Pete Seeger -- intervew, T'was On A Night Like This

"T'was On A Night Like This", words by Pete Seeger, adapting the Italian carol "Tu Scendi Dalle Stella"

One of the things we like to do on Ornaments is go back and find one classic recording for each hour and feature it, along with an interview with its creator. Among our living folk legends today, Pete Seeger is the sage, the gentle giant at the top of that mountain. To have a chance to revisit his Folkways album, "Traditional Christmas Carols," recorded by Moses Asch back in 1967, and to talk with Pete about it and the holidays in general, was an opportunity producer Joe Gunderman very much wanted.

Pete conveniently came to our very doorstep, thanks to the International Folk Alliance being held in Cleveland in 2000. Joe was there, and Pete graciously stepped into a side room off of the main convention floor and talked and sang with him. Yes, sang with him. It's easy to sing with Pete, just stand next to him for a few minutes. On the topic of Christmas songs, one of his favorites is "Last Month of the Year," which Joe grew up listening to on the Kingston Trio album of that name. So when Pete sang it, Joe joined right in, and they went back and forth on the call and response. Don't worry, that is not what we feature on the show. But Pete did add a final verse to that song:

"But now we're all here singing,
On the last month of the year..."

It was in discussing that verse, and the idea of the story of Christmas going forward, that prompted Pete's final thought featured on the show. And while you should hear it there, it's important enough that we decided to also write it here:

"Well, the story will not end as long as there's a human race on the earth that likes to sing, and likes to look at the stars, and likes to think about the old times, while thinking about the new times to come. And every century will have new problems to solve, and new disagreements. But we will learn that it's better to talk than shoot. We will learn that bombs always kill innocent people. We will learn that when words fail, we can use pictures, melodies, rhythms, harmonies, dancing, good food, sports, all kinds of different things to somehow reach our fellow human beings and find some way we can learn to agree to disagree."