Woody Guthrie

Overview

Woody Guthrie was a 20th-century musician and writer whose songs and stories about the American experience have come to define the country's folk music, identity, and mythology. Guthrie was born in Oklahoma in 1912 but moved to Texas in 1929. It was there that he experienced firsthand the Dust Bowl, the catastrophic ecological and economic disaster, and began writing songs about it.

Throughout the '30s, Guthrie became a significant political voice for migrants in California, penning a popular newspaper column, "Woody Sez." In 1940, he wrote the song "This Land Is Your Land" and recorded "Dust Bowl Ballads," a concept album about the migrant experience.

Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Joe Strummer, and many other songwriters cite Guthrie as a major influence. He was posthumously inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.

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