Tue, Dec 7, 2004, 8 pm

Venue: Zellerbach Hall

Price: $28/$38/$56

Subscription Series: World Stage Series B

Folk music icon. Dust Bowl balladeer. Labor Activist. These are the well-known facets of Woody Guthrie's legendary career. Now audiences have the opportunity to experience a lesser-known aspect of this American songwriting legend — a treasure trove of unrecorded Jewish lyrics penned by Guthrie that were recently discovered by his daughter Nora. These songs on Jewish themes, ranging from Hanukah and blintzes to the Holocaust (or, as Guthrie wrote, "from the sweet to the sour") were composed while he was living in Coney Island with his mother-in-law, Aliza Greenblatt, a politically outspoken kindred spirit and accomplished Yiddish poet. The "new" songs have been set to music by the popular New York klezmer group The Klezmatics and Guthrie's son Arlo, a folk icon in his own right, who shot to fame in the '60s with his anti-war anthem "Alice's Restaurant." Holy Ground is a soul-stirring exploration of Guthrie's favorite word, "union" — of the secular and the sacred, the humorous and the profound — and of his heartfelt lyric that inspired the project's title: "Every spot on earth is holy ground."

Patron Information

Program Notes: Program notes are available online, click here.

Parking Alerts: Parking may be more difficult on campus for this performances due to a Cal Basketball home game. Please see our Parking Alert section for more information.

Related Performances:
Chava Alberstein

Artists links:
Official Arlo Guthrie site
Official Klezmatics site
Woody Guthrie Foundation and Archive site