Kairos Center - Poor People’s Campaign Arts & Culture Convening August 25th
Kairos Center/Poor People’s Campaign Arts & Culture Convening
Sunday, August 25, 2024 at 4PM
Free to all!
From August 23-25, 2024 Bethany Arts Community welcomes for the second year a diverse group of activists and musical artists committed to envisioning a role for arts and culture in the present-day struggle for justice. Co-convened by the New York State Poor People’s Campaign and the Kairos Center for Religions, Rights and Social Justice, the weekend retreat brings together movement leaders, singers and instrumentalists to envision a role for art and culture in the 21st century fight for social justice. Encompassing three days, the retreat will include political education, arranging, composing and recording of movement songs old and new. The weekend concludes on Sunday August 25 at 4pm, where musicians from the Hudson Valley can participate in a song workshop to share in some of the music and political education explored during the retreat.
We're gathered here tonight to do a sacred thing sing sing sing, sing sing sing sing sing sing, sing
It says in the Bible somewhere that singing is praying times two and whenever angels show up it always seems that's what they do
We're gathered here tonight to do a sacred thing sing sing sing, sing sing sing
millions of pilgrims every day visit Mecca and I've heard it said when you hear their song millions singing all at once it's a sound you'll never forget
We're gathered here tonight to do a sacred thing sing sing sing, sing sing sing
the Navajo and Cherokee Lakota and Cheyenne Shawnee, Pawnee, Crow and Cree all had one common thread beside the one Great Spirit and the one Mother Earth they all raise their voices for all that they are worth
We're gathered here tonight to do a sacred thing sing sing sing, sing sing sing
Words and music by Fred Gillen Jr.
I told Fred recently that I have always considered Sing Sing Sing an anthem for Tribes Hill. I asked if I could use it for a special music video celebrating over two decades of our music community of kindred folk. I am currently going through our archives and will be posting the video soon. I also asked Fred if he could share with us how the song came about. Here is what he had to say:
"Memory is unreliable and I wrote Sing Sing Sing in 2007 or so. What I do remember is at the time I’d just spent a bunch of time with Pete Seeger. One night Steve Kirkman drove Pete to and from a concert with a kids choir that Turk had organized. After we dropped Pete off Steve and I were talking about how easy Pete made it look to teach 400 people how to sing his very complicated song “Take it From Doctor King.” I was thinking that no amount of practice would ever help me pull off something like that but that I’d like to write a song of my own which was easy to teach to a room full of people. Usually it’s hard to write from an intention, but in this case I wrote ABOUT singing, and it worked! Since then the song has been sung by many people with and without me (including Pete, with Sue Wright and her Sargent Elementary students.) From being in the songbook at a church in Toledo to me teaching the audience at Patan Durbar World Heritage site in Nepal to Solar Punch playing it in Haiti, I think the song really is a connection between the Hudson Valley (and the spirit of Pete) and the world."
