Regular Joe.
And when Joe looked back at the sweat upon his tracks
He had nothing to show but his age
He had nothing to show but his age – Phil Ochs – “Ballad of Joe Hill.”
This week at First Congo, Nashville’s Shelby Bottom String Band provides the music for a multimedia history of early 20th-century folk singer and union organizer Joe Hill and a discussion about art and activism in the Trump era.
Hill was an immigrant, but in the early decades of the 20th-Century there wasn’t a native-born worker in America who couldn’t relate to the stories he told in his songs. In addition to giving American labor its marching music, Hill became the movement’s patron saint when he was cut down by a firing squad for a murder he almost certainly didn’t commit.
Last words: “”Fire — go on and fire!”
A Musical History of Labor Hero Joe Hill at First Congo
It’s a pay what you can event, Wednesday, March 15th at 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m. First Congregational Church, 1000 South Cooper. For additional details, click here.
