Utah Phillips, the legendary folk musician and peace and labor activist, died earlier this year at the age of seventy-three. Over the span of nearly four decades, Utah Phillips worked in what he referred to as “the Trade,” performing tirelessly throughout the United States, Canada and Europe. The son of labor organizers, Phillips was a lifelong member of the Industrial Workers of the World, known as the Wobblies. As a teenager, he ran away from home and started living as a hobo who rode the rails and wrote songs about his experiences. In 1956, he joined the Army and served in the Korean War, an experience he would later refer to as the turning point of his life. In 1968, he ran for the US Senate on the Peace and Freedom Party ticket. For the past twenty-one years he lived in Nevada City, where he started a nationally syndicated folk music radio show. He also helped found the Hospitality House homeless shelter and the Peace and Justice Center. We spend the hour with an interview with Phillips from January 2004. [includes rush transcript]
Utah Phillips, legendary folk musician and peace and labor activist, interviewed in January 2004. He passed away in his sleep in his Nevada City home on May 23, 2008 of congestive heart failure. He was 73 years old.
AMY GOODMAN: Over the span of nearly four decades, Utah Phillips worked in what he referred to as “the Trade,” performing tirelessly for audiences in large and small cities throughout the United States, Canada and Europe. His songs were performed by Emmylou Harris, Waylon Jennings, Joan Baez and Arlo Guthrie. He earned a Grammy nomination for an album he recorded with Ani DiFranco and was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Folk Alliance.
The legendary folk musician, peace and labor activist died on May 23rd of this year. He passed away in his sleep in Nevada City. He was seventy-three years old.
Born Bruce Duncan Phillips in 1935, he later adopted the name “Utah,” from where he grew up. The son of labor organizers, Utah Phillips was a lifelong member of the Industrial Workers of the World, known as the Wobblies. As a teenager, he ran away from home and started living as a hobo who rode the rails and wrote songs about his experiences. In 1956, Utah Phillips joined the Army and served in the Korean War, an experience he would later refer to as the turning point of his life. In 1968, he ran for the US Senate on the Peace and Freedom Party ticket.
In Nevada City, California, he started a nationally syndicated folk music radio show called Loafer’s Glory, produced at community radio station KVMR. He also helped found the Hospitality House homeless shelter and the Peace and Justice Center there.
In January 2004, I had a chance to sit down with Utah for an extensive interview. We met at the pirate radio station, Freak Radio Santa Cruz. I began by asking Utah Phillips why he arrived at least a day early to any city or town where he performed.
UTAH PHILLIPS: When you have an engagement, at least in my world, the world that I create for myself, an engagement doesn’t begin when you hit the stage and end when you leave the stage. It begins when you hit the city limits, and it ends when you leave the city limits.
There’s a whole lot going on in that town. My trade is like being paid to go to schools, and every town is its own teacher. Every town, that’s my university. And there are marvels and wonders. There’s Hobos from Hell, are from Santa Cruz. They’re young people riding on the freight trains, and they’re better at it than I ever thought I would be. You’ve got the Homeless Garden Project. You’ve got just an enormous rich community here.
I was involved some years ago in helping to organize a street singers’ guild in this town, and it—you got to beat the streets and learn from the people, and then you’ve got to get on their stage and, having done that and been with those people, let that audience know that you’re not just doing the show you did in the town the night before, you know. You’re no—you’ve got to know who you’re with and where you are. That’s very important to me. And they’ve got to know that I understand that, that I’m really there for them.
AMY GOODMAN: Let’s start out where you started out. Where were you born? When were you born?
UTAH PHILLIPS: I was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1935.
AMY GOODMAN: And how did you start on this journey? When did you begin singing, storytelling?
UTAH PHILLIPS: Oh, mercy, I think we’re all storytellers, you know. You think of the excuses you told your parents for why you got home late. I just never gave it up.
I got—I left home. I went up to work in Yellowstone National Park during high school. I was going to make some summer money. I went up on the freight trains, and for the first time I rode the freight trains. And I worked on a road rating crew. And at that time, I was playing the ukulele and singing ersatz Hawaiian music—Johnny Noble, things like that, “Lovely Hula Hands,” “Malihini Melee.”
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