“Solidarity Forever” was one of the songs, along with “The Partisan” and “Passing Through,” Leonard Cohen discovered in The People’s Songbook while a camp counselor in 1950. This recording is from the Dec 8, 1979 Leonard Cohen Birmingham soundcheck.

“Solidarity Forever” was written by Ralph Chaplin for the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in 1915. Sung to the tune of “John Brown’s Body” and “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” it was soon adopted by other union movements, such as the AFL-CIO.

 

I am republishing selected posts from my former Leonard Cohen site, Cohencentric, here on AllanShowalter.com (these posts can be found at Leonard Cohen). This entry was originally posted