Woody Guthrie’s great line "Some will rob you with a six gun, some with a fountain pen” [“Pretty Boy Floyd”] sums up the current global crisis of concentrated wealth. Acerbically these kinds of lyrics took the wealthy elite by surprise... Like Walker Evans, Guthrie captured the dignity of ordinary people in times of crisis.
Brecht-Weill’s “What Keeps Mankind Alive” also acerbically captures the dilemma of knowing what the rich think of the rest of us & how we must survive: “Mankind can keep alive thanks to its brilliance / In keeping its humanity repressed.” A gloriously robust mosaic of joyously angry voices tries to address my frustrations with increased awareness of global issues – locally, spiritually, economically & affect us in every aspect of our lives – to know that knowledge is NOT necessarily power but maybe a way to oppose, address or manage power.
