A Celebration of American Stories
Larry Long is an American singer-songwriter who has made his life work the celebration of everyday heroes. Author, historian, actor, and broadcaster Studs Terkel called Larry “a true American Troubadour.”
Larry has written and performed hundreds of ballads celebrating community and history makers. His work has taken him from rural Alabama to the Lakota communities in South Dakota. He has given musical voice to struggling Midwest farmers, embattled workers, and veterans. He was the troubadour for peace on Soviet/American peace cruises, sang for Mrs. Rosa Parks at the 45th anniversary of the Montgomery Bus Boycott and organized the Mississippi River Revival, a decade long campaign to cleanup the Mississippi river. He assembled the first hometown tribute to Woody Guthrie in Okemah, Oklahoma, which today has evolved into the annual Woody Guthrie Folk Festival.
Now a Smithsonian Folkways recording artist, Long has sung at major concerts and festivals throughout the United States and world, including Awesome Africa Festival (South Africa), Winnipeg Folk Festival (Canada), Smithsonian Folklife Festival (Washington DC), and at Madison Square Garden with Joan Baez, Bruce Springsteen and many others for Pete Seeger’s 90th Birthday Celebration.
Larry produces and performs with American Roots Revue which celebrates America’s richest musical traditions of gospel, folk, blues, and R&B. American Roots Revue is a must-see event whose ever-changing line-up has included Prince’s former drummer Michael Bland, internationally acclaimed guitarist Cory Wong, Soul Asylum rocker Dave Pirner, bluesman Guy Davis, Billy Steele from Sounds of Blackness, Anishinaabe-Ojibwe Keeper of Song Dorene Day Waubanewquay, R&B powerhouse JD Steele, Pavoratti of Gospel Robert Robinson, Masterful Weaver of Story & Song Claudia Schmidt and others.
Long’s work in schools and communities sparked the creation of the nonprofit Community Celebration of Place which creates intergenerational and multicultural opportunities for students to learn and grow through a program called Elders’ Wisdom, Children’s Song. Through this work Long has honored the life stories of over one-thousand elders with communities throughout the United States. The fruits of which are now being housed and digitized through the University of Minnesota Performing Arts Archives.
