Holly Near to Receive Harvey B. Milk Lifetime Achievement Award
- Ron deHarte
- Apr 1
- 3 min read
The Harvey Milk Diversity Breakfast coalition is proud to announce that Holly Near will be honored with the Harvey B. Milk Lifetime Achievement Award. The Harvey Milk Diversity Breakfast will take place at the Palm Springs Convention Center on Thursday, May 8, 2024 at 8:30 AM, for coffee and networking and 9:00 AM for the breakfast and program.
Proceeds benefit LGBTQ+ programs in the Coachella Valley, and After 50 years of bold work, Holly Near is still one of the most consistent and well-informed voices for change. Her work is loving, challenging, funny, thought provoking, and remains rooted in the global community. As an outspoken singer and ambassador for peace, Holly brings a unique integration of world consciousness and self-evaluation, always growing and sharing experience humbly and boldly.
learning to sign along with recordings of some of the world’s great singers. After graduating high school, Holly attended UCLA but her academic journey ended after just a few months when she was spotted by agents and drawn into the world of film and television. She did guest spots on TV shows like The Partridge Family, Room 222, All in the Family, and played supporting roles in films like John Cassavetes’ Minnie and Moskowitz and George Roy Hill’s Slaughterhouse-Five.
She moved to New York and performed for a short run in Hair on Broadway, but soon turned to singing full time, as a soloist as well as sharing the stage with her sisters Laurel and Timothy. Throughout her career, she has enjoyed collaborations with such artists as Mercedes Sosa, Ronnie Gilbert, IntiIllimani, Emma’s Revolution, and her long-time songwriting partner, the late Jeff Langley.
In her early twenties, Near traveled with the Free The Army Show and the Indochina Peace Campaign; an experience that enabled her to learn about the function and consequences of the military industrial complex. While on the FTA tour in 1971, Holly was first introduced to the concept of global feminism.
By 1974, she was crossing paths and sharing songs with the wave of new lesbian feminist performers such as Meg Christian, Cris Williamson, Linda Tillery, Mary Watkins, and Alive! Near dove into the feminist movement, trying to understand the depth of sexism and homophobia by turning those lessons into song.
Holly is known for the anthem quality of some of her songs. As a songwriter, she takes up the challenge of turning big concepts into small, personal stories. In response to the slaughter of the students at Kent State, she wrote It Could Have Been Me. And following the assassinations of Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk in San Francisco, she penned Singing For Our Lives, which has become an anthem for the LGBTQ+ community and appears in the Unitarian Church hymnal. The chilling disappearance of people in Chile under the Pinochet dictatorship brought forth Hay Una Mujer Desaparecida to commemorate the women who had “been disappeared.”
In 2019, Near began a website project called Because of a Song, an online historic archive that documents some of the influential artists that rose from the feminist lesbian music scene in Oakland, California. The site can be viewed at www.becauseofasong.com.
A recipient of dozens of awards from organizations such as the ACLU and the National Organization of Women, Holly was one of Ms Magazine’s Women of the Year recipients and has been nominated for a Grammy Award as well as the Legends of Women’s Music Award.
Toni Atkins who served as the 51st president pro tempore of the California State Senate from 2018 to 2024 will also be honored, as she will receive the Harvey Milk Leadership Award.
The breakfast honors the memory of Harvey Milk, the first openly gay elected official in California, and his legacy of groundbreaking inspiration in the struggle to achieve lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender equality. On Thursday, May 8, we will join equality movements around the globe to celebrate the life story, message, and legacy of Harvey Milk. Together we will showcase the diversity of our community and celebrate his message of hope, civic-mindedness, and community.
The event is designed to strengthen coalitions among the many diverse community organizations that work toward equality in the Coachella Valley.
Tickets are available online www.HarveyMilk.us.
Co-sponsor tables of eight are available from $750 to $2,500. Tables of eight may be donated for students for $750.00. Individual tickets are available for just $95.00. This event is accessible for all persons with hearing and mobility impairments.
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