Album Review: Peg Millet's Clear Horizon

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It's strange to me that we celebrate Earth Day once a year.  Shouldn't every day be Earth Day?  This planet is, after all, the reason we are able to have days to celebrate. Of course, I understand the situation: we live in a very complex civilization full of daily intricacies, from getting to work on time, to feeding ourselves, and so on and so on. Who has time to contemplate nature? Is it really that important personally?

Peg Millet  can tell you. Peg is a local environmental activist and musician; last Saturday, I listened to a CD she released some 13 years ago, “Clear Horizon.”  As viable today as it was then, it will be hard for me to express the transforming nature of this album, but I will try. 

When the first song started I realized that this was going to be different than most of the music I listen to. A beautiful, clear voice streams from the speakers into the room, painting pictures of the land - not as the stationary space between home and anywhere else I go, but as a living, breathing, and conscious being. Peg Millet sings without accompaniment, so there is absolutely nothing to distract the listener from each impassioned story she tells. Her voice urges me to look at the world from a different perspective, to listen to voices that are rarely heard. 

By the third song, “The Last Leviathan,” about the last great whale, I was (unexpectedly) in tears. Peg's ability to communicate vocally the suffering and intimate experiences of those creatures, people, and places that are not given opportunity in normal life moved me deeply. It's strange how your emotions affect you when you open yourself to ideas and experiences everyday existence doesn't usually allow for, at least my everyday life.

Most of the material on the album is written by fellow nature-loving, environmentally active people. Many of the songs deal with shamanism and nature-oriented spirituality. Some, like “He Looked a Lot Like Jesus,” are obviously about actual events that occurred in the life of an activist, including the not-so-glamorous time spent in jail as a result of working for what you believe in. This puts me in mind of many known social reformers. It takes strength to stand up for what you know is right, especially if the “authorities” disagree with you. Clarity and deep conviction create the necessary inspiration to lead this kind of life. Peg's amazing voice is her testimony to her work; every one of her songs could be an anthem for preserving the beauty and sacredness of our planet.

As a musician myself, I was overwhelmed with the realization that Peg Millet uses her talent not only to express herself, but to do good in the world. I see in her work the potential to transform awareness and build a deeper relationship with our environment. Ah, the power of music! 

Personally, it reminds me of the days I have spent in the forests just outside of town, walking, watching the streams swell and singing to the stones. I wonder why I haven't done that lately? Because I let myself grow distant...  Peg Millet has an emotional way of intimately engaging the listener with nature, and she inspired me to get out there and appreciate. 

Peg has chosen melodies that haunt the heart, call us back to our own heritage and ask us to use our intuition to look into the future and behold the ideas that spread light. To quote a song she sings by Jay Mankita, “We are living on a living planet, circling a living star.”  After having spent time listening to this beautiful tribute to nature,  I am so excited to get to the source of the inspiration myself, to go out to the woods and spend time with the land to re-experience how much it has to show me. 

I can't tell you what event, or what circumstances will bring you face to face with Nature. But I can stress the importance of this experience. Only when you see it, can you appreciate it. Only when you appreciate it, can you work to heal the planet and the people.  That is what activism is.

Happy Earth Day!! 

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