A New Protest Song: Joan Baez Sings to Save Acres of Land

Joan is up a tree!

We love Joan Baez, in a tree, on the steps of City Hall is San Francisco, on a stage in DC, under a light drizzle crying out, "Where have all the Flowers gone?

She gladens our hearts and brings tears to our eyes.

Be warned, all you fascists out there. Harm one hair on this Peacemakers head, a woe be unto you!

A New Protest Song: Joan Baez Sings to Save Acres of Land: "

If the words of the song came easily to Joan Baez it was because she has been singing them most of her life. Standing in front of an ageing walnut tree threatened - along with the land on which it stood - by developers in Los Angeles, the veteran folk singer jammed her hands in the front pockets of her jeans and sang: 'No, no, no nos movean. No, no, no nos moveran.'

For the mainly Hispanic farmers and gardeners hoping to prevent the 14-acre site known as South Central Farm from being sold to developers, the presence this week of the silver-haired Baez and her Spanish rendition of the protest anthem 'We Shall Not be Moved' has boosted their efforts to save their community garden. For Baez, now aged 65, it is just the latest protest in a lifetime of demonstration and campaigning.
'At the moment it is absolutely extraordinary. It's one of those things that just take off,' Baez yesterday told The

Independent by telephone. 'Two days ago it was very iffy - there were just a couple of people [here]. I thought it would either fizzle out or else take off and it's taken off. It's such a morale-booster - everybody is bustling to work.' "