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Democracy Is Not Dead Yet

from Long Train A​-​Rollin' by Marc Nerenberg

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Around the world, democracy has been increasingly under attack of late by authoritarian forces in too many places for me to want to list here. Suffice it to say, it's a global phenomenon - and a scary one at that. Like climate change, these concerted efforts to undermine democracy feel like a serious existential threat. A couple of days ago, I had been noodling on my banjo in a not very familiar Cm tuning when a melody emerged that made me think it was time to write a song, though I had no idea about what, so I improvised a stanza of lyrics that became the middle stanza of this song, and then I sat down and wrote the rest of the song to follow the pattern I had established. An opinion piece in the New Yorker I had recently read, entitled "American Democracy Isn't Dead Yet, but It's Getting There" was surely in the back of my mind when these lyrics emerged, though they are actually about the worldwide threats to democracy, and not only American politics per se. This was recorded on 30 May 2021, and was played, using mostly old-time 2 finger picking style, with brief insertions of clawhammer bits, on a banjo tuned e♭CGCE♭, and a B♭ harmonica played cross-keyed in Cm.

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from Long Train A​-​Rollin', released August 2, 2021

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Marc Nerenberg Montreal, Québec

Marc Nerenberg is a veteran Montreal folksinger who plays old time banjo styles and blues harmonica. He has a narrative- centric repertoire, recounting stories in song and wrapping stories around songs. You may “be drawn in by a combination of Marc’s mastery of traditional banjo styles, his idiosyncratic singing, and [his] richly detailed ballads.” (Mike Regenstreif – Folk Roots/Folk Branches 2019) ... more

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