Song and Dance

The worst laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men Gang aft for the best.

Yesterday was Friday so I trekked up to Harrison for therapy. As I was getting ready to leave I went to the bathroom and discovered that cats left me three messes to clean up. I raced to clean them quickly and raced out of the house. I don’t know how people with children ever get anywhere on time. I proved fortunate, the bus I can take about half the distance to the train station came saving me the walk and some time so I was back on schedule. The bus didn’t make it to the stop, there was a big fire up ahead. Webster Ave was filled with smokes and fire trucks and more were racing to the scene. The bus let us off not far from the train station so I still had time even though I stopped to take a video of the fire. Somehow our brains that evolved over millions of years were pre-adapted to the invention of the smart phone.

It was an odd therapy session; the problem if you can call it that, was that I was feeling very good. I didn’t have my usual litany of anxieties and depressive episodes to discuss. There was an article in the New York Times this week by a woman who had cataract surgery and she said that it’s been shown that cataracts lead to depression and the surgery helps alleviate it. It’s one of those things that sounds reasonable but that doesn’t mean it’s true. Whatever the reasons I was feeling good; my only complaint was that I had no plans for the weekend. I was craving live music and socializing. My exciting plan for the evening was to buy milk on my way home.

My route home is a bit byzantine, bus to the MetroNorth station, train to Fordham, walk to the Fordham Road D train station, subway to Bedford Park Blvd. Then walk home. I just missed the D train and there was a long wait to the next. I took advantage of the Wi-Fi and looked at Instagram. Steph Jenkins posted a pic of cat playing banjo with the caption.

Kiddos! I’m playing some tunes at the Performing Arts Library a Lincoln Center! Legendary John Cohen will be showing “the High Lonesome Sound” on a 16 mm print! And yes there will be a square dance. Tonight (Friday) from 6:30 to 9:30 – and it’s free!!

It was 5:25 when I saw that. I crossed over to the downtown platform and took the next D train to Columbus Circle. I felt pressed for time but I wasn’t. I got there around 6:00. For dinner I got a hot sausage and French fries off a cart and was at the library at 6:15. There were other people waiting to get in. The door was locked. The Chapin Sisters arrived for sound check but they went around back where they let the artists in, or so we thought. Finally someone noticed that there was a small sign, off to the side, not on the door, saying that the banjo event was at the café entrance. There was no indication of where the café entrance was. I started talking to the new arrivals who found he sign, One looked familiar. I asked who she was and discovered it was a musician I know, Tara. I had met her at a Common Ground Coffeehouse event. We went in search of the café entrance. We finally found someone who knew and made it there. There was but one final hurdle. The even was free but ticketed. I did not have a ticket. I had to wait on the standby line. I wasn’t let in until 6:50; the music had started. It was not just Steph on banjo, she was joined by Stephanie Coleman was on fiddle and Eli Smith on guitar. I didn’t get a good seat, but it was a seat and could hear the great old-time music. Then came the films. I didn’t know it but it was billed as a banjo documentary film event. This puts it right in Steph’s (Jenkins not Coleman) wheelhouse as documentary film maker who plays banjo.

The first film was from 1946 and is a real period piece. It used the fake spontaneity that was popular then. It starts with Pete Seeger playing banjo and the narrator acting like he just happened to run across Pete sitting there. The revelation to me was he started by asking Pete, “What’s that strange looking guitar you are playing?” Pete then explained that it was a banjo and gave the instrument’s history. This was just at the start of the folk revival and they couldn’t assume that the audience would know what a banjo is! I find that difficult to wrap my head around. Much of the footage was filmed in 1942 but the project went on hiatus because of the war. It shows more traditional music centered around a performance by Woody Guthrie and his band. Woody was never named. He was just the guy singing and playing guitar. Woody was not famous.

The second film was the one Steph mentioned, John Cohen’s The High Lonesome Sound. John is a musician, musicologist, photographer, and documentarian. He was a founder of the New Lost City Ramblers. He was in the Village during the 1960 Folk Revival and photographed the young Bob Dylan among others. He put all this together and went down to Eastern Kentucky to record the music and life of impoverished Appalachia. The first I heard of Appalachia was in reference to its endemic poverty. This was coal mining country and even in 1962 it had long been in decline. The social aspects could have been made today. Out of work coal miners and those whose livelihood was serving the needs of the minors with no work but not wanting to leave their ancestral home. Their lives centered around religion and music. There is footage of baptism in the river and ecstatic devotion in the church. John, like me, was a Jewish kid from Queens though 25 years my senior. I wonder if this seemed as foreign to him as it does to me. I should have asked. There was a Q & A.

The music is the roots music that I know and love; what you hear on the Anthology of American Folk Music. The film could be a companion piece to the boxed set. The rest of their lives might seem foreign to me but their music touches my soul.

After the Q & A there was more music with Eli, Steph and Stephanie, (The Stephani as I call them) joined by John and the Chapin Sisters in a song swap. During this part I noticed Andrew over a few seats to my left. He’s also a musician and banjo player though very much not roots.

Then we cleared the chairs from the floor so we could have the square dance. I do not square dance enough. It’s so much fun. The challenging part for me is always finding a partner. I’ve learned to just ask any single woman I see. The first few already had partners but then I found a single. I had noticed her earlier as during the music she was wearing a winter hat shaped like a Viking helmet and the two cords hanging down were made to look like braids. My kind of person.

We had a great time dancing. During the dance I saw Steph Jenkins’ sister Cassie. Only when we joined them in in a square did I notice she was dancing with Andrew. Folk is a small world. I even did my poor imitation of a waltz at the end. I looked around, my imitation was as good as most people’s. It’s not like going to a swing dance where most people know what they are doing. Remind me that I have to do this more often.

On a night I expected to say home doing nothing I ended up having a great time and even got to talk to friends. As an added bonus I have something to write about. Tonight I’m probably staying home by I do have one possibility. If it comes through I’ll be at Carnegie Hall.