Play Your Guitars, American Friends

Annotation

What Now People? Volume 1 (Paredon Records # P-2001), released on the label founded by Barbara Dane and Irwin Silber in 1969, whose objective was to "seek out the music and speech, documentary or dialogue, that spring from the conscious artist who relates to people's movements, and which pour from all people in struggle".1 This record label released several albums either about the Vietnam War or that contained a Vietnam War song, which are discussed on this list. See the note below. Also note that in 1969 Dane and Sliber published the book "The Vietnam Song Book" which included the notation and lyrics of one hundred anti-war songs collected from around the world. This album contained four songs that dealt with Vietnam War issues. These are "It Could Have Been Me" by Holly Near about the Kent State, Ohio demonstration, which also appeared on her LP A Live Album (see the sub-list); Oscar Brand's "A Very Nice Country" about Americans living in Canada in exile (because of draft avoidance and opposition to the war); "Ballad of the Unknown Soldier" by Barbara Dane. Finally, it included the song "Play Your Guitars, American Friends" by Alfonso Ray Riate, a Vietnam veteran who had been a P.O.W. Dane wrote in the record booklet that: "I first heard Al Riate sing as he stood with two other former POWs on the platform of a rally for amnesty in Washington, D.C. He was simply glowing with the joy of finally being there....I immediately asked him if he would record one of the Vietnamese songs...Al...confirmed the fact that far more fellow POWs felt as they did than identified with the officers who had kept themselves apart in sour disdain of the Vietnamese, with their sights on their future military careers".2 Riate was born on 29 April 1945 in Sebastopol, California, USA, and died on 28 November 1984, in Lynwood, CA, USA. He joined the US Marine Corps in December 1964 at the age of 19. His father came from the Philipines, and his mother was a Native American from California. The army reported Riate M.I.A. on 26 April 1967 following a battle in Quang Tri Province in the vicinity of Hill 861. On 12 July 1967 he was reported K.I.A., but body not recovered (B.N.R.). A memorial plaque erected says: "1945-1967". However, the army eventually reported that he was in fact a P.O.W. He returned to the US on 16 March 1973.3 The army charged Riate for collaborating with the enemy, but the charges were dropped in 1973.4 Composed in Hanoi in December 1969 by Phạm Tuyên, a well-known North Vietnamese songwriter, about an anti-war demonstration in the US, which became popular across North Vietnam.5 It started out with an English spoken-word introduction from Riate, who told the listener that he had served "six years as an American prisoner of war in Vietnam". He then recited the song in Vietnamese, which took an anti-war, peace perspective, calling on Americans to march and play songs of protest against US intervention in Vietnam.Sources1What Now People, Vol. 1 - Paredon 2001↩2What Now People, Vol. 1 - Paredon 2001↩3Find a Grave↩4Chicago Tribune, 3 July 1973, p. 1: "Army set to drop POW case"↩5Wikipedia: Phạm Tuyên↩

Annotation by Justin A. Brummer

Lyrics

English: My name is Alfonso Ray Riate, I have served six years as an American prisoner of war in Vietnam / During my time in captivity I have learned to sing several songs in Vietnamese / I am going to sing that was made for the American people in the year of 1971 about the American people who are working for peace and to resolve the war in Vietnam... / Today in Washington the fire of struggle is burning, people everywhere can here your songs and the truth shines through brightly / The Potomac River has reflected your beautiful image by day and by night, playing your guitars and singing out loud / You march for life, play your guitars my friends... / Let us sing the ballad of commitment, the Ballad of Ho Chi Minh! / Have you heard that the whole United States is standing up with you? / The church bells are ringing with compassion...have you heard that Vietnam is also on the move / Holding back the hands of the murderers, defending the peace? / Play your guitars...to the tempo of the gunfire in South Vietnam / March American people...in the struggle for peace, to destroy aggressive war, let us sing the ballad

About the artist

Alfonso Ray Riate (1945-1984), born in Sebastopol, California to a Filipino father and Karuk mother, was a US Marine captured in Quang Tri Province in 1967 and held POW until 1973, becoming a member of the antiwar 'Peace Committee' of captured servicemen; he wrote 'Play Your Guitars, American Friends' in captivity and recorded it for the compilation 'What Now, People?' on Barbara Dane's Paredon Records (1975). He died in Lynwood, California in 1984. [Source: Wilber & Lembcke, 'Dissenting POWs' (Monthly Review Press); POW Network]

Themes

Anti-War · P.O.W. · Military

In collections

P.O.W. / M.I.A. Songs · Peace, Protest, & Anti-War Songs [War Years] · US Military & Veteran Songs