Jack & Jill Politics

From The Washington Post

Odetta, 77; Sang the Soundtrack for the Civil Rights Movement
By Martin Weil and Adam Bernstein
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, December 3, 2008; Page A08

Odetta, 77, the folk and blues singer whose renditions of civil rights anthems accompanied historic events and made history themselves, died last night in New York.

Afflicted for years with heart and lung ailments, she died at Lenox Hill Hospital, which she had entered at the end of October for treatment of kidney failure, according to her manager, Douglas Yeager.

Her hope to sing at the Jan. 20 inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama had helped keep her alive for weeks when medical experts had despaired of her prospects for survival, Yeager said.

In March 2007, she had attended a concert held in Washington in her honor. It seemed a marvel that she could attend at all, let alone sing, Yeager said in an interview early this morning.

Then, he said, she mounted the stage, wishing “to say hello” to the audience. She launched into a full-throated rendition of one of the songs with which she was most closely associated: “This Little Light of Mine.”

Her vitality and determination, he said, “no one could explain.”

Rest of article at link above.

Youtube clips of Odetta

Keep On Moving It On

Water Boy

You Don’t Know My Mind

Odetta at Newport Festival