Dick and Mickey's New Years Greeting
Posted by rflacks on:
The Mickey/Dick annual new year communique follows. 2011: this was one of those years of historic struggle, don't you think? A contagion of popular uprising and people power when old Karl's old prophecies about the 'workers of the world' begin to seem plausible?
This calls for some music! So--go to http://8tracks.com/rflacks for a new years mix. You'll hear the anthem of the Norwegian labor youth, sung widely this year in honor of the dozens of young dead in Norway (we were there a few weeks later and took the picture of the rose at the Oslo bombsite); a Syrian song whose author was killed after he performed it early in that uprising; a song for the 100th anniversary of the Triangle fire led by Adrienne Cooper who just died last week; a 100 year old Yiddish proletarian song updated for this year, an Occupy song parody based on the Etta James song (she is taking her last breaths as we speak), Xmas carol parody just sung in the Madison WI capitol building, a song about time passing by the Brooklyn son of one of my childhood friends, and a new anthem for our time by Roy Zimmerman...
Some Dick and Mickey highlights:
We've started writing our shared memoir. Title: Making History and making blintzes. We're intrigued by the process of reconstruction and have had fun going to write in places like Cambria (thanks to the Scotts) and Martha's Vineyard (thanks to the Gamsons).
we were 'roasted' at a fundraising banquet for our local progressive organization, SBCAN. Read about it: http://www.sbcan.org/hot-roast-dick-and-mickey-flacks (you can even make a donation there). Unfortunately, the roasting was exceedingly gentle. All this a reflection of our ongoing efforts at grassroots democracy in our region.
We savored the chance to visit with some of our oldest friends-- an increasingly important thing to do for many reasons.
We savored our grandchildren Allie, Marley and Olivia--all of whom had a chance to be together this year!
Mickey just yesterday took a flying lesson which she reports was a peak experience--not only the flying itself but the views of our glorious coastline and city...(see pic)
We're helping to organize a national conference: PORT HURON @ 50 here in Santa Barbara on February 2-3 featuring scholars and activists across generations reflecting on the legacies and lessons of that new left manifesto. Go here to find out the details: http://www.history.ucsb.edu/projects/labor/porthuron50.html
Dick is co-author of the book Playing for Change:Music and musicians in the service of social movements Rob Rosenthal is the principal author. You might well find it of interest--it's coming out in affordable paperback next month: http://www.paradigmpublishers.com/books/BookDetail.aspx?productID=215117D
The Culture of Protest radio show will be 30 years old this June. Still going strong on Thursdays at 6 pm pacific time at www.kcsb.org. This week--a program of new and recent songs fitting for the passing of the year...
#occupy life in 2012!!
