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ontologyI seem to have a strange aversion to actually posting about trips. Let's see if I can get it all over with in a rush!
The drive home and all that was fairly uneventful, and my back is sore -- let me suffice to say that we got home and aren't dead and got everything unpacked and Bartholomew was overjoyed to see us again. And life is settling back into old rhythms.
So, the festival was quite nice; the driving was not as bad as the last time we were all in an automobile for ten hours -- well, actually, it was probably pretty rotten, because we got stuck in crawling traffic for hours, or so I am told, but I slept through most of, well, everything. I'd been up half the night packing and straightening, and was dragged out of bed at six, so, you know. There was nothing for me but the black oblivion of slumber, come hell or high water -- or traffic jams. (Crying babies, though. Even I have difficulty sleeping through those.)
Anyway, we got to the festival around eight at night, had rather an adventure with trying to put up the tent in the dark -- there's a field where the free camping is done, and, for better or for worse, the powers that be had decided to have the last act of the night play on a makeshift stage on this field, accompanied by a glorious bonfire. I mean, any other time, there would be nothing but awesome about this scenario, but the act started early, and we were trying to put up our tent really quietly. And this was a new tent, and we'd never practised putting it up. Like I said, adventure. But we got it up and enjoyed the rest of the act (Vance Gilbert, who is tremendously talented and funny, though a bit bawdy in the between-song bits -- my oh my can he ever imitate instruments! horns, drums, everything; it was amazing). And I spent a long, long time lying on my back as close to the bonfire as I could get without injury, staring at the mingling of stars and sparks. It was the sort of thing that begs to be made into poetry: the cold white glimmering sparks in the sky and the red-gold ones flying like frenzied fireflies and disappearing into the cloudy black.
Lots of the festival was more interesting to be part of than to write about -- David Mallet is completely brilliant and if you've ever got a chance to see him live, don't pass it up. I feel very, very small for being a folk music geek and having been raised on the stuff and being wholly unfamiliar with Richie Havens and Chris Smither. Apparently Richie Havens opened at Woodstock; he's a soft-spoken African-American with a rather startling beard and a lovely rhythmic guitar style. He had an electric guitarist backing him up, and after a few songs, he brought out this cellist, and -- gorblimey, that was one of the high points of live music for me. That woman, how she played. It was so effortless, and so raw -- she played a very dark, rich, slightly edgy cello, and yet there was something achingly smooth in it, too, something that made the playing seem both phenomenally simple and unbearably difficult. And Chris Smither had a wonderful rusty voice and played the guitar like that woman played her cello -- effortlessly, gorgeously, with flair. Richard Shindell, poor bloke, had a rather bad day of it -- there were all manner of things going wrong with the sound, and his guitar lost amplification in the middle of "Arrowhead", but he managed to pull through with relative outward good cheer and a solid performance, though not his best. I kind of wanted to give him a hug. He played "Transit", though! And songs I haven't heard (which isn't so strange as I haven't got his last two albums). "Last Fare of the Day" is a brilliant bit of storytelling, and for an encore he sang one called "Balloon Man" which was just wrenchingly lovely.
The Kennedys have gotten rather embarrassing in their New Age fervour (really, I feel bad for them -- they actually sound like hippies now, complete with the weird intense and slightly fevered vocal inflections that people make fun of. And, look, when you put Jesus and Buddha and whoever else all together in one song and equate them as basically the same, you are not being Wonderfully Tolerant, you are deftly offending all of the religions at once, not to mention making yourself look rather silly and uneducated, because even the basic tenets of these religions are different enough that it's fairly obvious they do not all lead to the same destination -- but I digress, pet rant, sorry), but they can play mean ukuleles. I mean, great guitars, too, but you don't see people rocking out on a pair of ukuleles very often. And, um. Who else? Gandalf Murphy and the Slambovian Circus of Dreams would have been absolutely stellar if the musicianship and lyric writing were a bit tighter, and are really only mostly "pretty good", but they're fun to watch -- hey, they had a theremin. I mean, really. AWESOME. (Also awesome: the fact that the first electronic instrument was created for -- classical music. And: distributed by Lenin! One fascinating instrument, let me tell you.)
