http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/13/_n_1880268.html
And that about wraps up our music discussion.
Next week we'll get back into hardcore canoe talk, including the rather complicated take-out situation on the Duck if we're going to try to put in where we left off in 2011.
Friday, September 14, 2012
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Bill Monroe and the Stomach Steinway
Look at that song list now! Fifty songs and counting and most of them river tested. Which doesn't even count about two dozen more Dylan songs we can play in our sleep or any spontaneous improv by Jack. We could be up to 100 by November and that's a canoe trip's worth for sure.
Also, for you bluegrass purists, check out the recording info on this record. Did you know the squeezebox was once a key instrument in Bill Monroe's band? Click to expand:
Also, for you bluegrass purists, check out the recording info on this record. Did you know the squeezebox was once a key instrument in Bill Monroe's band? Click to expand:
Turns out the accordion player was a genuine Blue Grass Boy in every way except one.
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
The Music Issue
People get ready. On this trip, the #1 consideration for every planning decision we make is going to be creating as much opportunity as possible for making music. It's something we've talked about doing before but we're going to follow through on the threat this Fall. If you want to get any sleep you better set up at the other end of the gravel bar.
Here are some of the steps we've taken to prepare so far:
1. We have procured heavy duty "Conductor" music stands, replacing those flimsy wire ones that collapse if you look at them wrong. We also got heavy duty music stand lights. No more headlamps blinding the washtub bass player when you cue him up for a solo.
2. All of the chords and tabs will be printed up in nice, neat three-ring binders. We'll avoid using that tiny todger font that is so hard to read at 2:00 in the morning.
3. We're keeping the mileage short to ensure maximum daylight and merrymaking on the gravel bar. Of course we'll be at Vernon's all Friday afternoon and night which will be prime jug band time as well.
4. Rob is so committed to this cause that he is taking a sabbatical from kitchen duty to concentrate on drinking, smoking and guitar picking.
5. Mr. Mister has been invited.
6. Bob is always invited, but this time he's bought a tent AND a boat so it's looking good this year. Dr. Sands is coming with his mandolin.
7. We actually practiced once - and might do it again, although it does require planning around a two day hangover.
What you can do to help:
A radio was shrieking out that synthesis of the old simple Anglo-Saxon music with Tin Pan Alley and electric amplification that is usually called hillbilly, but not around there. There it's just "music," and the neon-glaring tonks near the cities seem its most appropriate setting. If you're from that country, you usually have an unwilling affection for it, having listened to its evolution. Even twenty years ago it still retained a little of the old directness and innocence, but now the directness and the innocence have passed to not very direct and not very innocent people with guitars around places like Greenwich Village, and the country people take their music with heavier seasoning.
Goodbye to a River, p. 71.
Here are some of the steps we've taken to prepare so far:
1. We have procured heavy duty "Conductor" music stands, replacing those flimsy wire ones that collapse if you look at them wrong. We also got heavy duty music stand lights. No more headlamps blinding the washtub bass player when you cue him up for a solo.
2. All of the chords and tabs will be printed up in nice, neat three-ring binders. We'll avoid using that tiny todger font that is so hard to read at 2:00 in the morning.
3. We're keeping the mileage short to ensure maximum daylight and merrymaking on the gravel bar. Of course we'll be at Vernon's all Friday afternoon and night which will be prime jug band time as well.
4. Rob is so committed to this cause that he is taking a sabbatical from kitchen duty to concentrate on drinking, smoking and guitar picking.
5. Mr. Mister has been invited.
6. Bob is always invited, but this time he's bought a tent AND a boat so it's looking good this year. Dr. Sands is coming with his mandolin.
7. We actually practiced once - and might do it again, although it does require planning around a two day hangover.
What you can do to help:
- Join in - flex your golden pipes. We will have all the lyrics printed up for you.
- If you see a player with an empty cup, refill him.
- Learn an instrument yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYmK2EAVV5U
A radio was shrieking out that synthesis of the old simple Anglo-Saxon music with Tin Pan Alley and electric amplification that is usually called hillbilly, but not around there. There it's just "music," and the neon-glaring tonks near the cities seem its most appropriate setting. If you're from that country, you usually have an unwilling affection for it, having listened to its evolution. Even twenty years ago it still retained a little of the old directness and innocence, but now the directness and the innocence have passed to not very direct and not very innocent people with guitars around places like Greenwich Village, and the country people take their music with heavier seasoning.
Goodbye to a River, p. 71.
Monday, September 10, 2012
I Know What You Did Last Summer
So much to catch up on about the offseason that we'll have to do a full report at Brown's, but here are a few developments you should know about:
1. The john boat leaks have been repaired for real. The toothpaste and duct tape solution we MacGyvered on the Current River has been replaced with J.B. weld and epoxy. It may leak again, but it won't leak there.
