Peter Paul & Mary, A holiday tradition

Peter Paul & Mary’s 1988 Holiday Concert is a favorite holiday tradition for me.

For some folks, their favorite tradition is family, friends, and gifts, around a festive yuletide tree. For some, a key tradition is caroling. For some, it’s fruitcake.

For me, it’s Peter Paul & Mary, surrounded by the New York Choral Society, singing We Wish You A Merry Christmas, Light One Candle, Silent Night, Marvelous Toy, and the Hallelujah Chorus – along with Blowin’ In The Wind and This Land Is Your Land. And then We Wish You A Merry Christmas – once again – to wrap things up.

For me, Peter Paul & Mary singing carols and classics is what Christmas is about – rich tradition, shared with family and friends.

And watching their 1988 Holiday Concert always leads me directly to their 2004 documentary, Peter Paul & Mary: Carry It On – A Musical Legacy.

From this video, I get the feeling of enduring tradition – and a sense of commitment to humanity and hope.

In Carry It On, Tom Paxton said, “There is a place where America can go to hear a musical voice that believes in working out social change, that believes that we have a collective responsibility to the least of us, and that’s all expressed in their music.”

And Ronnie Gilbert, of The Weavers, expressed a feeling that I get from the story, “Deep community – that’s what the folk world was about.”

Peter Yarrow carried the feeling on when he said, “I love the idea that we are a community that respects, cares about, and loves each other, and loves to laugh together. As we get older, it’s no less fun, no less intense, no less meaningful. The voices have a different kind of vibrato and a different kind of color, but the shaping of the sound together is as strong as it ever was.”

The video starts with their beginning in the early 1960s. It guides the viewer along their activist, anti-war journey. It shares their PBS special concerts, which include: the 1988 Holiday Concert; then Peter Paul & Mommy, Too in 1993; and Peter Paul & Mary: Lifelines Live in 1996. And it celebrates making their 2004 album, In These Times.

When they tell about the Lifelines special, Richie Havens comments about The Great Mandala,”I thought it was the most powerful anti-war, anti-injustice song ever written.”

Talking about the new album, In These Times, Bob De Cormier, their music director, says, “Every song on the album deals with some aspect of the struggle for social justice in this country.” That of course includes Jesus Is on the Wire.

Watching their concerts, I particularly love when the cameras show people in the audience getting wrapped up in the music. Or people turning to their partner and sharing the experience. Or a parent turning to their child and becoming immersed in the child’s open fun and enjoyment.

As Ronnie Gilbert said, “Deep community,” always. And deep emotions, as well.

Peter said, “There’s no reason to have to reinvent folk music, you just gotta’ carry it on.”