by Ida Bly

David Rovics and Kamala Emanuel sang a concert in Madison on September 4th.They call their duo “The Ministry of Culture.” Madison DSA and WORT-FM helped sponsor this performance. This evening of folk-style music offered abundant moments of truth-telling and authenticity.

There were about 35 people in attendance, in a range of ages, at Muso on Winnebago Street. Muso hosts acoustic music events without amplification. In this case, the pleasing harmonies contributed by Kamala Emanuel greatly enhanced the songs David sang while playing guitar. Attendees responded warmly to Rovics’ songs, including his most well-known song, “St. Patrick’s Battalion,” with driving rhythm and a refrain containing the lyrics: “we witnessed freedom denied…we fought on the Mexican side.” It’s the story of Irish immigrants who switched sides during the Mexican-American war of the 1840s. Having recently faced the choice of “death, starvation or exile” in Ireland, they found the Mexicans’ cause more compelling, staving off an invading army, in a parallel to their struggle against the British.

Rovics and Emanuel also sang the tongue-in-cheek “I’m a Better Anarchist than You,” encouraging us to poke fun at ourselves, and to work across sectarian lines. Another popular song with a singable chorus was “If Only it were True,” which recounts the absurd right wing charges against Obama as being a tree-hugging, socialist, immigrant-loving, peace-loving Muslim. DSA members can identify with the song’s sentiment, given the bizarre, fact-free accusations of socialism slung as an insult toward various and sundry figures who are anything but.

There were also new songs about Gaza, including “From Auschwitz to Gaza.” Another brand new song was “Zahid” about a US Veteran who is a beloved long-time local resident of Olympia Washington, and uses a wheelchair, lingering now in ICE detention in solitary confinement in Tacoma. The concert also included the song, “In Wisconsin in 1854 (Song for Joshua Glover)” (see sidebar article).

Prior to the main act, local singer Tom Wernigg opened the night with his country-tinged, humanistic, singable, and informative songs that have a deep vein of humor. He sang, “I don’t like genocide…under any guise”. The sarcastic “My Minivan…it’s my best friend” included the line, “I like my burgers with freedom fries.” We hope Tom in his signature hat will perform more often in Madison.

Rovics and Emanuel concluded their performance to applause. Returning to the stage for an encore, they sang “Behind the Barricades“ [2001] acapella with the passage: “As the movement grows there will be hills and bends—But at the center of the struggle are your lovers and your friends—The more we hold each other up the less we can be swayed—Here’s to love and solidarity and a kiss behind the barricades.” It was a tremendous and satisfying finish to a great night.

Muso performance space

Muso created a magical and whimsical backdrop for the event. The proprietors have roots in the Act 10 uprising and long-running Solidarity Sing Along at the Wisconsin Capitol since 2011. Muso puts a strong emphasis on pure musical experiences, especially participatory events. The venue has continued to improve over the last year. We enjoyed comfortable seating augmented by luxurious sofas piled with comfortable pillows, a bookshelf-lined wall, fanciful stenciled woodwork and colorful paper mobiles. There was even a break between sets to enjoy refreshments and visit with others at the event. Muso has great potential for more political and socialist-themed gatherings.

Music in Social Movements

David Rovics is a singer with anarchist politics, connecting many movements over the decades. He describes his “songs of social significance” as being “about life on earth” or, variously, as “songs to fan the flames of discontent.” His works touch on dozens of contemporary struggles including immigration, war, labor, gentrification, capitalism, environmental struggles, high rents, and so on. He is particularly notable as a prolific song writer. Never shying away from difficult subjects, he also writes about bicycles, bonobos, and visions of a better world we can create.

One of my favorite songs is “We Just Want the World” [1998]. It speaks to our fondest wishes: ”closing down munitions plants…shutting down the oil rigs/ And turning towards the sun…we don’t want your dead-end highway/ We just want the world.”

