2024 Films-On-Music Series at The West Theatre

This coming weekend--April 19-25--the West Theater here in Duluth is hosting a mini film fest featuring films showcasing music. Here's the schedule, with film summaries below. Which ones will you go to see?

Click to enlarge

It Might Get Loud

Davis Guggenheim USA 2008 Documentary -- 98 mins

“It Might Get Loud” is a 2008 American documentary film by filmmaker Davis Guggenheim. The film explores the careers and musical styles of three prominent rock guitarists: Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin, The Edge of U2, and Jack White of The White Stripes. It reveals how each developed his unique sound and style of playing favorite instruments, guitars both found and invented. The film revolves around a day when Jimmy Page, Jack White, and The Edge first met and sat down together to share their stories, teach, and play.

Best viewed in the theater.

Velvet Goldmine 

Todd Haynes USA 1998 Drama -- 118 Mins

"Velvet Goldmine" is a 1998 musical drama film directed by Todd Haynes. Set in Britain during the glam rock days of the early 1970s, it tells the story of a fictional bisexual pop star named Brian Slade, who faked his own death. The film uses non-linear storytelling to achieve exposition while interweaving the vignettes of its various characters.

Best viewed in the theater.

Stop Making Sense

Jonathan Demme USA Documentary 1984 -- 88 mins

Considered by critics as the greatest concert film of all time, the live performance was shot over the course of three nights at Hollywood's Pantages Theater in December of 1983 and features Talking Heads' most memorable songs. Newly restored in 4K to coincide with its 40th anniversary, the 1984 film was directed by renowned filmmaker Jonathan Demme.

Best viewed in the theater.

Joan Baez: I Am A Noise

Directors Miri Navasky | Maeve O'Boyle | Karen O'Connor, USA 2023 -- 113 mins

At the end of a 60-year career, legendary singer and activist Joan Baez takes an honest look back and a deep look inward as she tries to make sense of her large, history-making life, and the personal struggles she's kept private.

Neither a conventional biopic nor a traditional concert film, JOAN BAEZ I AM A NOISE is a raw and intimate portrait of the legendary folk singer and activist that shifts back and forth through time as it follows Joan on her final tour and delves into her extraordinary archive, including newly discovered home movies, diaries, artwork, therapy tapes, and audio recordings. Baez is remarkably revealing about her life on and off stage - from her lifelong emotional struggles to her civil rights work with MLK and a heartbreaking romance with a young Bob Dylan. A searingly honest look at a living legend, this film is a compelling and deeply personal exploration of an iconic artist who has never told the full truth of her life, as she experienced it, until now.

Finding Her Beat

Directors: Dawn Mikkelson | Keri Pickett USA 2022 -- 89 minutes

For thousands of years women have been locked out of Taiko drumming. Not anymore. In the dead of a Minnesota winter, Asian drumming divas smash gender roles and redefine power on their own terms. FINDING HER BEAT dives into the rhythms and struggles that lead to an electrifying historic performance that changes everything.

Jay’s Longhorn

Director: Mark Engebretson USA 2019 -- 93 minutes

Before First Avenue there was Jay's Longhorn - the epicenter of the Minneapolis punk rock and indie rock scene in the late 1970s. At a time when the music scene was dominated by Top 40 cover bands, a group of punk rock visionaries - led by Andy Schwartz, former publisher of the New York Rocker -- scoured the city in search of a place that would welcome the New Wave. The Suicide Commandos, Flamingo, Curtiss A, the Suburbs, and NNB found a home at Jay's Longhorn -- which also served as the launching pad for Hüsker Dü and the Replacements and the preferred venue for touring acts like Elvis Costello, The B-52s, and The Police. 

Meeting Charlie Parr

Directors: Francois Xavier Dubois & Charles Dubois, France 2013 -- 70 Mins

Meeting Charlie Parr is a musical journey through the Midwest that meets one its most emblematic folk singers. In the Great Lakes forests, through the Minnesota plains, on stage or at home, we get to know Charlie Parr, an endearing and unique artist. Meeting after meeting, Charlie talks about his authentic blues music and what it says about America.

 

Big "Shout Out" to Bob Boone at The Reader and Richard Hansen of the DuSu Film Festival.

