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Why Our Movements Need to Start Singing Again
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2022/12/04/why-our-movements-need-start-singing-againWhy Our Movements Need to Start Singing Again
Music is making a comeback in movement spaces, as organizers rediscover how song culture strengthens the capacity to create social change.
PAUL ENGLER
December 4, 2022
by Waging Nonviolence
Social movements are stronger when they sing. That's a lesson that has been amply demonstrated throughout history, and it's one that I have learned personally in working to develop trainings for activists over the past decade and a half. In Momentum, a training program that I co-founded and that many other trainers and organizers have built over the last seven years, song culture is not something we included at the start. And yet, it has since become so indispensable that the trainers I know would never imagine doing without it again.
The person who taught me the most as I came to appreciate the impact that song can have on movement culture is Stephen Brackett, an activist and hip-hop MC known on stage as Brer Rabbit.
A tall Denverite with abundant dreadlocks and an easy-going presence, Stephen started rapping for fun in the fourth grade. As a high school student in the 1990s, he and his friend Jamie Laurie started the Flobots, a group they have dubbed a "band with an agenda." Stephen's stage name, Brer Rabbit, came to him one day during a college freestyle, when he picked up a ceramic rabbit from a countertop. In an "act of divine accidents," as he calls it, he named himself after the figure in folklore "that represents most what a rapper is and can be"—namely, "a trickster who succeeds by his wits rather than by brawn, provoking authority figures and bending social mores as he sees fit."
Because his off-stage persona is so warm and humble, it can be startling to watch Stephen transform into Brer Rabbit when he takes the mic in a show, firing off rhymes that denounce destructive state and corporate power while celebrating human potential. Perhaps best known for their viral 2005 single "Handlebars," which went to number 3 on Billboard's Modern Rock Tracks and has racked up more than 80 million views on YouTube, Jamie and Stephen's sharp phrases can be found throughout the Flobots catalog. In their 2007 song, "Rise,"
…more…
https://www.barnesandnoble.com › w › the-little-red-songbook-gary-blanchard › 1118959987
The Little Red Songbook: A Brief History of the Wobblies and Their ...
When a person joined the IWW, they were given a union card and a copy of the Little Red Songbook. The songs in the book, set to familiar tunes of the day, were a great organizing and educational tool. ... Part songbook and part history book, this is a great resource for those interested in the story and song of the American labor movement ...
Available on line
https://store.iww.org/shop/little-red-songbook-38th-edition/
Look for the Union Label 1981 classic ad
https://m.
(What’s your favorite action song?)
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"Most people don’t think about singing when they think about revolution. But song was the weapon of choice when Estonians sought to free themselves from decades of Soviet occupation. The Singing Revolution is an inspiring account of one nation’s dramatic rebirth. It is the story of humankind’s irrepressible drive for freedom and self-determination.
The Singing Revolution shares how, between 1987 and 1991, hundreds of thousands of Estonians gathered publicly to sing forbidden patriotic songs and share protest speeches, risking their lives to proclaim their desire for independence. While violence and bloodshed was the unfortunate end result in other occupied nations of the USSR, the revolutionary songs of the Estonians anchored their struggle for freedom, which was ultimately accomplished without the loss of a single life.
The Singing Revolution tells the moving and dramatic story of how the Estonian people peacefully regained their freedom–and helped topple an empire along the way.
“The young people, without any political party, and without any politicians, just came together … not only tens of thousands but hundreds of thousands … to gather and to sing and to give this nation a new spirit,” remarks Mart Laar, a Singing Revolution leader featured in the film and the first post-Soviet Prime Minister of Estonia, “This was the idea of the Singing Revolution.”
https://singingrevolution.com/about/