Folk music project: Mayday picnic
Primary tabs
A musician I know was inspired last year at a Mayday picnic to collect, write, and publish folk songs for the public domain, because it is not legal to play many songs under copyright protection at public gatherings, and telling stories through music is really important!
So we made songbooks and also a website to spread songs with revolutionary spirit:
The website has an ever-expanding collection of songs suitable for a Mayday picnic, or any other festive celebration of kindred spirits (and if you write songs, please contribute if you'd like!). The songs, with their memorable melodies, are simple enough for a crowd to remember and gentle enough for singing a baby asleep. Some are new, some are old as the hills, all are free to be interpreted, cut-up, performed, arranged, and re-written any way you please. Even the ones as old as the hills can be recreated, made fresh, and made your own.
These are folk songs. Music by people, for people, made to enjoy live, in flesh and blood. To be played at gatherings with friends and families, at places where people laugh, dance, and cry. Smash that radio and feel the power of a music being created as part of free culture, not as part of some money-making venture. Don’t let music remain shackled by the greed and chains of the spectacle. You are what you sing!
I hope that you enjoy the songs in this collection, and that they serve as a starting point to transmit your own messages and feelings. The creation and sharing of live music is an important and vital part of any culture. And all cultures, regardless of godliness or nationality, have to acknowledge the awesome power of the changing of the seasons. Winter has passed. Spring has arrived. The world is reborn!