Happy Birthday, Joan Baez

 

80 years ago Joan Baez was born on this day in Staten Island. As all who are familiar with her music know, she was born with liquid silver vocal chords. That is to say, she has a beautiful, beautiful voice.

I like the way she acknowledges her voice as something she doesn't take credit for in the opening line of her memoir. (A whole blog post could be written about great opening lines of memoirs and books. I am thinking here o U.S. Grant's autobiography, and the opening sentence in Tolstoy's Anna Karenina.) 

Several thoughts and memories came to mind when I imagined what I would write here today, the first being that both she and Bob Dylan, whose life intersected hers at numerous junctures, were both born the same year. 

* * * 

Her interest in social justice stems from her family background. Her grandfather left the Catholic church to become a Methodist minister. He came to the U.S. when Joan's father was two years old. Her grandfather preached to and advocated for a Spanish-speaking population. Though her father considered the ministry he instead pursued a math and physics career, obtaining his PhD at Stanford in 1950. Joan's mother was born in Scotland, second daughter of an Anglican priest, and lived to be 100 years old, passing in April 2013.

Joan Baez at the March on Washington 1963. (Public domain)

For many of us, the most memorable image in our minds is her performance during Dr. Martin Luther King's March on Washington in 1963. Few people knew she knew Dr. King personally and had met him years earlier before she ever became a recording artist/folk singer. That was a milestone introduction to the wider world for Bob Dylan, who sang three songs including "Only A Pawn In Their Game."

Or maybe the most memorable is of Joan singing with Bob on the Rolling Thunder Revue. Or maybe it's that photo of her and Bob from the Newport Folk Festival.

As if that weren't enough Joan and Bob stuff, she (like so many others since) recorded an album of Dylan's songs suitably titled Baez Sings Dylan.

* * * 

One of my memories that is not included in the Wikipedia account of her life and career (where much of this info comes from) was the 25th Anniversary for the Dylan-themed show on KUMD hosted by John Bushey. A local notable, the late John Bushey was in the middle of his third bout with cancer and the anniversary became a good occasion to have a fund raising event to alleviate his rising medical bills. A silent auction was held and items from both the Dylan camp and from Ms. Baez were contributed. In addition, John received a phone call from Joan during which they spoke for about 20 minutes.

My Favorite album by Joan is not even listed in the Wikipedia listing hotlinked above. The album is titled Ring Them Bells, a collaboration recorded live in 1995 with Mary Chapin Carpenter, Mimi Farina and others. The album features a number of Dylan classics but Joan's heartbreaking rendition of "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda" elevates this to another level. 

Of course anything Joan interprets in song gets elevated to a new level. And much more can be said, but for now I really only wanted to say Happy Birthday, Joan. 

Here's the lyrics to a classic folk song from her earliest years. Her song selection through the years has been impeccable. 

All My Trials

Hush, little baby, don't you cry

You know your mama was born to die
All my trials, Lord, soon be over

River of Jordan is muddy and cold
Well, it chills the body, but not the soul
All my trials, Lord, soon be over

I've got a little book with pages three
And every page spells, "Liberty"
All my trials, Lord, soon be over

Too late, my brothers
Too late, but never mind
All my trials, Lord, soon be over

If living were a thing that money could buy
You know the rich would live and the poor would die
All my trials, Lord, soon be over

There grows a tree in Paradise
And the pilgrims call it the Tree of Life
All my trials, Lord, soon be over

Too late, my brothers
Too late, but never mind
All my trials, Lord, soon be over
All my trials, Lord, soon be over

 
Relate Link
Three Versions of "Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You." 

Tomorrow Is A Long Time

There's beauty in the silver singin' river, there's beauty in the sunrise in the sky, and there's richness in the simple beauty of this stellar song Bob Dylan penned as a 21-year-old.

About ten days ago I was listening to the Judy Collins station on Pandora when her version of this song played and it made me wish to share it. It's almost incomprehensible how many songs Dylan wrote as an emerging artist those first years in New York, songs so timeless and evocative that they are still being sung today. According to The Story Behind Every Song, Dylan played the song for Artie Mogull, an A&R record exec involved in Dylan's signing, and Mogull's first thought was that it would make a great number for a young Judy Collins whose star was also on the rise. Mogull called Collins to come hear it, and when she did she cried. She was first to record it as a result, and would not be the last.

