Pete Seeger - Unwavering idealism

That activist and musician Pete Seeger died yesterday, at the age of 94, days after Oxfam reported that the wealth of the world’s 85 richest people equals that of the poorest 3.5bn people suggests that the ambition expressed in one of his famous anthems — ‘We Shall Overcome’ — remains unrealised.

Blacklisted during the McCarthy terror in the 1950s, Seeger never shirked challenging the status quo. His, and his peers’, idealism may not have swept the world they so disdained away, but they helped create the political and social expectations, that so radically changed the world in his long lifetime. He or his political views may not have overcome the mores he rejected, but for a man armed with little more than a banjo, an unprepossessing voice, simple enough lyrics but allied to a great heart, his influence was profound.

Most of all, he showed what a powerful agent for change unwavering idealism can be. And, as the Oxfam report confirms, it was never more needed.