Singer, songwriter and campaigner, Pete Seeger, 94

PETE SEEGER, the banjopicking troubadour who sang for migrant workers, college students and presidents has died at the age of 94.

Just three years ago Seeger walked through the streets of Manhattan leading an Occupy Wall Street protest.

Though he would later admit the attention embarrassed him, the moment brought back m a ny feelings and memories as he instructed yet another generation of young people how to effect change through song and determination.

President Barack Obama said Seeger used his voice to strike blows for workers’ and civil rights, world peace and environmental conservation.

With The Weavers, a quartet organized in 1948, Seeger helped set the stage for a national folk revival.

The group — Seeger, Lee Hays, Ronnie Gilbert and Fred Hellerman — churned out hit recordings of Goodnight Irene, Tzena Tzena and On Top of Old Smokey.

Seeger also was credited with popularising We Shall Overcome, which he printed in his publication People’s Song in 1948.

He later said his only contribution to the anthem of the civil rights movement was changing the second word from will to shall.

His musical career was always braided tightly with his political activism, in which he advocated for causes ranging from civil rights to the clean-up of his beloved Hudson River.

Seeger said he left the Communist Party around 1950 and later renounced it, but the association dogged him for years.

He wa s ke p t o ff commercial television for more than a decade after tangling with the House of Representatives UnAmerican Activities Committee in 1955.

Repeatedly pressed by the committee to reveal whether he had sung for Communists, Seeger responded: “I love my country very dearly, and I greatly resent this implication that some of the places that I have sung and some of the people that I have known, and some of my opinions, whether they are religious or philosophical, or I might be a vegetarian, make me any less of an American.”

Pete seeger.