Though Dylan recorded the song himself, it was part of a series of sessions never released called The Witmark Demos, which emerged in 2010 as Bootleg Series Volume 9, one of my favorite sets in the Bootleg Series. Though tapes of these sessions circulated amongst hard core Dylan circles as bootlegs, the first version of the song to arrive on vinyl appeared on his 1971 Greatest Hits, Volume II, a live recording from his 1963 concert in New York's Town Hall. Throughout the Sixties numerous other artists performed and recorded the song, however, including Harry Belafonte, We Five, Joan Baez, and the Kingston Trio. It's been recorded by countless others, and was even used in the wind-up episode of The Walking Dead. Elvis Presley also recorded it in 1966, which led Dylan to remark that this was his all-time favorite cover recording of one of his songs.

I recommend Dylan's Witmark Demo version, but have included versions by Odetta and Ms. Collins at the end of this post.

Tomorrow Is A Long Time

If today was not an endless highway
If tonight was not a crooked trail
If tomorrow wasn’t such a long time
Then lonesome would mean nothing to you at all
Yes, and only if my own true love was waitin’
Yes, and if I could hear her heart a-softly poundin’
Only if she was lyin’ by me
Then I’d lie in my bed once again

I can’t see my reflection in the waters
I can’t speak the sounds that show no pain
I can’t hear the echo of my footsteps
Or can’t remember the sound of my own name
Yes, and only if my own true love was waitin’
Yes, and if I could hear her heart a-softly poundin’
Only if she was lyin’ by me
Then I’d lie in my bed once again

There’s beauty in the silver, singin’ river
There’s beauty in the sunrise in the sky
But none of these and nothing else can touch the beauty
That I remember in my true love’s eyes
Yes, and only if my own true love was waitin’
Yes, and if I could hear her heart a-softly poundin’
Only if she was lyin’ by me
Then I’d lie in my bed once again

Copyright © 1963 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1991 by Special Rider Music

Meantime.... life goes on. 

I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine and Thoughts On Being Human

This past two weeks I've been carrying this song around in my head, letting it swirl, percolate, produce something to share here. As Dylan fans know "I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine" appeared on his John Wesley Harding album, his first album of new songs after the infamous motorcycle accident that terminated his world tour with The Band.

What was striking about the album was how it signaled another change in direction for Dylan as an artist. His previous three albums rocked a lot of foundations and shook up a lot of the fans he'd acquired during his folk days. Now, it was a scaled back sound that featured simple tunes, an acoustic guitar and harmonica. John Hinchey called this album the "comeback of all comebacks." In describing it, he cites Dylan's own comment on comebacks from Love and Theft: "You can always come back, but you can't comeback all the way." Perhaps this was considered a comeback only because he'd come out from a long period of silence, veiled from the public eye.

This song was the third cut on side one. Interestingly, he performed it 39 times between 1969 and 2011. As many writers have pointed out, "I Dreamed" opens with a tune and structure similar to the classic folk song about the union organizer Joe Hill.

"I dreamed I saw St. Augustine, alive as you or me"
Compare: "I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night, alive as you or me..."

It's easy for me to hear Joan Baez singing that line as it rises, whereas Dylan's version, with similar cadence, falls at the end of the line.

What we hear in this song is a tale about a strange dream featuring this significant fourth century theologian/philosopher tearing about "in the utmost misery with a blanket underneath his arm and a coat of solid gold." The blanket is a symbol of comfort, the gold a symbol of purity and perfection, not earthly wealth. As the Proverb states, "The crucible is for silver, the furnace for gold, but the Lord tries hearts." In the narrator's dream, St. Augustine is searching for souls. The second stanza elaborates on why Augustine is so concerned.

“Arise, arise,” he cried so loud
In a voice without restraint
“Come out, ye gifted kings and queens
And hear my sad complaint
No martyr is among ye now
Whom you can call your own
So go on your way accordingly
But know you’re not alone”

David Pichaske, in his Song of the North Country, writes "John Wesley Harding is pervaded with sin and redemption, and associated with concerns for the health of the soul." Of this song Pichaske notes that the singer is "lamenting the death of prophets and martyrs in this modern American wasteland, and offering his own message of comfort: 'Know you're not alone."

The third verse comes with another twist.