His pieces have been called “song stories,” and in many cases use a specific event to symbolize a much larger issue. Rovics’ historical references have also been compared to what folk singer Utah Phillips called The Long Memory, a connected view of history that can help us see where we want to go. In this moment especially, we need singers and cultural workers to help illuminate our history because it is intentionally obscured by the ruling elites. David Rovics has a large catalog of music on Palestine (see https://www.davidrovics.com/palestine/), dating back at least twenty years but particularly voluminous in the last few years, with new songs coming out regularly on the topic.

For his troubles, Rovics has suffered the demonetization of his YouTube channel in the last year, a major threat to a performer’s financial stability. Just this week, YouTube removed his song “I Support Palestine Action.” His events have been cancelled for political reasons, and he has endured government surveillance during his stops, even in New Zealand and Scandinavia. This reminds us of something we know very well from TV’s top comedians lately: cultural workers put themselves at risk. If our enemies know how powerful cultural workers can be, why don’t we?

I first saw David Rovics perform in Madison at the First Congregational Church on the corner of University Avenue and Breese Terrace in the early 2000s, as part of the Earth Day to May Day events. He also performed at Wil-Mar Community Center around 2009 — on that visit his friend and legendary labor troubadour Anne Feeney was in the audience (his tribute to her: “I Dreamed I Saw Anne Feeney”). On August 25, 2024, Rovics and Kamala Emanuel played on the Madison Labor Temple lawn, with sponsorship of the Family Farm Defenders, with the Raging Grannies as an opener (See the Grannies’ video clip and lyrics listing from that event here).

David Rovics was interviewed by Brian Standing on the WORT-FM show, The 8 O’Clock Buzz in 2024, touching on the role of music in protest gatherings, and that interview can be heard here:

More recently, host Martin Alvarado interviewed David Rovics on Global Revolutions on WORT-FM radio on Mon. Sept. 1, 2025, in the 3rd hour, minute 2:04-2:27. The archive of this brief interview is still available for a while. In this interview, David reported witnessing a Labor Day Parade in Rockford, Illinois, on their way up to Madison to perform this year. Although it was a massive nationwide day of protest with the theme “Workers over Billionaires,” these cultural workers did not get invited to participate, enjoying it instead as spectators.

It was a notable omission, especially because Rovics has made remarkable contributions to the labor movement’s songbook, writing original songs on topics such as Mother Jones (“Pray for the Dead and Fight Like Hell for the Living”), May Day (“The First of May,” and “When the Workers of the World Unite”), “The Battle of Blair Mountain,” the IWW “Ballad of a Wobbly, the Depression (“Union Makes Us Strong” [2010]), the Wisconsin Uprising “We Will Win (Song for Wisconsin)” [2011], and “Tax the Rich” [2011]. Rovics’ bluegrass classic, “Minimum Wage Strike,” is at least as relevant today as when he wrote it in 1998. His song “Joe Hill,” (written on the 100th anniversary of Joe Hill’s death in 1915) is about a labor organizer who was condemned to death by the state of Utah, and was executed by a state firing squad. How strange it is that the state of Utah may again execute someone by firing squad, if recent events at Utah State University play out as expected. The Death Penalty Information Center wrote a post about this. The current case is nothing like Joe Hill’s, and yet it is amazing how history echoes!

Rovics’ song “Everything Can Change,” about organizing, has a valuable message. We need our organizations of course, but these are just part of larger movements. Our organizations ebb and flow, and only partly contain our capacious aspirations. We need art, music, feasts, festivals, and culture that can carry us from one organization, movement, and phase of life to the next. We need to build deep community that can sustain us for the long haul.

It’s a mistake when our organizations forgo art and music. We deprive ourselves of the succor of music and poetry when our protest events do not include them. Author Barbara Ehrenreich, who was active in DSA, made the point that movements are more than their organizations, and need vital cultural elements to make them strong. The Poor People’s Campaign has made art and music an important component of their work. Preaching to the choir is not pointless, and even left-brained people need encouragement, connection, and learning –- preferably in handy formats to integrate into daily life, such as songs you can sing in the shower or while cleaning the house, as well as before the city council, at a protest, or on a picket line.

