Louis Armstrong - George Gershwin - Rich Hall TV - Andrew Marr TV - Bob Dylan: No Direction Home 2005 - Ian Hislop TV - Simon & Garfunkel: The Harmony Game TV - Massacre of the Stadium TV - Constant Lambert - How a Folk Singer's Murder Forced Chile to Confront Its Past 2019 -
All music is folk music. Louis Armstrong
Jazz I regard as an American folk music; not the only one, but a very powerful one which is probably in the blood and feeling of the American people more than any other style of folk music. George Gershwin, cited Henry Cowell ‘American Composers on American Music’, 1933
You know a situation is critical when folk singers start wading in. Rich Hall’s Red Menace, BBC 2019
Dusty Springfield started her musical career with her brother as the singer in a three-piece folk band: they called them The Springfields … The first British group to enter the US Billboard charts. New Elizabethans with Andrew Marr III: Made in Britain, BBC 2020
I had ambitions to er set out and find like an odyssey, going home somewhere and set up to find this home that I’d left awhile back … Bob Dylan, No Direction Home I, 2005
We didn’t have the clothes that we have now … There really wasn’t any philosophy or … ideology to go against. ibid.
He’s changed from what he was. He’s not the same as he was at first. ibid. British fan post-concert
Woody Guthie: he had a particular sound. And he said something to go along with his sound. That was highly unusual to my ears. ibid. Dylan
Fantastic. Very good. ibid. British fan post-concert
Hey, her, Woody Guthrie, I wrote you a song, about a funny old world that’s moving along.’ ibid. song lyric
It was very much the spirit of the time. ibid. fan
The land that I live in has God on its side … Oh the country was young with God on its side. ibid. song lyric
The process was new to me. I felt like I’d discovered something no-one else had ever discovered, and I was in a certain arena artistically that no-one else had ever been in before. Ever. Although, I might have been wrong about that. ibid. Dylan
Fan: What happened to Woody Guthrie, Bob?
Bob: These are all protest songs. Now come on. Bob Dylan, No Direction Home II
All my sons are protest songs. ibid.
No-one had heard anything like this before. ibid. fan
A deeply felt but essentially nostalgic rural vision took hold. Ian Hislop’s Olden Days III, BBC 2014
The latest expression of a very ancient idea in art and literature – the pastoral. ibid.
Folk music was the soundtrack to more egalitarian times. ibid.
A huge folk music revival ... ‘The heart and soul of the whole nation’. ibid.
Morris dancing caught on. ibid.
If you’re in the harmony game, you learn to scorn harmonies like that. Simon & Garfunkel: The Harmony Game, Simon & Garfunkel in taxi, BBC 2021
Oh we were on top of the world. We were lucky sons of guns. Our toes were twinkling. There’s nothing that brings out your talent than hit records. It puts you in such a good mood. ibid.
We got hate mail … and we got plenty of that. You don’t like it here? Get out. ibid. Simon
He became a symbol of the power of the people. Massacre at the Stadium: A Victor Jara Story I, woman, Netflix 2019
He was too much of a threat. They had to kill him. ibid. other woman
One of the great unsolved murders of the twentieth century. ibid. dude
Victor sang traditional folk repertoire. ibid. woman
During the presidential campaign we accompanied [Salvador] Allende to many places. Victor’s songs were the soundtrack for that piece of history. His music was essential to Allende’s victory. ibid. dude
Then we realised that the right-wing opposition to Allende was getting more aggressive. Paramilitary groups were forming. We saw how right-wing forces wanted to disrupt society just because they were losing power. ibid. musician
He was murdered in the worst possible way. Tortured to death. ibid. dude
The CIA was sent by Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger to overthrow Allende and help bring Pinochet to power. ibid. historian
For 44 years we’ve been seeking justice. ibid. Joan Jara
To the question, ‘In 1973 did you fire and kill Victor Jara?’ he [Barrientos] shows a high 97% rate of deception [less than 99% = inconclusive]. ibid. Alberto Gonzalez, lie detector examiner
Every year, the festival of 1000 Guitars for Victor Jara is held in Santiago, Chile, to celebrate his life and his music. ibid. caption
On July 3 2018 eight retired Chilean officers were sentenced to fifteen years for their involvement in Victor Jara’s torture and death. Pedro Barrientos was not included in the process, since he resides in the United States. Although the Chilean judicial system has renewed their effort to have him extradited, Barrientos still lives a free man in Florida. ibid.
The whole trouble with a folk song is that once you have played it through there is nothing much you can do except play it over again and play it rather louder. Constant Lambert, Music Ho! 1934
Every year musicians gather to pay tribute to the legendary folk singer Victor Jara murdered during a military coup in Chile in 1973. How a Folk Singer’s Murder Forced Chile to Confront Its Past *****, Youtube 13.44, Retro Report 2019
‘He was completely committed to trying to make the world a better place. And he actually gave his life for that.’ ibid. Jara’s widow
In the 1960s Jara and other artists used their music to advocate for political and social change and workers’ rights. ibid.
Over the next 17 years of military rule under General Augusto Pinochet an estimated 27,000 were tortured and over 3,000 were killed or disappeared. ibid.
In 2015 a Chilean judge charged 9 army officers with Jara’s murder and ordered them to stand trial. ibid.