I dreamed I saw St. Augustine
Alive with fiery breath
And I dreamed I was amongst the ones
That put him out to death
Oh, I awoke in anger
So alone and terrified
I put my fingers against the glass
And bowed my head and cried

In the narrator's dream he discovers that he is amongst the ones who put the martyr to death. When he wakes, he is shaken to the core.

At this point it would make a good segue to do a little study of the various dreams by which God spoke to characters in the Bible, from Jacob and Job to Jonah and Joseph. But that's a study you can do on your own.

* * * * 

My thoughts this morning fall into alignment with another book I'm reading, Francis Fukuyama's Our Posthuman Future. The question of the moment is this: what does it mean to be human? What does it mean to have a soul? The questions have been generated by recent reading about robotics and artificial intelligence. (AI).

In 1980 I wrote a paper analyzing contemporary culture, attempting to bring order from the chaos of our times. On pages 22-25 I spotlighted two of the most influential dystopian novels of the previous fifty years, Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World. Despite the the seemingly disparate images of our future -- a totalitarian state so complete that Big Brother is everywhere vs. a ghastly, genetically pre-programmed human race where artificial happiness reigns -- the two "visions" of the future have something in common. Both point to a dehumanized humanity, devoid of mind, will and emotions and soulless.

Fukuyama opens his book with a discussion of these very same works. The nightmare more frightening to Fukuyama is Huxley's because "it's easy to see what's wrong in the world of 1984," but in Orwell's story the evil is not so apparent. Everyone gets what they want. Humanity is seduced rather than compelled to be less than human. (In my paper I also compared these two with That Hideous Strength by C.S. Lewis.)

If everyone can be happy, what's wrong with this picture? Leon Kass states, "Unlike the man reduced by disease or slavery, the people dehumanized a la Brave New World are not miserable, don't know that they are dehumanized, and, what is worse, would not care if they knew. They are... happy slaves with a slavish happiness."

What does it mean to be human? What is it that sets us apart from the rest of creation? Conscience is part of it. How we treat our brothers and sisters is central to it. All this is tied, as theologians explain it, to the imago dei, the image of God in us. But many modern scientists deny the existence of this part of our species. Instead religious experiences, they suggest, are generated by our own genetic dispositions. It's nothing more than a illusion, albeit compelling.

Fukuyama argues that this corrosive postmodern smog was foretold by C.S. Lewis in his Abolition of Man (1943). Lewis saw what was happening in public education which had begun teaching relativism and the denial of objective truth. Huxley only detailed the manner in which this de-humanizing would occur.

Dylan keyed into the matter of conscience in a number of songs on this album, including Dear Landlord, I Pity the Poor Immigrant and this one, among others. I appreciate the straightforwardness of its simple ending. When the narrator of I Dreamed awakes he's shocked, saddened, broken by what he's seen. He's seen himself.

Fukuyama's concerns here are how features of contemporary biotechnology need to be given ethical restraints before the real damage is done. It's not just about the side effects of pharmaceuticals that should concern us. What Huxley predicted in the 40s is unfolding faster than anyone back then could have imagined. 

The frightening part is that what's taking place in biotechnology and pharmacology is so nuanced and complex that we don't even know how to argue against it. The "progress" taking place in these and other fields, like neuroscience, genetic engineering and A.I., will change us in ways we can't fully foresee and with benefits that no doubt create other unintended consequences.

My thoughts here are full of loose ends. Just trying to sort something out, I suppose. 

For more on the significance of Augustine, visit my 2009 blog post here. 

Three Versions of "Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You"

I remember where I was when I first heard Led Zeppelin. 1969. Their first album had just been released and someone turned us on to it in Scott Homan's basement. Scott and a couple other kids were forming a band and I sometimes used to sing with them, though I was too shy to perform live. The power of Zeppelin's music with Robert Plant's vocals was devastating. From the opening chords our music stopped and all we could do was listen. Three cuts were especially riveting: "Dazed and Confused" and "Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You" on side one and "How Many More Times" as the closer on side two.

In those days when we listened to music we seldom connected it to a pre-history. It was a song and it moved us. Only later did we understand that much of rock and roll had roots in the Mississippi Delta or folk music history. Bands like Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones drew inspiration from these sources, re-inventing them and making them their own, as Zeppelin did with the classic "Hangman", re-naming it "Gallows Pole."

