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The Gram Partisans

The Gram Partisans are a Vancouver (BC, Canada) based roots folk group whose music combines our collective respect for many diverse musical traditions with our beliefs in hope, integrity, justice and a long memory. We play mostly original songs that tell stories of courage, trust, imagination, and solidarity. We seek to challenge your views of what music rooted in social justice can sound and feel like.

"In the city of Vancouver I did a wonderful gig with the brilliant local band, the Gram Partisans, and the Solidarity Notes choir....." - David Rovics

Follow us on Facebook ~ Contact the Gram Partisans by email.

The current line-up of the Gram Partisans is:
William (Bill) Hood - vocals and guitar
Georgina Arntzen - vocals and mandolin
Jack MacDermot - fiddle and  vocals
Alan Zisman - accordion and piano
Michel Drouin - bass and vocals

News:

2025:


MayDay 2025
 David Rovics Apr 27
 May 3rd GPs et al

  • Jan 15, 7:30 pm -  The Gram Partisans performed a short feature as part of the Vancouver Folk Song Society's Social Justice theme night; this performance will be live at the Friends' Meeting Hall, 1090 W 70th, Vancouver - video of the full set

  • April 26, 2-4 pm: The Gram Partisans performed, unplugged, at the Mayday Social Justice Info Fair at Grandview Park, Commercial Drive (at Charles)

  • April 27, 3-5 (doors at 2.30) - The Gram Partisans opened for Portland political singer-songwriter David Rovics - - 411 Seniors Centre, 3502 Fraser (at 19th) Profits will be donated to the Secwepemc Land Defense Legal Funds
  • May 3, 2-4 pm - The Gram Partisans, along with the Left Coast Labour Chorus, re:Sisters and Fraser Union played at a MayDay benefit for Radisson Blu hotel workers, victorious after Canada's longest strike - 411 Seniors Centre, 3502 Fraser (at 19th). Most of the set can be viewed on YouTube.

  • May 15, 7.30-9 pm - The Gram Partisans will be the feature act at the Steveston Folk Guild, Chinese Bunkhouse, Britannia Shipyard, 5180 Westwater Drive, Steveston (Richmond)

  • Sept 27 7.30-10 pm - The Gram Partisans will be the feature act at Renfrew Rhythms coffee house at Frog Hollow Neighbourhood House: 2131 Renfrew Street (corner of 5th Avenue)

Apr 20 Book Launch2024 at Beats 




2024 MaydayRovics 		2024:
  • Jan 14, 1.15 pm - Four of The Gram Partisans performed two songs at a fundraiser for Gaza at Tamam Restaurant, 2616 E Hastings, Vancouver
  • Feb 16, 2 pm - The Gram Partisans performed at a Valentine's Party at Britannia Community Centre . Video of the set is on YouTube.
  • Feb 23, 7.30 pm - The Gram Partisans performed at Port Coquitllam's Crossroads Hospice coffee house. Video of the first 6 tunes of the set is on YouTube
  • Feb 28, 5.30 - The Gram Partisans performed at a fundraiser for COPE at the Pink Pearl Chinese Restaurant: 1132 E Hastings, Vancouver
  • April 20, 6 pm - The Gram Partisans performed at the launch of GP's bassist Michel Drouin's book Past the End of the Road: A North Island Boyhood at the Maritime Labour Centre, 1880 Triumph Street, Vancouver
  • May 1 - The BC Labour Heritage Centre posted a labour history podcast on the 1966 Lenkurt Electric strike, featuring a song written about the event by Bill Hood and performed by the Gram Partisans
  • May 4, 2 pm - The Gram Partisans performed at the Mayday Social Justice Info Fair at Grandview Park
  • May 18, 2.30-5 pm - The Gram Partisans opened for Portland singer-songwriter David Rovics, 411 Seniors Centre, 3502 Fraser (at 19th)
  • Sept 27, 7.30 - The Gram Partisans will be the feature act at the Beats on Broadway coffee house: 411 Seniors Centre, 3502 Fraser (at 19th)
  • Dec 11 - The BC Labour Heritage Centre posted a 32 minute labour history podcast on the 1976 Kitimat Alcan Wildcat Strike, featuring the original song, 'Something Good Worth Fighting For' written by Bill Hood and performed by the Gram Partisans - hear just the song







Beats on Broadway

Spartacus event
 MayDay 2023

Labour for Palesine
2023:
  • The Gram Partisans were the feature act at the Beats of Broadway coffee house: Friday Apr 28, 7.0 pm 800 East Broadway (Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House) - info: 605-874-1256

  • The Gram Partisans performed unplugged outdoors at Grandview Park as part of the Vancouver May Day Social Justice Info Fair, Sunday Apr 30.

