MIDDLEBURY — The Open Door Clinic in Middlebury, which delivers free health care services to the uninsured and under-insured, will reap the proceeds of a “Seeger Tribute Sing-along Concert,” to be held on May 11, at 7 p.m. at the Middlebury United Methodist Church at 43 North Pleasant St.
The concert will feature Charlie King, Annie Patterson & Peter Blood, and The RIX (Rick Nestler & Rik Palieri), all of whom worked closely with the late, legendary folk singer Pete Seeger.
King is a musical storyteller and political satirist. Seeger hailed him as “one of the finest singers and songwriters of our time.” They worked together to help build the People’s Music Network. He is recipient of the Phil Ochs Award, the War Resisters League’s Peacemaker Award, the Sacco-Vanzetti Social Justice Award nominated by Pete Seeger and the Joe Hill Award.
Patterson and Blood are the co-creators of the best-selling songbook Rise Up Singing. They have led sing-along concerts across North America and abroad building “hope & change through song.” The audience at the Pete 100th Concert will be singing out of their newest songbook If I Had a Hammer, which contains 50 of the best songs that Seeger liked to sing with audiences at his own concerts.
Palieri and Nestler performed with Seeger since their earliest years as troubadours. As sailing partners on Seeger’s sloop, The Clearwater, Nestler & Palieri sang for decades with Pete. They have a new album, just out, called “Steering Pete’s Course: Maritime Songs from the Seeger Songbag.”
Pete Seeger was born a century ago, in May of 1919. He spent his life using music to help create a better world. He sang on picket lines in the 1940s and 1950s. In the summer of 1964 Seeger took part in the Mississippi Freedom Summer. At Martin Luther King’s invitation, Seeger and his wife, Toshi, took part in the historic 1965 Selma to Montgomery March. He was a regular fixture at mass rallies against the Vietnam War in the 1960s. Pete and Toshi Seeger co-founded the Clearwater organization in 1966, sailing a sloop (often filled with school children) up and down the Hudson River to clean up the river.
The Open Door Clinic’s patients include neighbors, friends, and family, keystone members of our community who work on and support the local farms, restaurants, and small businesses. And approximately 60 percent of the clinic’s clientele are Latin American migrant farm workers who face profound language and cultural barriers.
For more information about the concert, contact Priscilla Baker at  [email protected]. Advance tickets can be purchased through riseupsingingvtconcert.com.