The 36th Annual Kerrville Folk Festival:

Peter Yarrow

with Freebo

Interviewed June 2007, Kerrville Folk Festival

FAF: Peter, it’s been 40 years since I first took your hand backstage at St. John Terrell’s Music Circus in Lambertville, New Jersey. A lot has changed since then; but unbelievably – and regrettably – a lot of things are the same.

“Worse. We seemed in many ways steadily making ground in terms of the

equations of fairness in the United States, the equations of the recognition of the rights of all people to have some measure of dignity and equality: blacks, as well as whites, women, as well as men.

“The United States was beginning to cease to be a pernicious, voracious, economic power that acted with arrogance, and there was a greater measure of respect of America internationally, as we began to formulate policies that made sense. We began to be reasonable in terms of our consideration of the environment, and we had Super Fund cleanups.”

“In much the same way that Hitler and Goebel managed to take advantage of fear, fear was created when fear didn’t have to be created. The United States didn’t have to become totally subject to the fear that was manipulated after 9-11. And in the name of that fear, the process of democracy pretty much collapsed. And the ability of individuals to speak their mind pretty much was suppressed. The damage has been extraordinary. In the world, we are the most vilified, feared nation, and not without cause.

“We have decimated and eviscerated some of the fundamental tenets of our Constitution. There is no such thing as a democracy without habeas corpus! If you don’t have the right to say, ‘Tell me why I’m being arrested,’ follow the dissent.”

FAF: Do you think that, as musicians, we are doing enough?

“We have our songs. We have our determination. And that, on a personal level, not necessarily political level, has continued to revitalize itself, in spite of the perverse and horrific series of reversals and challenges. Now we’re beginning to come out of it. It’s beginning, the spirit of determination, to be other than hopelessly embarrassed and ashamed of our country. It has started to assert itself again, and I think that this process onstage is fundamental to the success of the reversal of these terrible dilemmas.

“I just think that people can’t make peace without being touched in the heart. It’s not a logical thing to choose peace. It’s an appeal to something that is quite deep within us that has to do with our hearts, not with our logical systems. We have a world that’s dedicated extraordinarily to false presumes: money, power, fame, beauty. We know that’s not what it’s about.”

“I don’t think we’re doing enough in the sense that the situation requires a helluva lot more. But the Vehicle for Transmission of the Spirit no longer exists as it once did. It has to emerge through The Net, so that people can get the inspiration and the information, because the record companies have been taken over by the financial interests and there are very few really, really heartfelt, valuable things inspiring us and telling our story and letting us recognize each other.”