Singing Together, Singing By Ourselves

I am happy to report that the second class meeting of my seminary class in protest music lived up to the promise of the first week.  Our professor does have a PowerPoint, but unlike some other professors, he does not read from the PowerPoint.  We cover the material that's in the book, but so far, it hasn't left me saying, "I could just read the book."  We listen to the music and discuss it, but not in the depth that a music appreciation class would offer.  The book offers a more in-depth dive into the history that prompted the creation of the music.

One thing that's different from other classes:  we sing together.  It's an online class meeting by way of a Zoom session, so it's not what you might imagine, a group of seminarians with a guitar and folk songs in a physical room.  The professor, who is also a professional musician, has a keyboard as part of his set up, so he sings the song and plays it.  We students keep ourselves muted and sing.  Well, some of us do.  I realize that not everyone knows these songs.  

Last night we sang "This Land Is Your Land," "We Shall Overcome," and "If I Had a Hammer."  We also talked about why some of us grew up singing these songs in elementary school, while others didn't.  My professor's theory is that there was once was a core group of songs that many of us knew, from singing them around campfires and such.  I thought about what a wide range of songs I knew and how I came to know them:  church choir, camp, parents who had music playing in the background throughout much of the day, radio stations that played a wide range of music.

I didn't offer my theory:  those of us who went to elementary school in the 70's had teachers who thought those songs were important and taught them to us.  I had music classes in school, taught by people who were once hippies, radicals, and organizers (or people who knew these types).

We talked about what children sing now, perhaps Disney songs, but it was late in the evening, and we didn't spend much time on the topic.  I did spend some time thinking about my childhood and music, thinking about elementary schools that once had music as a class period.

I've also been thinking about my classmates, some of whom are so much younger, who have never heard of this music, and perhaps this history.  I feel lucky to have been educated when I was, with such a wide variety of educational experiences.