Peter Blum and the Sound-Outs
Peter Blum circa 1969
Peter Blum is a long-time resident of the Woodstock area. His shamanic sound healing practice is widely recognized and supported by the community. In 2009 he was honored with an award from the National Guild of Hypnotists for “a lifetime of outstanding achievement, dedication and service.” I spoke to him recently by phone to learn about his connection to the Sound-Outs.
Peter started his journey as a folk singer in the Bronx. During the early 1960s he traveled down to Greenwich Village to see such fellow folkie acts as Happy and Artie Traum perform in Washington Square Park. From 1962 he took in performances of Bob Dylan, John Sebastian, Richie Havens and Jimi Hendrix around the Village at venues like the Night Owl Café and the Café Au Go-Go. But soon all his idols were hanging out and performing in Woodstock. In 1965 he became a counselor at the Boys Club of America’s Camp Harriman in East Jewett, NY. One day he heard that John Hammond, Jr. was performing at the Café Espresso. Blum decided to hitchhike to Woodstock to catch the show. Unfortunately he couldn’t get a lift from Mt. Tremper to Woodstock, and missed Hammond’s performance. By 1969 he met Jan Zeitz in Greenwich Village and learned about the Sound-Outs. Zeitz was living with her then boyfriend, Cyril Caster, in a school bus on Pan Copeland’s farm. Caster later booked Blum for a gig at the Sound-Outs. Read the rest of this entry »
From Camp Woodland to the Woodstock Music Festival
Raising Reds Author to Give Talk and Sign Books
Raising Reds: Young Pioneers, Radical Summer Camps, and Communist Political Culture
Woodstock, NY—On Sunday, September 12, from 2 to 4 p.m., Paul C. Mishler, author of Raising Reds: Young Pioneers, Radical Summer Camps, and Communist Political Culture, will give a talk at the Eames House, 20 Comeau Drive in Woodstock. Mishler’s presentation will be titled, “From Camp Woodland to the Woodstock Festival and Beyond.” Camp Woodland was located near Phoenicia from 1939 to 1962 and it helped to spark a revival in Catskill Mountain roots music. This event marks the final day of the Historical Society’s current retrospective exhibit on Camp Woodland.
In Raising Reds, Mishler focuses on the era of 1920 to 1950. During this time the Communist Party was able to make significant inroads into American society. Communists were active in labor unions and universities, and they published their articles in popular newspapers. These activities were undermined and demonized in the early 1950s due to McCarthyism and the advent of the Cold War. However, Mishler contends that the Communist radicalism of the 1930s re-emerged in the New Left’s activism of the 1960s.
Further, in his book Mishler explores how, during the Great Depression, some Americans believed that the music of the people was being forced underground due to the rise of larger, more impersonal instituions of social, commerical and industrial development. Therefore, during the 1930s, the Communists and their allies sought to discover/construct/create an alternative America grounded in the roots of the country’s culture. Camp Woodland set in motion an experiment to bring this alternative democratic model into being. The camp’s organizers felt that the most important way for Woodland to establish new ground was via a celebration of folk music and early American folk values, and that this could be made the basis for societal change. Mishler contends that these same beliefs led to the activism of the 1960s, to the 1969 Woodstock Music Festival, and beyond.
Paul Mishler is an Associate Professor of Labor Studies at Indiana University. Raising Reds is published by Columbia University Press. Mishler will be on hand to answer questions and sign books. Refreshments will be served and the event is free. For more information call 845.246.3436 or log onto www.campwoodland.org.
Roots Pressroom
Fund-Raiser Concert
To raise money for Woodstock’s Zero-Carbon Initiative, Roots of Woodstock LLC held a "40th anniversary" concert on August 15, 2009, at the Bearsville Theater in Woodstock.
Blogroll
Roots Book News
Roots Concert News
Tags
Barnes & Noble Bearsville Theater Billy Batson Blues Magoos Bob Dylan Bob Fass Bob Liikala Camp Woodland Cat Mother and the All Night Newsboys Children of God Clearwater Solar Trailer Cyril Caster Dave Mason David Salidor Eleanor Walden Ellen McIlwaine Gerd Stern Greg Stanton Hubert Sumlin Hudson Valley Magazine Jerry Moore Joe Hickerson John Sebastian Jud Yalkut Julia Blelock Kenny Rankin Larry Brown Michael Lang Pan Copeland Pete Seeger Ramblin' Jack Elliott Roots of the 1969 Woodstock Festival Roots of Woodstock Live Concert Sound-Outs Steve Walter The Cutting Room The New York Times Tim Hardin Weston Blelock WKZE Woodstock WoodstockArts Woodstock Festival Woodstock N.Y. Zero-Carbon Initiative
Subscribe
Archives
- March 2012 (1)
- January 2012 (1)
- August 2011 (1)
- July 2011 (1)
- April 2011 (1)
- March 2011 (1)
- February 2011 (1)
- December 2010 (1)
- November 2010 (1)
- October 2010 (1)
- September 2010 (1)
- August 2010 (1)
