In the class SMEA 500: Marine and Environmental Affairs Theory and Practice, I read a section of Katherine McKittrick’s book Dear Science and Other Stories, where she reflects: “I sometimes show texts, such as images of music (scores, album cover art, musicians), because I adore music and it structures my life and work, but these ideas are not represented satisfactorily in my research”. After reading this, I began thinking about my own reflexivity which is how my feelings, reactions, and motives influence my work. I started to wonder how my taste in music impacts my attitudes and passion for environmental conservation. 

When thinking of the ties between music and environmental movements, I first think of the 1950’s to 1970’s when many cultural shifts were happening across the country. The era was marked by the civil rights movement, second-wave feminism, anti-nuclear activism, protests against the Vietnam War, and of course, the environmental movement. Jedediah Purdy, author of the book, After Nature: A Politics for the Anthropocene, notes that “the late 1960’s and early 1970’s were a peculiar cultural moment, when many people saw ‘environmental values’ as radical on the one hand and, on the other hand, as a likely point of consensus.” With society divided on so many issues, many musical artists found the theme of environmentalism as a way to connect with and unite listeners on a common goal. 

One of the most well known pioneers of connecting music and environmentalism is American folk musician and activist Pete Seeger. Born in 1919 in New York City, Seeger first gained radio popularity as part of the Almanac Singers with Woody Guthrie and others before founding a quartet called The Weavers in the 1940’s. This group was eventually blacklisted in the McCarthy era due to its members’ communist beliefs. Seeger’s political ideologies were informed by a nostalgia for rural America which transitioned into songwriting about his environmental concerns on the industrialization of the country. Seeger left the Communist Party in 1949 later saying, “I should have left much earlier… I didn’t realize the danger the world was in; I thought everything would turn out right”.

In the 1960’s, Seeger started a solo career and earned success as a songwriter whose folk songs were popularized by counterculture groups. Some of his most notable songs include “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” (The Kingston Trio in 1962), “If I Had a Hammer” (Peter, Paul and Mary in 1962), and “Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There Is a Season)” (The Byrds in 1965). Even though Seeger found mainstream success with these cover versions of his songs, he continued to write folk music that reflected his passion for environmental causes.

In 1963 Seeger wrote “Mack the Bomb” in response to scientists finding the radioactive isotope Strontium-90 in cow’s milk. Strontium-90 is a product of nuclear fission and it has a long half life of 28 years. When above ground nuclear testing occurs, the isotope can end up in agricultural areas that are used by dairy cows for grazing causing the isotope to be found in milk products. Strontium-90 acts similarly to calcium if it enters the body and is easily absorbed into bones, bone marrow, and teeth where it can cause cancer and lymphoma. Seeger likened a nuclear bomb to a shark in the song to better portray the damaging effects of invisible nuclear fallout. A few years later in 1966, Seeger released the album, “God Bless the Grass” which is regarded as the first album solely containing songs dedicated to environmental issues. The key points of the album were pollution, overdevelopment, and resource wastage that impacted rural America. Many of the songs on the album, like “My Dirty Stream”, draw attention to and mourn the loss of pristine natural spaces due to human activities while also maintaining hope that these places can be saved.

“I still love it and I’ll dream

That someday, though maybe not this year

My Hudson and my country will run clear”

–Pete Seeger, “My Dirty Stream” 1965 

In many folk songs, musical complexity was considered secondary to content and the simple language used in folk songs was used as a tool for communicating ideas. However in the mid to late 1960’s this topical style of music was declining in popularity due to the rise of rock music. In contrast to folk music’s acoustic sound and authentic messaging, it was difficult to connect the rock and roll mentality with ecological themes.  Many songwriters of this era also began to doubt the efficacy of folk music to generate social or political change due to the lack of progress made in the environmental and antiwar movements. This shift was most famously heard when folk musician Bob Dylan “went electric”. The deviation from his usual acoustic set at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island came as a shock to audience members because Dylan had portrayed himself as a non-conformist and yet was joining the popular rock music scene. The overall change in attitude toward folk music caused Seeger to devote his time and energy into local environmental causes, particularly the pollution of the Hudson River near where he lived in New York. 

Pete Seeger began building a 106-foot sloop, a single masted sailboat, named Clearwater, that resembled the boats that traversed the Hudson River in the 19th century. Seeger and his organization, now called the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, Inc., used the sloop to inspire people to advocate for the river’s preservation. There are now programs like this across the country including here in the Salish Sea. Sound Experience owns a historic schooner, a ship with two or more masts, named Adventuress that provides a similar experience for youth in Washington state.

Though folk music’s prominence in culture faded in response to the popularity of rock music, many more folk artists have used music to bring attention to environmental issues in more recent times. Dana Lyons is a folk musician who resides in Bellingham, Washington but has roots in Kingston, New York just a few miles from where Pete Seeger’s Clearwater project began. Lyons reflected “certainly I was influenced at a very young age by Pete Seeger’s work on the Hudson River with the Clearwater.” He even got to sail on the Clearwater when he was in his twenties. By the time Lyons began folk songwriting in earnest in the 1980’s, folk music had fully fallen off the charts. To better connect with listeners, his environmental songs contain both comedic and emotional elements and are less accusatory than most folk songs of the 1960’s. This unique style of music can be used as a conversation starter for environmental topics.

Going beyond just writing about environmental topics, Lyons designs his tour routes to link communities that are affected by an environmental policy issue through a series of concerts. His first tour route in 1986 was along the entire length of Interstate 90 which was the proposed path by the Department of Energy to dump commercial nuclear waste in Hanford, Washington. Dana wrote “Our State Is a Dumpsite” a comedic song about the proposal and in one line calls Washington an “ever-glowing state.” The Department of Energy eventually dropped the initiative because the state demonstrated such great resistance to the dumping. 

“Oh hush hear the voice from both sides of the border

The rallies, the blockades, the brave sons and daughters

The people speak out for protecting the water

The people are rising to come save the orca”

–Dana Lyons, “The Great Salish Sea” 2014 

More recently, his Great Coal Train Tour of 2012 followed a route from Bellingham, Washington to Montana which protested the Pacific Gateway Terminal which would serve as the port to bring coal mined in the midwest to Asian markets. The tour was scheduled just ahead of local hearings on the matter which helped generate publicity to increase public participation. Many communities that were going to be impacted by the train routes felt isolated and the tour helped build connections and unite different groups. Lyons wrote the song “Sometimes (The Coal Train Song)” as a call to action in story form. Due to the resistance to the Pacific Gateway Terminal, most notably by the Lummi Nation over concerns of the impacts on their usual and accustomed fishing rights, the United States Army Corps of Engineers denied the permit for the export terminal.

In 2014, Lyons released an album titled “The Great Salish Sea” dedicated to the beauty of the region and to inspire connection to place through song. The lyrics of the title song are written from the point of view of a matriarch orca named Granny about the changes she has seen in her long life. Similarly to Seeger’s songs, Lyons’s piece ends on an optimistic note that despite the human-caused impacts to the Salish Sea, people are now working to protect the waters. Lyons stated, “music combined with stories can just touch your heart” and that is precisely what the folk albums by Seeger and Lyons do. The music that we listen to, even if it isn’t specifically environmentally focused, can inspire us to care for natural places through our work and research. What music is on your playlist?

Listen to the artists mentioned in this article