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Barbara Dane, Who Fought Injustice Through Song, Dies at 97
She was highly regarded as a folk, blues and jazz singer. She was also ardently left-wing and prioritized social change over commercial success.
Barbara Dane, an acclaimed folk, jazz and blues singer whose communist leanings and fierce civil rights and antiwar activism earned her both critical plaudits and a thick Federal Bureau of Investigation file, died on Sunday at her home in Oakland, Calif. She was 97.
Her daughter, Nina Menendez, said that after suffering shortness of breath for several years because of heart failure, Ms. Dane chose to terminate her life under California’s End of Life Option Act.
Over the course of her long career, Ms. Dane, with her rich, woody contralto, built a reputation in a variety of musical genres.
She established her bona fides as a folky of the first order while still in her teens, performing with Pete Seeger. “I knew I was a singer for life,” she recalled in a 2021 interview with The New York Times, “but where I would aim it didn’t come forward until then. I saw, ‘Oh, you can use your voice to move people.’”
Ms. Dane wore her convictions proudly, belting out worker anthems like “I Hate the Capitalist System” and “Solidarity Forever.” She performed at the first Newport Folk Festival in 1959 with Memphis Slim and Willie Dixon. In the 1960s, Bob Dylan would often sit in with her when she was performing at Gerdes Folk City, the renowned Greenwich Village club.
