Musician Sarah Jane Morris shares her appreciation for the folk singer
BY SARAH JANE MORRIS, IMAGES PEGGY SEEGER (LEFT) BY VICKI SHARP, SARAH JANE MORRIS (RIGHT) BY RICCARDO PICCIRILLO
Dear Peggy,
The song I wrote for you, called Longing To Be Free, was written as a personal address, from me to you. I listened to you sharing the secrets of songwriting – your passion – and thought there could be no better response than to craft a song for you, about you, how you are loved and understood. And yet, even at the outset, I doubted that I could reach you with my music; your idiom, the pure, strong voice of the storyteller, the accompaniment always limited to what could be shouldered, whereas I am no purist. I see forever your response, wise monkey style, palms pressed against your ears, blocking out the cacophony my band and I had made. That was back in 1989 when I first met you, though I seemed to have known you forever.
And so I write to you, expressing how I can how your life and art have shone for me and for countless others, but above all for women and girls. The burden-bearers, the brave sisters, the daughters who aspire to fulfilment and to freedom. The mothers of time yet to be. You awoke to the fact that within the great class struggle in which you and your comrades engaged was another age-old iniquity: the subordination of women, which was as prevalent in the field and factory as it was among the boss-class and in privileged society. I know that this became a matrix of your artistic and political life, which led to your writing and broadcasting many songs with the power to awaken others, to inspire and to engage others in the causes you championed in song and, just as importantly, in activism.
To take just one of your songs, Gonna Be An Engineer – you packed more into that one song than Tin Pan Alley managed in a decade – it is brilliant social satire, and funny too, but above all, you wrote a feminist manifesto in words that had never been sung before, but which we could all sing along to. With your eloquence and wit you changed our world forever. You showed us women how to be artists and activists, showing us by example that each role is as important as the other. Here are the words which conclude my song for you: Thank you, Peggy, for leading the way.
The Sisterhood 2 by Sarah Jane Morris features new original songs celebrating the lives of Peggy Seeger, Etta James, Joan Baez, Dolly Parton, Patti Smith, Bonnie Raitt, Joan Armatrading, Janis Ian, Tracy Chapman, Sinéad O’Connor and Amy Winehouse.
The Sisterhood 2 is out March 6th. Pre-save here.
Sarah Jane kicks off her new UK tour on International Women’s Day (8th March) at London’s 229. For full info visit: sarahjanemorris.co.uk
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