  • The Gram Partisans performed outdoors at MacLean Park as part of the 2023 MacLean Park Music series on Sunday, July 9
  • The Gram Partisans performed at Spartacus Books' 50th Anniversary Celebtration at 648 Kingsway (near Fraser) on Saturday, November 25

  • Bill, Michel, and Alan performed Bob Rosen's original tune The Ballad of Rachel Corey at the meeting Labour in Solidarity with Palestine, November 29. Click on the links for video of the song and the full meeting.



Gram P's 20222022:

Welcome new Gram Partisans bass player - Michel Drouin

The Gram Partisans performed on Nov 25 as the feature set at Unplugged at the Crossroads Hospice Coffeehouse, Mabbett Hall, Port Coquitlam Community Centre, 2150 Wilson Avenue, Port Coquitlam.

The set was filmed and can be viewed here....





2021:


 September 19, 2021, 2 pm: The Gram Partisans played a set outdoors at Vancouver's MacLean Park, opening for The Hot Mammas and The Tumbleweeds. Much of the set can be viewed here as part of the 2021 Virtual Accordion Noir Festival. The set was filmed and posted by the Accordion Noir Festival and can be viewed as tracks 34-42 of their YouTube playlist.

July 27, 2021: The Gram Partisans recorded Ginger Goodwin: Ain't No Way/El Pueblo Unido, to mark the BC socialist/labour & antiwar activist on Ginger Goodwin Day.

July 5, 2021: Vancouver's The Gram Partisans recorded Empty Pairs of Shoes, words and music by William Hood. The Gram Partisans are William Hood (vocals, guitar), Georgina Arntzen (vocals, mandolin), Jack MacDermot (fiddle), Alan Zisman (accordion). The song was written following the rediscovery of 215 unmarked graves of indigenous children on the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia, and the creation of a memorial by Haida artist Tamara Bell. More information: https://thetyee.ca/News/2021/06/02/Shoes-Activists-Create-Symbol-of-Mourning-Residential-Schools/

May 2, 2021: The Gram Partisans recorded Bill Hood original Anne Feeney - Union Made, a tribute to political folk singer Anne Feeney, who died Feb 3 2021.

The Gram Partisans recorded a pair of tunes associated with John Prine as part of a group of Vancouver musicians and bands marking the anniversary of Prine's death by COVID, April 7 2020. See: Unwed Fathers and That's the Way That Every Empire Falls (written by RB Morris). Additional words and music for each tune are by Partisan Bill Hood.

2020:

June 19: The Gram Partisans played outside at Vancouver's MacLean Park 

April 9: Cancelled - House Concert in Support of Unist'ot'en Legal Fund - The Gram Partisans & The Re:Sisters sing in Solidarity

2019:

MacLean ParkMay 7: Anti-pipeline benefit at St James Hall (W 10th & Trutch)

March 10: Clinton Park Celebration - 2nd Ave and Slocan

March 9: Fundraiser - Taking a Stand to Protect the Land - Sutikalh & Ulluisc at Notional Space, 1523 E Pender

2017:

October 6: 6-11 pm: Pre-Hallowe’en Party: featuring Geoff Berner & The Gram Partisans - fundraiser for Jean Swansen's campaign for Vancouver City Council - Selecter's Records, 8 E. Pender

July 4th: Feature act at the Jericho Folk Club

June 29: Opener for Albuquerque's Eileen & the In-Betweens at Spartacus Books

June 10: Just Voices:Union Made concert at the Russian Hall

May 29:, Fundraiser for Ulluilsc and Sutikalh, Grandview Calvary Baptist Church, 1803 E 1st Ave, Vancouver

March 16: Celebration of 10 years of the Vancouver Squeezebox Circle, at Spartacus Books.

