Public disapproval over federal agents in the streets, the war in Iran, rising grocery and fuel prices and corruption at the highest levels of government led Dave Specter to organize. For the Chicago blues guitarist, that meant working the phone to invite musicians from throughout the city to stand onstage with him Sunday to sing songs of resistance.
“It’s our responsibility as musicians. This is what America’s about,” he said. “Protest music has always been a part of the need to stand up against injustice and speak out.”
Specter’s efforts resulted in “Songs of Protest, Sounds of Freedom,” on July 26 at Space in Evanston. The evening will feature just what the title promises across a spectrum of Chicago music, from blues artists Billy Branch, Melody Angel and John Katke, to jazz singer Lynne Jordan, slam poet Marc Smith and punk songwriter Jason Narducy. Also on the lineup are rock auteur Nicholas Tremulis, singer-songwriter Steve Dawson, pop singer Phil Angotti and reggae singer Kwame Bediako. Proceeds from the show benefit the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.
Chicago musicians have long played a pivotal role in political and social movements, from the Staple Singers and Curtis Mayfield providing the soundtrack to Civil Rights activism to folk-rock songwriter Michael McDermott releasing a song to commemorate the first “No Kings” march last year. More recently, musicians like Bruce Springsteen, Dessa, Dropkick Murphys, and Billy Bragg have used songs to express a range of emotions, from anguish to defiance.
Locally, Specter, who is a partner in Space, released several protest songs over the years; most recently “The Times are Deranging (The Buck Stops Where?),” a slow blues number that blasts the current White House inhabitant. “Can’t stop lying/good people are dying/fools believe that he really cares,” Specter sings.
He said his political outlook was shaped by his father, Jerry Specter, a community organizer who in the 1970s helped lead resistance against the former Mayor Richard J. Daley administration’s plan to transform the former Municipal Tuberculosis Sanitarium on the Northwest Side into a commercial shopping center.
Today, the site is North Park Village, consisting of a nature center, senior housing and other neighborhood facilities. “He taught me that when you’re confronted with a bully, you stand up and you fight,” said Specter. “I don’t think passivism is particularly effective in times like this.”
Narducy, who helms the band Split Single while playing bass with Bob Mould and other bands, said that his recent activism began in 2018 when he volunteered with States Win, an organization that provides grassroots help for state legislature races throughout the US.
He rallied friends to write postcards every week at a nearby bar; over time, when the number of volunteers grew to more than 100 people, he turned to Space. The club provided the entire room for two separate drives that totaled more than 7,000 postcards.
“When you have a venue that provides an amazing experience for musicians and audience members but also embraces activism, I’ll do anything I can do be part of what Dave is doing,” Narducy said.
Events like “Songs of Protest, Sounds of Freedom,” he said, are not about convincing people to change their vote. Their greatest value is about “building community and building community is the way you create change in politics.”
“It’s important to not feel alone. That’s what the best music does anyway,” Narducy said. “When people hear someone sing, it’s a reminder that ‘Oh yeah, I’m not crazy for what I believe in.’”
Specter said inspiration for the show was “Songs of Conscience, Sounds of Freedom,” a show documenting the role music has played in protest movements over the years that ran at the Woody Guthrie Center Tulsa and the Grammy Museum in Los Angeles. Among the instruments and handwritten lyrics from Guthrie, Springsteen, Pete Seeger, Josh White, and others, are lyrics Specter wrote for “The Ballad of George Floyd,” a song he and Chicago blues harp player Billy Branch released in 2020. “It was a total honor,” Specter said.
Each performer at the Space event will perform two songs, including originals and protest songs that span decades. “As a musician, it is more effective to speak through our music than to get into an argument on social media or in a bar,” Specter said. “Music brings people together. That’s what art should do.”