"Babe I'm Gonna Leave You" was a folk song written by Anne Bredon in the late 1950s, but it was Joan Baez who gave it wings. And that's what brought this recollection to mind.

Last week as I was digging through my vinyls I came across her 1962 live recording titled Joan Baez In Concert. The concert opens with her spellbinding rendition of this song. I immediately thought of the manner in which the Led Zeppelin version floored me and I realized that Baez in her way was equally smashing. I could see why Jimmy Page and Robert Plant felt this might be a good song to sink their teeth into.

Here's that 1962 Joan Baez rendition... at DailyMotion.

Joan Baez Babe I'm Gonna Leave You by Selvilicadde

While looking for the Baez performance I came across another heart-wrenching interpretation of the song by Barbara Mueller. Mueller was also a Greenwich Village folk singer of the 60's. Interestingly, this YouTube video attributes the song to a Janet Smith.

Finally, here's Led Zeppelin's compelling permutation. Ironically the album that so moved us when we first heard it was panned by Rolling Stone magazine. They gave it a "ho hum, so what" type of review. In 1994 it was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. In 2003 Rolling Stone listed it at 29th on its list of Top 500 Albums of All Time. What does that tell you?

It's a simple blues song, but all three singers manage to inhabit the lyrics in such a way as to make it their own.

Nothing more to say. The song says it all.

And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda

This past week I have been listening to a BBC audio book about the decade from 1910-20. The book is primarily recordings of eyewitnesses to the history that was being made at that time. For example, first person accounts from people who were on the Titanic and the responses of political and social observers of that tragedy. The same for the Lusitania, the sinking of another "immortal" ship, which served as a real catalyst to bring Britain into the war while simultaneously stirring anti-German sentiment on the Isles. The Suffragettes and the Labor movement have their stories told by people who were there.

But the First World War takes largest chunk of this period with eyewitness accounts from men who fought in every battle field, from Verdun, Marne, Ypres, Somme and more. The world had never witnessed slaughter and horror on such as scale. Britain buried a million of her young men and left millions scarred. Germany, France and Russia lost millions more.

The experiences of those who fought in the trenches have been repeatedly captured in films so that we get a sense of how bad it was. The stories on this BBC audiobook really amp up the impact. The lice that lived in the seams of their clothes, the foot deep muck that soaked their boots, the first encounters with toxic gases used as a weapon and the terrors it inflicted... The stories told by men who were there are harrowing.

Several share their first reactions to the announcement that Britain was at war. "I was fourteen and a half and we were worried the war would not last very long and we wouldn't be able to get into it because you had to be fifteen to go serve." Yes, war fever was a thrill and it was the young whose eyes glistened as their hearts sprang up.

Against this backdrop comes tale after tale of the nightmare hell of the real war, one of the most terrible battles being Gallipoli and Suvla Bay which was the first major offensive involving the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. The green flies covered everything and when you were wounded your wounds were immediately swarmed over. The lice were even worse, but worst of all was the chaos and seeming pointlessness of it all. According to one of the survivors, his division was in total confusion as clumps of soldiers marched about aimlessly not sure what they were to do, their officers dead.

Joan Baez performed and recorded a song about this fragment of history. Based on how often I've played it, it must be a favorite of mine, written by Eric Bogle (ericbogle.net)...

AND THE BAND PLAYED
WALTZING MATILDA

When I was a young man I carried my pack
And I lived the free life of a rover
From the Murrays green basin to the dusty outback
I waltzed my Matilda all over
Then in nineteen fifteen my country said Son
It's time to stop rambling 'cause there's work to be done
So they gave me a tin hat and they gave me a gun
And they sent me away to the war.
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As we sailed away from the quay
And amidst all the tears and the shouts and the cheers
We sailed off to Gallipoli.

How well I remember that terrible day
How the blood stained the sand and the water
And how in that hell that they called Suvla Bay
We were butchered like lambs at the slaughter
Johnny Turk he was ready, he primed himself well
He chased us with bullets, he rained us with shells
And in five minutes flat he'd blown us all to hell
Nearly blew us right back to Australia.
But the band played Waltzing Matilda
As we stopped to bury our slain
We buried ours and the Turks buried theirs
Then we started all over again.

