All right, so we will let pass without further comment the strange coincidence of the holiday honoring Martin Luther King, Jr.—and all the noble ideals he stood and died for—falling this year on the same day as the inauguration of the incoming president. We shall instead focus on another profoundly decent man who also called us to our better angels over a long career of music-making.
I, perhaps like you, have sung David Mallett’s music out loud on various occasions over many years now without even knowing who he was. His “Garden Song” (“Inch by inch, row by row….”) has been a staple of elementary school students and gardeners of all ages from all over the world since its 1975 debut. Soon after, it was brought to the attention of none other than folk icon and humanitarian Pete Seeger.
“Young fella from Maine taught me this song last year,” Seeger, quite the songwriter himself, tells his concert audience in a grainy film of the time, since brought to You Tube.
In the way of such things, Mallett was a struggling 24-year-old singer-songwriter when Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul & Mary fame opened a recording studio in Blue Hill, Maine, and Mallett paid a visit to play him “Garden Song” on his guitar. Stookey, who later recorded the song himself, as did Arlo Guthrie, John Denver and yes, The Muppets, knew just the man who could help put it—and Mallett—on the map.
So off to Seeger it went, kick-starting Mallett’s career that eventually saw him produce 17 albums and keep a steady concert schedule while also raising a family of musicians on the family farm in Maine with his wife, Jayne. (His two sons and a daughter all pitch in on the You Tube clip below.
Mallett’s final album was entitled “Celebration,” the title song of which distills a good deal of his approach over the years to his country and its ways of life he loved while still keeping his eyes on the horizons of what it could still be.
As time and fate would have it, I just came across Mallett’s other music (besides “Garden Song”) a couple of months ago, noted him as a near-term purpose, then returned to him early this week, only to ruefully discover he had just died of cancer in mid-December at age 73.
So let’s celebrate his life by diving into “Celebration” now.
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“Celebration” hits the ground running with a piercing take on what all of us know as the dismal, dark underbelly of American (most every nation’s, really) life. Turning a withering eye at a tableau of modern horrors, Mallett strikes almost a preacher’s or rapper’s tone through the first stanza:
Too many politicians lyin’
Too many hungry babies cryin’
Too many random bullets flyin’
Too much time spent in struggle
Too many little kids in trouble
Too many cities gone to rubble
Too many people talkin’ double
Yep—been there, seen that.
All too often, actually, and it is an ongoing tragedy.
But then, some light that comes in through the cracks of that foundation, a vision and hope for a better way:
This can’t be our destination
This could be a better nation
Time to set the big horse racin’
We can change the situation
Train’s a leavin’ from the station
Need a brand new generation
This could be a celebration, now
Now
Mallett sings here not merely rhetorically but as a call to action, a cue to “change the situation,” with the active image of a train, all its gleaming metal steaming and clanging its way to a longed-for destination.
Surely, a nation endowed with such enormous capital as world history’s pre-eminent economic success story can be “a better nation” than to leave “hungry babies cryin'” and the working class “spent in struggle.” And it can be a refuge, where the human right to more life by avoiding “random” (and not so random) “bullets flyin'” is of far greater value than some absolutist divine right to lethal weaponry.
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Having set the train of his song in motion, Mallett stays with the rhythm of stanzas that alternate between human venality, fear and delusion on one hand and the recurring resolve of “This can’t be our destination” on the other.
Whether the latter statement carries the power of an exclamation point or the plea of a question mark at the end isn’t exactly clear, but I suspect, judging from his voice and the following line in which he uses the subjunctive mood of “could be a better nation,” that Mallett comes down somewhere in the middle.
Which seems entirely apropos, given that America remains a grand experiment, ever in the making and remaking that democracy requires.
Besides which, “people shouting all so sure/That their side is the right side more and more” was never David Mallett’s rhetorical cup of tea. Like all fights for liberty, decency, justice and dignity, there are no certainties for how that battle will go, what the best way to go about it might be, and how much or little of what one does today will or will not influence the short- or long-term future in any way.
So many unknowns, so much faith and commitment to today, this day, required.
And on that day, every day, the plaintive request, important enough to utter twice:
“Tell me what you gonna do
Tell me what you gonna do.”
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If you’re inclined to read along with lyrics, this rendition has them en toto when you listen by clicking the “Watch on You Tube” button bottom left on the screen. Just hit your back arrow afterwards, because the song below this is a beautiful evocation of place and memory, and was my original choice for this series before “Celebration” emerged as the more apt choice for this time….
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Gone now 27 years, would have just turned 81 on New Year’s Eve…
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For a list of all songs and their opening paragraphs in this series, most recent first, see
http://andrewhidas.com/?s=Brilliant+songs
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Deep appreciation to the photographers! Unless otherwise stated, some rights reserved under Creative Commons licensing.
Elizabeth Haslam, whose photos (except for the books) grace the rotating banner at top of page.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/lizhaslam/
Library books by Larry Rose, all rights reserved, contact: larry@rosefoto.com
MLK statue and “Don’t Talk About It…” sign by Andrew Hidas https://www.flickr.com/photos/andrewhidas/
Mallett photo from his website https://davidmallett.com/
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