AT THE age of 85 and with a lifetime of singing and campaigning for progressive causes, Peggy Seeger has just released her latest album and it has been described as “probably” her final one.

Yet the songs and the themes explored in First Farewell demonstrate that she is as committed as ever to using music to express both life and hope in these particularly challenging times.

Composed of entirely new songs and with support from sons Calum and Neill MacColl and daughter-in-law Kate St John, the album reflects on growing older as well as developing further concerns such as peace, the environment and feminism that Seeger has had throughout her career.

In parts both witty and melancholy, the album is a celebration of life and ageing but also a battle cry against the injustice that still permeates the planet.

The Invisible Woman explores themes of women’s oppression that Seeger has often written about in previous songs but, with the emphasis on growing older, “we may not have a choice but we still have a voice. The invisible gals love a fight.”

Political themes are to the fore in Lubrication, a commentary on fracking, and Lullabies for Strangers explores the experience of migrant women workers caring for other people’s children but unable to sing for and comfort their own.

How I Long for Peace speaks to the struggle to end war, a commitment she shared with her late husband Ewan MacColl, and it raises the question of why sisters, wives and mothers cannot stop the slaughter.

For Seeger, doing nothing is not an option — stage disruptions to make the whole world listen.

Her humanity is to the fore in One of Those Beautiful Boys, about young male depression, and themes of growing old are explored on All in the Mind and The Puzzle.

But the album ends on a cheerful note with Gotta Get Home by Midnight, where the ageing process change as the day progresses — we get younger by the hour as we become aware of what the day’s possibilities are.

If this is indeed to be Seeger’s last solo venture into the recording studio, the hope remains that what is billed as “probably” the last solo album might turn out to be “but not necessarily.”

First Farewell is released on Red Grape Music.