Pete Seeger & The Weavers - Wimoweh

Reunion at Carnegie Hall 1957
The Songs Of Pete Seeger
1998

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Pete
• Seeger
• The
• weavers
• Wimoweh
• Songs
• Lion
• Sleeps
• Tonight
• Mbube
• wimoweh

[imhotep1]

Actually, Pete Seeger said on the "A Lion's Trail" documentary by Independent Lens that he would donate money to the family everytime he performed the song. He was one of the few singers who has done this. The Tokens said they were exploited too by their record company, and that they were the victims too.

[ytcarol]

Excellent folk singing group, we listened to the fabulous voices and harmonies of Weavers growing up. Their versions brought folk songs alive for me - the heart of this country.

Thank you for posting this version.

[hawkess08]

@the9thinning1 studied this in my ethnomusicology class

[the9thinning1]

Solomon Linda is the creator of this song.

[allenshepard]

The weavers never took any credit for this song and they had given i think i heard 5 thousand everytime they did this song.

[singwolf]

@2Margaritaz not completely true. When he heard and recorded the song, he was under the impression that the song was a trad song. And his mgmt was happy to let him believe that. When he found out otherwise, he actually sent a cheque for $1K to Linda (huge amount in the 50's) and donated his portion of the royalties to him. The publisher never kept his word, and Seeger didnt find out until much later that Linda wasn't paid the royalties. It was a different time, and artists were much more nieve.

[2Margaritaz]

@gandalfpres Sadly the Weavers (or at least their recording and publishing companies) paid the composer & his family nothing at all, although the group did try to arrange some small payment (much less than $4,000). The family received nothing until the 1980s and only received reasonably fair payment in 2006.

[martenandrew]

yeah, by the tokens. first it was called mbube by solomon linda, then edited by the weavers, then lyrics were put in by the tokens, and then many covers where made of the final one

[sidh05]

Yes, this is 1951, the lyrics were added in 57, with a new title: The lion sleeps tonight. Wimoweh is a mis pronounciation of the Zulu "Uyimbube", meaning You're a lion. The first title was Mbube, meaning the lion, writtren by Solomon Linda in 1939, referring to the Zulu culture, and the Zulu leader Shaka nicknamed the lion, it had nothing to do with a lion. It is only since 1951 that the song refers truly to a lion, and only since 1957 that it is truly referring to a lion who sleeps.

[edith6363]

so the lyrics were added later?

[noebodynose]

It seems that everybody is a victim these days.