First Time Ever - by Peggy Seeger (Paperback)

About the Book

A superbly wrought memoir from one of folk music's most respected and influential musicians

Book Synopsis

A superbly wrought memoir from one of folk music's most respected and influential musicians A Guardian, Sunday Times, Observer, Telegraph and Financial Times Book of the Year

The musician Peggy Seeger has lived a life full of art and passion, family and separation, tragedy, celebration and the unexpected - and irresistible - force of love. It would by any standards be an extraordinary story, but what elevates her account is the beauty of the writing in her fascinating memoir: it is clear-eyed and playful, luminous and melodic, fearless, funny and always truthful, from the first word to the last.

Review Quotes

"A quirky, unique, and fabulously memorable memoir."--STARRED Kirkus Reviews "I loved this book - it is deeply personal and idiosyncratic and generous, and evocative of so many different eras and moments. Peggy Seeger is a master of traditional song who's life has spanned many important and fascinating eras of musical and cultural life on both sides of the Atlantic. Her memoir brings all of this to life in a distinct voice: eloquent, feisty and wise."--Sam Amidon "This whirling memoir follows the folksinger and activist through international tours, crises in her famous musical family, and a long, all-consuming relationship with the British singer Ewan MacColl. Seeger's conversational prose has a flair for capturing the common (a 1938 Chevy 'had a vertical fish-mouth and a fat lady's rump') and the cataclysmic; remembering her mother's early death, she writes, 'I try to see and hear things for her, to lure her spirit back from the lost body.' Colorful characters flit in and out, and, remembering them, Seeger, who is now eighty-two, is often wistful. Of one friend, she writes, 'He died, but he is still in my present tense.'"--New Yorker