Working on It

Snow Day

Not only have I begun to feel Spring in my bones, I have also begun to see it on the trees. Tell tale white flowers forming on the pear tree in the back yard, the slightly perceptible pink just beginning to bud on the peach tree.

And then today, Mother Nature's last hurrah. The raised bed garden, almost finished, rests silently under a blue tarp. The signs of my work lay as remnants in the yard. Scaffolding lay dormant on the porch, springtime painting only just begun.

















This is the first snow in 9 years, and the heaviest snow since the early or mid 1990's.










All is silent. The tools and the work lay quietly for the day. This is winter's final moment. Inhale, exhale, then greet the Spring.

Weather Report: February 10

WEATHER REPORT: FEBRUARY 10

I walk downtown, wearing a good many of the clothes I own, keeping my head down and breathing through several thicknesses of a wool scarf. A day so cold it hurts to breath; dry enough to freeze spit. Kids crack it on the sidewalk.

Walking with care, snow barely covering the patches of ice, I begin to recall a canticle or a psalm - I can't remember which - and my body keeps time:

Cold and chill, bless the Lord
Dew and rain, bless the Lord
Frost and chill, bless the Lord
Ice and snow, bless the Lord
Nights and days, bless the Lord
Light and darkness, bless the lord

Another line comes to mind: "at the breath of God's mouth the waters flow." Spring seems far off, impossible, but it is coming. Already there is dusk instead of darkness at five in the afternoon; already hope is stirring at the edges of the day.

Written by Kathleen Norris
From the book Dakota: A Spiritual Geography

Working on it

How To Build a Banjo

1. Plant a tree. I prefer black walnut.







2. When the tree has grown to just the right height and circumference (approximately 80 years), it is time to begin.



3. Look at the tree. Try to visualize the banjo within the tree.



4. With a chisel, remove the parts of the tree that are not a part of the banjo. For your safety, you may consider laying the tree on it's side before carving.








And that's all there is to building your very own banjo. Enjoy.










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White House Blues 1932

For some reason I awoke this morning humming the 1932 version of White House Blues :

"Got up this morning, all I could see

Was cornbread and gravy just a-waitin' for me

And now he's gone, I'm glad he's gone"

Christmas Tree / Last leaves of the New Year

It is December 27th. It is 75 degrees outside. The sun is shining brightly, but dark gray clouds are moving in from the east. The wind is up and even though it is almost the end of December, it feels like early spring.

I am at my day job at the moment. As I write this in my notebook (I usually keep a notebook handy, even when I'm away from the shop), I notice a crow take flight from one corner of the building where I work, to land on the roof of the bank building across the street. The sun throws an elongated shadow of the crow across the pitch of the bank building roof as the bird walks back and forth across the roofs length.

Christmas was especially nice this year. The rotten economy has effected us all, so gifts were thinner this year, but it seemed like we got closer to the core of what Christmas is about. To amend a popular saying, 'it's the thoughtfulness that counts,' and it's family that counts.

And now, as a new year approaches, so does a new life. My workplace will be closing permanently in a couple of weeks, and I will be without a steady job.

And that has given me an opportunity to pursue my dream of becoming a luthier full time. You only have one life, might as well try to do something rewarding with it, right? An old friend once told me that all major life choices were decided by either faith or fear, so let's hear it for faith. Lou Reed said that you've got to have a busload of faith to get by. Lou never did have the cheeriest outlook on life, though.

So, if all goes well, I will be spending my time in the shop building banjos, maybe book arts tools. I'm also open to other projects if anybody needs anything...but the wood is calling, and I must follow.

The one thing about my workplace that I will miss is a small maple tree planted on the sidewalk just outside the front window. Beautiful, caged in cement. It is unnatural that such a thing be caged like that. The tree's lifespan is the lifespan of the building. Depressing.

Nevertheless, I spent many pleasant moments gazing out of the window at that maple. I've watched that Maple since it was four years old, I believe. We've marked ten seasons together. Ten years of flaming red autumns and bright green springs.

About three years ago I planted a maple tree of my own in a wooded area on the family property. I cleaned out an area that was overgrown with nambina bushes covered with a soft blanket of kudzu. The tree is planted in a valley just across the street from our house, and is not visible without peering down into the valley from the road. As time moves on, I expect to see the top of the tree peer from the valley as it slowly but surely makes its way toward the sun. Even in its youth it is a majestic tree.

If you've been reading this blog for awhile, then you know that I am a man who loves symbols and ritual, so it would be no surprise to discover that the olive tree is one of my favorite trees. Beautiful, varied, and arguably the most significant tree in history. Mentioned in the Odyssey by Homer, written about numerous times in the bible and the Koran, painted by Vincent Van Gogh. Brought to America in the 17th century, the olive tree is a symbol of abundance, glory, peace and purification. Thomas Jefferson once said that "the olive tree is...the richest gift of heaven." And it was an olive branch that the dove brought to Noah as a sign that the flood waters were receding.

