Stand Up and Sing! Pete Seeger, Folk Music, and the Path to Justice

Reich and Gustavson, who previously collaborated on Fab Four Friends, deliver a rich portrait of musician and activist Pete Seeger, focusing on how his deeply held convictions galvanized his music. Gustavson’s mixed-media illustrations highlight Seeger’s modest upbringing and down-to-earth persona, pairing lushly illustrated scenes of him traveling and performing with rough, loose sketches of unemployed men lined up for free food during the Great Depression, a couch where Seeger rested while on tour, and soldiers wading through a river in Vietnam (Seeger was outraged when one of his protest songs, “Waist Deep in the Big Muddy,” was cut from a television appearance). It’s an intimate look at a pivotal American figure who saw himself, as Reich notes, as a link in “a chain in which music and social responsibility are intertwined.” Ages 6–9. [em]Author’s agent: Edward Necarsulmer IV, Dunow, Carlson & Lerner. Illustrator’s agent: Abigail Samoun, Red Fox Literary. (Mar.) [/em]