Hearing Difficult Truths

One of the motivations for listening to Rovics’ music is that hearing the truth brings cleansing release, even when it is challenging. Particularly now, one longs for the truth, as science is being sidelined, and the gains of the Enlightenment erode. One’s mind and senses feel polluted, as the disgusting residue of falsehoods accumulates. The obsequious worship of power pervades our airwaves and hardens our souls. There is also a struggle to make meaning of our experiences, living here in the heart of Empire, passing people sleeping on the street, taking in the horrors on TV and the crossing of red lines around the world. It is helpful to gather together to seek shared understandings.

While cringing at the sorrows, we reach for the serenity of wisdom. I often think if I understood better how things got so bad, it might help me know how to move forward. This is why learning about socialism is so important now.

David Rovics’ culture work includes essays published in Counterpunch and other places. David’s archive of music is accessible for free at www.davidrovics.com. He also has a presence on Blue Sky, Tiktok, X, Instagram, Threads, Facebook, Substack, YouTube and Songkick. Tou may tune into his podcast “This Week with David Rovics” – with music, history and current events at http://www.davidrovics/com/THISWEEK”. He also has a new memoir out in the form of an audiobook, called My Life as a Protest Singer. To get full access to this and other special material, there is a subscription-based Community-Supported Art program available through his website.

The morning after his performance in Madison, Rovics and Emanuel left for Woodruff, far in the north of Wisconsin, to continue to bring this music to new places, and new people. Rovics often performs for free in parks, at protest gatherings, and on picket lines. Having wrapped up the Midwest tour for now, the next stop is a tour of New York and New England starting in October.

Sidebar: Song for Joshua Glover

Rovics’ and Emanuel’s concert included a song written last year about Wisconsin history, “In Wisconsin in 1854 (Song for Joshua Glover).” It is about the Fugitive Slave Act period when the federal government forced local police to cooperate with slave catchers. But it is also a triumphant tale of rebellion by the local population against this unjust law. After a mob of Wisconsinites helped Glover escape from jail and leave the country, the state of Wisconsin declared the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 unconstitutional in 1854. The people of Wisconsin made a singular, definitive pushback, and effectively ended this law through this one instance of cross-racial solidarity, and public collective disobedience. It usually takes more than one.

Phil Busse (a Madison native) wrote a guest column that ran in the Wisconsin State Journal on May 5, 2025, “Arrest of Milwaukee judge hearkens back to 1850s” explaining how the Joshua Glover incident has important parallels to the immigration struggle embodied by the Judge Hannah Dugan case, set to go to trial in Milwaukee in December.

In 2021, the city of Toronto commissioned a statue of Joshua Glover for a city park. The design is well worth looking up online, and includes Glover in a top hat and with Afrofuturist elements. After escaping the US, Glover lived out the rest of his long life in Canada but also suffered a short bout of imprisonment there, and was denied a proper burial. There have been recent tributes to Glover, including a commissioned song called “Freedom Heights” with a video version spliced with images of Toronto’s pro-basketball Raptors team members. There is also a new mural to Joshua Glover on the I-43 underpass in Milwaukee. There is a new mini-documentary film (“Liberty at Stake”) too. The Republican Party intentionally highlighted the Joshua Glover incident during their convention in Milwaukee in 2024, aiming to claim the abolitionist roots of their party’s founding in Ripon, Wisconsin. But it is an open question whether the Party would make the same effort today, less than one year later. In any case, it is an important historical incident that is too little known, even here in Wisconsin.

Also relevant is David Rovics’ song “In Between Milwaukee and Chicago” written in the wake of the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha.

On the topic of statues and murals, it is truly remarkable how many long-overdue historical markers went up only after the protests spurred by George Floyd’s death in May 25, 2020. I saw three examples of this on a recent visit to Jackson, Tennessee. Historical markers were recently put up there to the late-1800 lynchings on the courthouse lawn, the 1960’s Woolworth’s lunch counter sit-ins, and to honor their native son, Gil Scott-Heron, the world famous jazz poet and spoken word artist (“The Revolution Will Not Be Televised”). This history languished, ignored in plain sight, until the Black Lives Matter protests after George Floyd forced local communities to rectify their long silencing of history.