For Christmas I received three gifts from Amy based on new beginnings for 2009. The first a *black walnut tree, that I may live long enough to cut it down and use the lumber. The second, seeds for our vegetable garden from Seeds of Change, and finally, a Lucca olive tree, a symbol of hope, prosperity and purity for my new venture. I hope that, like Noah's dove, this simple olive tree is a sign that I will soon gain solid footing on dry land.

Just recently I painted the shop. I only got the base coat on before it turned too cold to paint, and then too wet, but it's a start. And now that the shop has a fresh coat of white paint, it resembles a little country church, to me anyway. And that is just as it should be; there are ghosts in there.

So, I planted my Lucca in front of the shop window. The tree is only 4 feet tall, so, from inside the shop, I have to consciously peer over the window sill to see the tree, and even then I can only see the top.

But, like the maple caged by sidewalk, I hope to spend many peaceful moments watching the Lucca tree grow, and I hope to grow with it.

And I hope to take care of my olive tree just as I build banjos. The Lucca tree will be a reminder to concentrate carefully, listen thoughtfully, and work peacefully and diligently.

And as the olive tree instills hope in me, it is a reminder to instill hope in others. I guess if I had a New Years resolution, that's what it would be, to try to be a vehicle of hope.

So...wish me luck, and think good thoughts, they will be felt and appreciated. I am fortunate to have someone in my life who has enough faith in me to entrust me with an olive tree. It is a big responsibility.






If I can find my copy, I hope to start posting The Man who Planted Trees by Jean Giono soon. One of my favorite short stories.


*this gift was based on something I wrote for Amy several months ago entitled "how to build a banjo." I never intended to post it, but since it came up, I'll try to include it in a post within the week.

Merry Christmas

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Here's wishing everyone a happy holiday and a peaceful New Year.





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Sun is Gonna Shine (slight return)

A quick follow up to the March 14th 2008 post, "The Sun is Gonna Shine."

TUSCALOOSA STREET TO BE NAMED
FOR "QUEEN OF THE BLUES"
DINAH WASHINGTON

The Alabama Blues Project is very happy that Dinah Washington, known as the "Queen of the Blues", will now have a street named for her in her hometown of Tuscaloosa. The Tuscaloosa City Council renamed 30th Avenue between 15th Street and Kaulton Park as Dinah Washington Avenue.

Reflections

It's hard for me to pin down exactly what it is that attracts me to "old-time" or "roots" music. It's like a multifaceted gem, place it between your fingers and it will sparkle in different areas depending on how you hold it to the light.








Roots music is history: It's American history, the peoples history, our ancestors history...dig back as far as you like.

One of my favorite tunes to play on the banjo is "Road to Boston," a song popular during the revolutionary war. Another favorite is "If You Miss Me at the Back Of the Bus."

"If you miss me at the back of the bus
And you can't find me nowhere
Come on up to the front of the bus
I'll be riding up there"

Old-time songs keep history alive. They inform us and teach us, and we are the better for it.












And the old songs give me a certain, indescribable feeling, like a connection of sorts, a bond. It feels like the earth, the dirt. It's beautiful and dangerous and very, very real. Listen to "Little Bessie" by Roscoe Holcomb. If that doesn't hit you in the breadbasket nothing will.











I can't imagine what my world would be like without the song collectors, folk scholars and historians who collect, preserve and teach the music and stories of the past. People like Mike Seeger, who not only collects and preserves, but teaches as well, assuring that the music of the people will never be far from view for those who are willing to look for it. People like Alan Lomax, Art Rosenbaum, Joyce Cauthen, Cecil Sharp, John Cohen, Joe Bussard Jr., etc. These people handed us a gift. They are the ones who placed the multifaceted gem in our hands to do with as we please.










So, what do we do with it? Do we coddle it and protect it like a baby?

As Mike Seeger once said, "I feel like we're picking up this music from where it was left off, and we're going to carry it on. Some of us will warp it around a little and mix different elements together. And then some of us will write new tunes and songs based in tradition. That's the way tradition has always worked," and "young people all over the U.S. are picking up this kind of music now, and not only playing it well but...they're expanding on it."*


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So, this music, this gift, has been given to us without baggage, to do with as we please. We can keep it to ourselves, preserving the music as one would bones in a museum, or we can let the music live and breath, continuing the tradition of integrating cultures and experiences into the music. We can think of the gem as something to be taken out and played with, not hidden.

That, I believe, is where the jewel will sparkle.

I'll leave with a quote from Alice Gerard: "It's not just a question of keeping the music alive but integrating it into our own lives, and it's having meaning alongside the way we live now."*








This post was inspired by Consumerism and Orthodoxy in old-time written by Cathy Moore on the Banjo Meets World blog.

*from the film Homemade American Music by Yasha Aginsky