2. The terminally wobbly kitchen grate that has been run over at one too many put-ins has been replaced with a brand new sturdy one. Kitchen guys: if one is good is two better? Now is the time because they are surprisingly hard to find and Bass Pro has them right now.
3. We lost a set of RRCC keys the size of your fist. That left the trailer locked to the hitch, the cargo lids locked shut, the key to Phil's warehouse is gone, not to mention the dozens of other keys that we won't remember what they go to until we're standing by a gate somewhere scratching our heads.
Josh solved the lock-out problem on the trailer with a circular blade Dremel tool and a twelve-pack. The way that thing cuts through padlocks is a sensual experience. If we just add a Honda generator to the packing list our river access problems will be gone forever ("if you're not trespassin' you're not tryin'"). And there's a barbed wire fence out on Big Swan Creek calling our name, too.
1. The john boat leaks have been repaired for real. The toothpaste and duct tape solution we MacGyvered on the Current River has been replaced with J.B. weld and epoxy. It may leak again, but it won't leak there.
2. The terminally wobbly kitchen grate that has been run over at one too many put-ins has been replaced with a brand new sturdy one. Kitchen guys: if one is good is two better? Now is the time because they are surprisingly hard to find and Bass Pro has them right now.
3. We lost a set of RRCC keys the size of your fist. That left the trailer locked to the hitch, the cargo lids locked shut, the key to Phil's warehouse is gone, not to mention the dozens of other keys that we won't remember what they go to until we're standing by a gate somewhere scratching our heads.
Josh solved the lock-out problem on the trailer with a circular blade Dremel tool and a twelve-pack. The way that thing cuts through padlocks is a sensual experience. If we just add a Honda generator to the packing list our river access problems will be gone forever ("if you're not trespassin' you're not tryin'"). And there's a barbed wire fence out on Big Swan Creek calling our name, too.
Friday, September 07, 2012
Where We're Going
The second question, the one that comes right after "Do we have a date for the next trip?" and just before "What's for dinner?" is always: "Which river?"
It doesn't hurt that this section of the Duck is barely an hour away - and just fifteen minutes from Vernon's plantation where we will stay on Friday night.
So the Fall trip will look just like this, plus or minus a few river bends:
As a reward for the long, hard trek to Missouri in the Spring, and to keep a vow we made to ourselves last Fall, we are going back to the Duck. The plan is to put in right where we took out at the end of the Fall trip, where we stood triumphantly in the field after everything was hauled up and loaded and declared that we were going to do the entire Duck River, one section at a time, before we die or the club dissolves, whatever comes first.
Take-Out 2011 = Put-In 2012
The Promise
It doesn't hurt that this section of the Duck is barely an hour away - and just fifteen minutes from Vernon's plantation where we will stay on Friday night.
So the Fall trip will look just like this, plus or minus a few river bends:
Thursday, September 06, 2012
Two Month Warning
The Fall 2012 trip will be November 2 - 4. That's fifty-seven days of meal planning, map gazing, knife sharpening, guitar stringing, Bob Dylan's new record release and multiple pre-trip-meetings. The only thing that could be better is the trip itself. Especially the beginning - when the boats are loaded and the gear's shined up and ready to go and and the whole river is still in front of you.
The philosopher store owner offered me fifteen dollars for the pup, and when I turned it down, he said he didn't blame me, and went out to commandeer a seat for me, regally, in a blue pickup truck that stopped to buy gas. The two men in it were brown, lean small-townsmen headed out to a deer lease, and made room cheerfully for me and the pup. They were talking about how they'd packed the eggs and whether the milk would keep without ice and such matters, the talk of women-tended men magnifying the maleness of a three or four-day expedition away from their women. I'd talked that way myself, often, but listened now feeling different from them. They let me out at the bridge, and good wishes flew both ways through the air.
Goodbye to a River, p. 81.
The philosopher store owner offered me fifteen dollars for the pup, and when I turned it down, he said he didn't blame me, and went out to commandeer a seat for me, regally, in a blue pickup truck that stopped to buy gas. The two men in it were brown, lean small-townsmen headed out to a deer lease, and made room cheerfully for me and the pup. They were talking about how they'd packed the eggs and whether the milk would keep without ice and such matters, the talk of women-tended men magnifying the maleness of a three or four-day expedition away from their women. I'd talked that way myself, often, but listened now feeling different from them. They let me out at the bridge, and good wishes flew both ways through the air.
Goodbye to a River, p. 81.
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