Now those that were left, well we tried to survive
In a mad world of blood, death and fire
And for ten weary weeks I kept myself alive
But around me the corpses piled higher
Then a big Turkish shell knocked me arse over tit
And when I woke up in my hospital bed
And saw what it had done, I wished I was dead
Never knew there were worse things than dying.
For no more I'll go waltzing Matilda
All around the green bush far and near
For to hump tent and pegs, a man needs two legs
No more waltzing Matilda for me.

So they collected the cripples, the wounded, the maimed
And they shipped us back home to Australia
The armless, the legless, the blind, the insane
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla
And as our ship pulled into Circular Quay
I looked at the place where my legs used to be
And thank Christ there was nobody waiting for me
To grieve and to mourn and to pity.
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
As they carried us down the gangway
But nobody cheered, they just stood and stared
Then turned all their faces away.

And now every April I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me
And I watch my old comrades, how proudly they march
Reliving old dreams of past glory
And the old men march slowly, all bent, stiff and sore
The forgotten heroes from a forgotten war
And the young people ask, "What are they marching for?"
And I ask myself the same question.
And the band plays Waltzing Matilda
And the old men answer to the call
But year after year their numbers get fewer
Some day no one will march there at all.

Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda
Who'll come a waltzing Matilda with me
And their ghosts may be heard as you pass the Billabong
Who'll come-a-waltzing Matilda with me?
--------------------------------------------------
copyright © Eric Bogle

Our Military Industrial Complex

"War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today." ~ John F. Kennedy, Letter to Navy friend

This is a very interesting observation by former president John Kennedy, especially on the heels of President Eisenhower’s parting remarks expressing concern about the growing power of the military-industrial complex. It’s interesting because today we have a minority with a shot at the White House, as well as a woman within striking distance. On the other hand, where is the nearest conscientious objector?

Here is what I find especially interesting regarding the Sixties protestors who took a stand against the military-industrial complex. The very phrase itself originated in the mouth of a U.S. president.

A conscientious objector is someone who, for matters of conscience, must decline from military service. Usually it is for religious reasons, but some there are who simply refuse to do harm to others of the human family. In the course of history many conscientious objectors have been imprisoned, or even killed, for this adherence to conscience. It's a stain on our history.

The stance of conscientious objector is a challenging one. Few there are who would disagree that a brutal tyrant like Adolph Hitler would require being stopped, which presupposes a commitment to maintaining armaments of greater force. Conscientious objectors can be opposed to carrying weapons and doing damage to others, but may be fully integrated into an army as stretcher bearers or nurses, though others would oppose even this assistance to a war effort.

The attitude of a conscientious objector may also include a call for reflection on whether a war is just or unjust. Patriotism is challenged by this stance. Many patriots, standing beneath the banner “My country right or wrong,” demand a fully unified affirmation from the masses. To be perceived as unpatriotic is a form of anarchy or sin in their eyes. But a conscientious objector can love his or her country very much while calling the nation into account to higher laws.

Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy felt strongly that war was incompatible with Christian faith altogether, citing much historical literature to support his beliefs. Here is but one typical example of Tolstoy’s view. “The most ardent and sincere fathers of the Church declared the teaching of Christ to be incompatible with one of the fundamental conditions of the existence of the State: armed force. In other words, a Christian must not be a soldier prepared to kill every one whom he is ordered to.”
Dr. Francis Schaeffer, however, cites Charles Finney to lay out a case for Christians taking up arms against tyrants. In this manner he justifies the American Revolution in his book “A Christian Manifesto” which also provided the wind power that swept many Christians into political activism in the 1980’s. C. S. Lewis stated in one of his essays that two Christians serving their countries as soldiers might shoot one another simultaneously and meet immediately once more on the other side of the veil.

In other words, individuals can with good conscience choose a variety of paths, each becoming accountable for his or her individual choices and actions. If I may weigh in here, I would suggest that the important thing is that we have the fredom to have this dialogue and not have it taken from us.

War is a terrible thing, and even winning has a terrible cost.

As we look back on the turbulence of the sixties, it helps to keep in mind the context for what we saw and experienced. The warning from Ike (below) took root in the soil of many hearts and was transformed through song into a movement. Masters of War by Dylan, Pete Seeger's troubadorian protest stance, and the beautifully tragic appeal reflected in Joan Baez were all woven together into an anthem that found hearers whose consciences had not yet been seared.



Joan Baez sings "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?"