Mike Seeger
Mike Seeger was an influential American folk musician and ethnomusicologist, known for his deep commitment to preserving traditional American music. Born to a family steeped in musical heritage, including half-brother Pete Seeger, he became a prominent figure in the folk music revival of the 1960s. Seeger was largely self-taught on various instruments and adopted a performance style rooted in the string band traditions of the 1920s. He co-founded the New Lost City Ramblers in 1958, a group that played a key role in the traditionalist side of the folk movement, contrasting with more commercially oriented acts of the period.
Throughout his career, Seeger recorded extensively and toured both as a solo artist and alongside groups like the Strange Creek Singers. Known for his ability to play multiple instruments during performances, he brought a unique sound to vintage songs that often blended original styles with his personal interpretations. His dedication to field recording revitalized interest in old-time musicians, allowing lesser-known artists to gain exposure. Seeger's legacy encompasses not only his own recordings but also a significant body of field recordings that document the rich tapestry of American folk music, inspiring future generations to appreciate and continue these musical traditions.
Subject Terms
Mike Seeger
American folk and country singer, songwriter, and banjo player
- Born: August 15, 1933
- Birthplace: New York, New York
- Died: August 7, 2009
- Place of death: Lexington, Virginia
Seeger’s prowess as a multi-instrumentalist and his mining of a deep vein of obscure yet striking song material made him a charismatic figure on the folk music revival scene.
Member of The New Lost City Ramblers
The Life
Mike Seeger is the son of ethnomusicologist Charles Seeger and musicologist-composer Ruth Crawford Seeger. Pete Seeger is his half brother; Peggy Seeger is his sister. The Seeger children heard Library of Congress field recordings and other original source material at impressionable ages. Largely self-taught on a wide variety of instruments, Seeger was the one who excelled as an instrumentalist and who adopted a performance aesthetic grounded in the grittier string band and related traditions of the 1920’s. While learning to play, he was also recording still-active exponents of those traditions in the Washington, D.C., area, where he grew up.
In 1958 he joined forces with like-minded musicians and singers Tom Paley and John Cohen to form the New Lost City Ramblers. Through performance and recordings, the New Lost City Ramblers exerted an influence far exceeding the group’s limited commercial success. They epitomized the traditionalist side of the folk music revival, in marked contrast to such pop-oriented folk groups as the Kingston Trio.
In 1962 Seeger released his first solo album on the Folkways label. Over the next decade, he recorded and toured extensively, both as a soloist and with the New Lost City Ramblers and with similar groups such as the Strange Creek Singers. All the while he continued to do extensive field recording and to rediscover musicians such as singer-banjoist Dock Boggs, one of many remarkable old-timey artists Seeger brought to the Newport Folk Festival and other urban concert venues. By the mid-1970’s, the New Lost City Ramblers were only occasionally performing (Tracy Schwartz replaced Paley in 1962), but Seeger continued as a veritable one-man band, performing what he dubbed “music from the true vine” on an impressive array of instruments. Seeger is a vital exponent of musical styles that appeared all but extinct when he embraced them in the 1950’s.
The Music
A typical Seeger performance finds him playing no fewer than eight instruments: banjo, fiddle, guitar, harmonica, autoharp, Jew’s harp, quills (panpipes), and a homemade “shaker” (percussion instrument). In this way he produces an impressive range of sounds and styles that supports his vintage songs.
Some of those sounds originated on 1920’s vintage “hillbilly” records, while others came from older musicians Seeger discovered and from whom he learned firsthand. In both cases, he distilled his source material to produce his individual sound. The songs he sings may be comic (“Tennessee Dog”) or tragic (“Wind and Rain”), but rarely are they interpreted precisely in the manner of Seeger’s source.
“Don’t Let Your Deal Go Down.” The source for this song is a 1927 recording by Fiddlin’ John Carson and His Virginia Reelers. Seeger first recorded his arrangement on the album Music from True Vine. He had then only recently experimented with playing the fiddle and harmonica (held in a rack) at the same time. Thirty years later, Seeger rerecorded the song for a Smithsonian Folkways album entitled True Vine.
