats. Seeger identifies as

bisexual Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whi ...

and contributed an essay to ''Getting Bi: Voices of bisexuals around the world''. In it she details a relationship she began with the traditional singer Irene Pyper-Scott (who lives in

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

) after Ewan MacColl died. Seeger performed "Tell My Sister" on a live tribute album to the late Canadian folk artist

Kate McGarrigle Kate McGarrigle (February 6, 1946 – January 18, 2010)Obituary at CBC ...

entitled '' Sing Me the Songs: Celebrating the Works of Kate McGarrigle''. The album was released in June 2013. Seeger's memoir, ''First Time Ever: A Memoir'' was published by

Faber and Faber Faber and Faber Limited, usually abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in London. Published authors and poets include T. S. Eliot (an early Faber editor and director), W. H. Auden, Margaret Storey, William Golding, Samuel B ...

in October 2017. A double CD of songs to accompany the memoir was released at the same time. From early 2022 Seeger has been doing her "First Farewell" tour of Britain and Ireland.

Selected discography

Solo albums

* ''Folksongs of Courting and Complaint'' (1955) * ''Animal Folksongs for Children'' (1957) * ''Folksongs and Ballads'' (1957) * ''A Song for You and Me'' (1962) * ''The Best of Peggy Seeger'' (1963) * ''Peggy Alone'' (1967) * ''Penelope Isn't Waiting Anymore'' (1977) * ''Different Therefore Equal'' (1979) * ''The Folkways Years 1955 1992 Songs of Love and Politics'' (1992) * ''Familiar Faces'' (1993) * ''Songs of Love and Politics'' (1994) * ''Love Will Linger On'' (1995) * ''An Odd Collection'' (1996) * ''Classic Peggy Seeger'' (1996) * ''Period Pieces'' (1998) * ''No Spring Chickens'' (1998) * ''Almost Commercially Viable'' (2000) * ''Heading For Home'' (2003) * ''Love Call Me Home'' (2005) * ''Bring Me Home'' (2008) * ''Peggy Seeger Live'' (2012) * '' Everything Changes'' (2014) * ''Love Unbidden'' (26 June 2020) * ''The First Farewell'' (9 April 2021)

With Ewan MacColl

* ''Second Shift – Industrial Ballads'' (1958) * ''Chorus From The Gallows'' (1960) * ''Popular Scottish Songs'' (1960) * ''Singing The Fishing'' (1960) * ''New Briton Gazette, Vol. 1'' (1960) * ''Classic Scots Ballads'' (1961) * ''Bothy Ballads of Scotland'' (1961) * ''Two Way Trip'' (1961) * ''New Briton Gazette, Vol. 2'' (1962) * ''Jacobite Songs – The Two Rebellions 1715 and 1745'' (1962) * ''Steam Whistle Ballads'' (1964) * ''Traditional Songs and Ballads'' (1964) * ''The Amorous Muse'' (1966) * ''The Manchester Angel'' (1966) * ''The Long Harvest 1'' (1966) * ''The Long Harvest 2'' (1967) * ''The Long Harvest 3'' (1968) * ''The Angry Muse'' (1968) * ''The Long Harvest 4'' (1969) * ''The Long Harvest 5'' (1970) * ''The World Of Ewan MacColl And Peggy Seeger'' (1970) * ''The Long Harvest 6'' (1971) * ''The Long Harvest 7'' (1972) * ''The World Of Ewan MacColl And Peggy Seeger Vol. 2 – Songs from Radio Ballads'' (1972) * ''At The Present Moment'' (1972) * ''Folkways Record of Contemporary Songs'' (1973) * ''The Long Harvest 8'' (1973) * ''The Long Harvest 9'' (1974) * ''The Long Harvest 10'' (1975) * ''Saturday Night at The Bull and Mouth'' (1977) * ''Cold Snap'' (1977) * ''Hot Blast'' (1978) * ''Blood and Roses'' (1979) * ''Kilroy Was Here'' (1980) * ''Blood and Roses 2'' (1981) * ''Blood and Roses 3'' (1982) * ''Blood and Roses 4'' (1982) * ''Blood and Roses 5'' (1983) * ''Freeborn Man'' (1983) eissued 1989* ''Daddy, What did You Do in The Strike?'' (1984) assette mini-album* ''White Wind, Black Tide – Anti-Apartheid Songs'' (1986) assette album* ''Items of News'' (1986)

With Mike Seeger

* ''American Folk Songs Sung by the Seegers'' (1957) * ''Peggy 'n' Mike'' (1967) * ''American Folksongs for Children'' (1977) * ''American Folk Songs for Christmas'' (1990) * ''Fly Down Little Bird'' (2011)

With the Critics Group and Frankie Armstrong

* ''The Female Frolic'' (1967) * ''Living Folk'' (1970)

With guests

* ''Three Score and Ten'' (concert) (2007)

Collaboration

* ''Who's Going to Shoe Your Pretty Little Foot'' (

Topic Topic, topics, TOPIC, topical, or topicality may refer to: Topic / Topics * Topić, a Slavic surname * ''Topics'' (Aristotle), a work by Aristotle * Topic (chocolate bar), a brand of confectionery bar * Topic (DJ), German musician * Topic (g ...

UK version, 1964) – US version by

Tom Paley Allan Thomas Paley (March 19, 1928 – September 30, 2017) was an American guitarist, banjo and fiddle player. He was best known for his work with the New Lost City Ramblers in the 1950s and 1960s. Biography Paley was born on March 19, 1928 and r ...

and Peggy Seeger with Claudia Paley * ''

The Unfortunate Rake "The Unfortunate Lad", also known as "The Unfortunate Rake", is a traditional folk ballad (), which through the folk process has evolved into a large number of variants. Synopsis In nineteenth-century broadside versions, the narrator meets a comr ...

'' (1960) – In 2009, track sixteen from this album ("Girl on the Green Briar Shore") was included as track five on the seventh CD of Topic Records' 70-year anniversary boxed set, ''

Three Score and Ten ''Three Score and Ten: A Voice to the People'' is a multi-CD box set album issued by Topic Records in 2009 to celebrate 70 years as an independent British record label. The album consists of a hardback book containing the seven CDs and a paper ...

''.

References

External links

Official siteBiography from Appleseed Music
* *
Lady, What Do you Do All Day?: Peggy Seeger's Anthems of Anglo-American Feminism: Thesis by Amber Cook (née Good)
*
How Can I Keep From Singing?: A Seeger Family Tribute

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

American Folklife Center The American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. was created by Congress in 1976 "to preserve and present American Folklife". The center includes the Archive of Folk Culture, established at the library in 1928 as a repos ...

, March 2007 symposium and concert. All events are available as webcasts via the site. Retrieved August 25, 2009. {{DEFAULTSORT:Seeger, Peggy 1935 births American folk singers Seeger family Tradition Records artists Riverside Records artists American feminists Feminist musicians Bisexual musicians LGBT people from New York (state) Bisexual women Bisexual feminists American expatriates in the United Kingdom Singers from New York City Living people 20th-century American women singers 21st-century American women singers LGBT singers from the United States LGBT singers from the United Kingdom 20th-century American singers 21st-century American singers Topic Records artists Folkways Records artists