Lincoln Cantata - Earl Robinson's Lonesome Train
Building Bridges: Your Community and Labor Report
National Edition
28 minutes
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Earl Robinson’s Cantata, Lonesome Train,
as part of Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial
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The Riverside Church in NYC presented the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College, The NYC Labor Chorus and The Riverside Inspirational Choir in Earl Robinson’s cantata, The Lonesome Train in honor of the 200th birthday of the great emancipator Abraham Lincoln. The work had not been heard in its entirety for more than 50 years. The performance featured theatrical direction by LorcaPeress,a narrator played by acclaimed actress Ruby Dee (American Gangster, Steam), a chorus led by a balladeer, Michael Mark (I Love My Wife, Cotton Patch Gospel), barn-dance caller David Amram (composer/Author/Jazz musician), banjo soloist Eric Weissberg (Dueling Banjos, Deliverance) and Sam Waterston (Law and Order) as President Lincoln. The four join gospel preacher Tyrone Aiken and his choir, a barn dance caller and fiddler to honor Lincoln’s message of “a new nation conceived in liberty.” The Riverside production was introduced by Pete Seeger.
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February 18, 2009 at 4:23 PM
The UAW has failed to give serious concessions to the Big Three as part of a deal to satisfy the terms of the automotive bailout. They have only offered token reductions that will mean very little to Detroit's bottom line. According to the Associated Press the UAW agreed to limit overtime, reduce cash bonuses, forgo cost of living pay increases and limit supplemental pay for laid-off workers. Are they serious? Who in the automotive manufacturing sector is working overtime now? Auto production is down almost 40% this year. Also, they are going to reduce their cash bonuses? How do you get a cash bonus when you have helped drive your company bankrupt? Who do they think they are? Bank executives? No one I know gets supplemental pay from their former employer when they are laid-off. When a company can not afford to pay their current employees, they should not be giving money to laid-off employees. The UAW have refused to take a cut in their base wages. The retiree health care cost issue is still not resolved. The 'Big Three' want the UAW to take half of their 20 billion dollar payment as stock. The UAW only wants to delay the payment, but this issue is still not settled. The CEO's of GM and Chrysler LLC should be embarrassed to beg for another 17 billion in taxpayer dollars. There is something unjust about taking money from a worker struggling by on 20 or 30 thousand dollars a year and using it to save the job of someone with a $70,000 wage and benefit package. The UAW will declare this deal a major concession. The leaders of the 'Big Three" will stay silent because they need more bailout money. The Obama Administration will look the other way and hand over more of our tax dollars.