It was the sole song to appear on both those albums. The eerie sound Seeger coaxes from the fiddle and harmonica accentuates the darker implications of Carson’s original. Seeger makes the tune plainer, even more archaic-sounding than his source. This has long been a standout of Seeger’s performance repertoire.
“Down South Blues.” Dock Boggs recorded this song with banjo in 1927. Seeger learned it from him when they toured together in the 1960’s. Seeger’s right hand picking is faithful to Boggs’s original, while Seeger’s left hand uses a slide to fret the banjo, something Boggs never did. Nevertheless, Seeger’s instinct for musically appropriate revision is flawless. This performance appears on the ambitious album Southern Banjo Sounds, an audio guide to a wide range of banjo styles performed on a variety of mostly vintage instruments. Seeger created a series of three instructional DVDs, which teach the tweny-six tunes on the album.
“Gold Watch and Chain.” Recorded at the Newport Folk Festival around 1963, this performance of a Carter family standard with Seeger on lead vocal and autoharp captures the reverence the New Lost City Ramblers show their sources and the audience’s admiration for the group’s authenticity. This and other live performances of Seeger, the New Lost City Ramblers, and such legends as Maybelle Carter appear on the album Old Time Music.
Musical Legacy
Seeger performs a diverse repertoire otherwise destined to be known only to a handful of folklorists and record collectors. His combination of musical scholarship, performance flair, and interpretive acuity inspired others to take up the “old-timey” music cause. Along with his own recordings, his legacy includes extensive field recordings he has made through the years of musicians both famous and obscure.
Principal Recordings
albums (solo): Solo: Old Time Music, 1962; Tipple, Look, and Rail, 1965; Strange Creek Singers, 1968 (with Strange Creek Singers); Music from True Vine, 1972; American Folk Songs for Children, 1977 (with Peggy Seeger); Fresh Oldtime String Band, 1988; American Folk Songs for Christmas, 1989 (with Peggy Seeger and Penny Seeger); Animal Folk Songs for Children, 1992 (with Peggy Seeger, Penny Seeger, and Barbara Seeger); Third Annual Farewell Reunion, 1994 (with others); Way Down in North Carolina, 1996 (with Paul Brown); Southern Banjo Sounds, 1998; True Vine, 2003; Early Southern Guitar Sounds, 2007.
albums (with the New Lost City Ramblers): The New Lost City Ramblers, Vol. 1, 1958; The New Lost City Ramblers, Vol. 2, 1959; Old-Timey Songs for Children, 1959; Songs from the Depression, 1959; Earth Is Earth Sung by the New Lost City Bang Boys, 1961; The New Lost City Ramblers, Vol. 3, 1961; The New Lost City Ramblers, Vol. 4, 1961; American Moonshine and Prohibition, 1962; The New Lost City Ramblers, Vol. 5, 1963; Radio Special No. 1, 1963; String Band Instrumentals, 1964; Rural Delivery No. 1, 1965; Remembrance of Things to Come, 1966; Modern Times, 1968; The New Lost City Ramblers with Cousin Emmy, 1968; On the Great Divide, 1973; Old Time Music, 1994; There Ain’t No Way Out, 1997.
Bibliography
Cantwell, Robert. When We Were Good: The Folk Revivial. Cambridge, England: Harvard University Press, 1996. Cantwell’s well-written meditation on the roots and flowering of the folk music revival includes an appreciation of Seeger and his unique role in it.
Dylan, Bob. Chronicles. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2004. Dylan’s recollection of Seeger’s impact on him in his early days is stunning. Dylan had such adulation for Seeger that Dylan realized he could never perform traditional folk music half as well. That realization led Dylan to write his own songs.
Goldsmith, Peter D. Making People’s Music: Moe Asch and Folkways Records. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1998. This fascinating portrait of the development of the premier folk music label and the man behind it includes details of Seeger’s early recording career and that of the New Lost City Ramblers.