February 18: Cleansing the Waters, a benefit house concert in support of the First Nations, the Musgamagw Dzawada'enuxw, on western Vancouver Island who are opposing the fish farms in their territory.

2016:

GPs 2017Oct 2: Opening act for Toronto punk-poet Rob Moir - Spartacus Books

April 23: Workers' Celebration: Gram Partisans, Left Coast Labour Chorus, Cosmic Wink, Fraser Union, Re-Sisters, and more. WISE Hall

April 13: Feature act at Heartwood Community Cafe

January 28: Resistance Cabaret III - a fundraiser for the Madii'Lii anti-pipeline First Nations encampment - Cafe Deux Soleils

2015:

December 18: Opened for Illiteratty at Deep Cove Coffee House. 3 songs from that performance are online: Bells of Harlem, Better Times Will Come, Song of the Birds

July 23: Fundraiser for Voice for the Voiceless action camp, Spartacus Books

June 12: Anti-Capitalist Music Show - a fundraiser for the Vancouver IWW - Toast Collective

January 21: Opened for David Rovics - a fund-raiser for the Unist'ot'en Action Camp, Spartacus Books. Partisans and Rovics sets are online.

2014:
Picket line w. dog - Video of the Gram Partisans performing These Schools Are Your Schools at Vancouver's Chief Maquinna Elementary picket line, September 16 2014, the day the tentative settlement was announced. Thanks to Dora Kwok for filming and posting online.

- BC Teachers' Picket Line Songs -  Two songs written by Gram Partisan member Bill Hood for the 2014 BC teachers' strike. Recorded by Simon Kendall (Thanks Simon!) All proceeds from these recordings  donated to the union strike fund.

- Video clips of the Gram Partisans playing on teacher picket lines, June 2014 (including at the VESTA study session at the Orpheum, June 16) and at the June 10 teacher rally.

- Video clips of the Gram Partisans at the 2014 VDLC May Day rally: I Still Can Hear Him Now and The Internationale		 Orpheum teacher rally

Gram Partisan founder, vocalist, and guitar player Bob Rosen died November 22, 2011. Read his obituary and leave a comment and watch video of his memorial.

Bob Rosen
 The Gram Partisan's 2011 recording, You Will Not Stand Alone, can be listened to online and purchased as a (on sale for $10) digital download. To purchase a physical CD ($15 + $2 postage), email the band. You can also hear the entire CD as a YouTube playlist

CD cover

More:

Old Photo
Former members (and still Partisans in our hearts):

- Bob Rosen - guitar and vocals (2004-2011)
- Steve Quattrocchi - mandolin and banjo (2008)
- Ted McNenny - lead guitar and dobro (through Fall 2007)
- Wahl - mandolin (through Fall 2006)
- Annie Bailey - bass (through Winter 2008) - Annie died in 2023. Here's an online obituary and a poster for her memorial
- Peter Bazovsky - violin (2010- 2012)
- Phil Wallace - bass (2011 - Fall 2014)
- David Anderson - bass (various times through 2018); David died in 2018 - here's a 4 minute video from his memorial.
- Caitlan Read - fiddle (2014-2018)
- Joni Miller - bass (2018-2019)
- Tom Arntzen - bass (2021)


- photo by Eric Wong

Cartoon

-- Sketch by Jim Easton from Feb 25 2013 performance at Marche Bakery

We acknowledge that we are meeting on the ancestral,
traditional and stolen territories of the Coast Salish peoples,
specifically the Musqueam, the Squamish, and the Tsleil
Waututh - who have continuously inhabited these territories for
at least five thousand years. We are grateful to have the
opportunity to live, work and raise our families and create
community on this land.

We also recognize that Canada was built on the attempted to
destruction of Indigenous Peoples and the theft of their land.
Stating a land acknowledgement is the first step in recognizing
our shared history with indigenous people, which is important
to the members of the Gram Partisans. We recognize the
ongoing marginalization of, and discrimination against, First
Nations peoples all across Canada, and we support the Truth
and Reconciliation process and we pledge our collective
efforts to resist the colonial heritage and practices within our
midst.