I had other little adventures here and there which have all fled the mind at the moment, so I shall keep them and deftly weave them into later posts when they come to me, I suppose.
The festival was over on Sunday afternoon; we drove most of the way home and stopped at a lodge in a state park about forty-five minutes from here by the name of Black Moshannon (hasn't that got a marvellous tang to it?). The lodge itself was not especially cosy: built in the sixties, and it shows; it's all concrete and lines and corners. But in the great room there was a two-story window like a cathedral's, and with all the lights off at night we could see the stars through it. And oh, what stars! We read that the park's lights were built specially, to direct all of their light down so as not to obscure the night sky. I felt so wondrously alone -- at night, the sky fairly shimmered. I can't describe stars. I keep trying; I can't.
I spent some of Monday feeling rather hormonal and gloomy, until I decided to go outside, as there wasn't anything better to do -- and there I romped until dark. It was so blessedly autumnal -- the winds were chill, and even the sunlight had a pale gold quality to it. I spread my cloak out on the ground and intended to listen to music but just lay instead, for at least half an hour. I wandered down the side of the mountain for a while, until I got my camera and spent two or three hours wandering about and taking photographs of dry ancient tree stumps and sprays of yellow flowers (and being very frustrated with the quality -- or lack thereof -- of my camera). Then I lay on my cloak at the top of the slope for a while longer and listened to Over the Rhine and watched the stars come out.
Later, Dad and I lay out on a picnic table on the back porch and watched the stars, and when Dad left for bed, I stayed for a long, long while, listening to Vienna Teng (there is no more perfect starwatching music than Dreaming Through the Noise), staring at the stars turning and glittering above me, and bats flittering hither and thither above my head. And oh, I saw falling stars streak across the sky like shining vessels.
When Dreaming Through the Noise had ended, and I was cold to my fingertips, I went back inside and made my inaugural cup of cocoa and stood in front of the great window and drank it, still watching the heavens. I thought, how can anyone look at the stars and not believe in God -- some god?
Then I went to bed. (But not before writing myself out in my paper journal!)
Anyway, we got to the festival around eight at night, had rather an adventure with trying to put up the tent in the dark -- there's a field where the free camping is done, and, for better or for worse, the powers that be had decided to have the last act of the night play on a makeshift stage on this field, accompanied by a glorious bonfire. I mean, any other time, there would be nothing but awesome about this scenario, but the act started early, and we were trying to put up our tent really quietly. And this was a new tent, and we'd never practised putting it up. Like I said, adventure. But we got it up and enjoyed the rest of the act (Vance Gilbert, who is tremendously talented and funny, though a bit bawdy in the between-song bits -- my oh my can he ever imitate instruments! horns, drums, everything; it was amazing). And I spent a long, long time lying on my back as close to the bonfire as I could get without injury, staring at the mingling of stars and sparks. It was the sort of thing that begs to be made into poetry: the cold white glimmering sparks in the sky and the red-gold ones flying like frenzied fireflies and disappearing into the cloudy black.
Lots of the festival was more interesting to be part of than to write about -- David Mallet is completely brilliant and if you've ever got a chance to see him live, don't pass it up. I feel very, very small for being a folk music geek and having been raised on the stuff and being wholly unfamiliar with Richie Havens and Chris Smither. Apparently Richie Havens opened at Woodstock; he's a soft-spoken African-American with a rather startling beard and a lovely rhythmic guitar style. He had an electric guitarist backing him up, and after a few songs, he brought out this cellist, and -- gorblimey, that was one of the high points of live music for me. That woman, how she played. It was so effortless, and so raw -- she played a very dark, rich, slightly edgy cello, and yet there was something achingly smooth in it, too, something that made the playing seem both phenomenally simple and unbearably difficult. And Chris Smither had a wonderful rusty voice and played the guitar like that woman played her cello -- effortlessly, gorgeously, with flair. Richard Shindell, poor bloke, had a rather bad day of it -- there were all manner of things going wrong with the sound, and his guitar lost amplification in the middle of "Arrowhead", but he managed to pull through with relative outward good cheer and a solid performance, though not his best. I kind of wanted to give him a hug. He played "Transit", though! And songs I haven't heard (which isn't so strange as I haven't got his last two albums). "Last Fare of the Day" is a brilliant bit of storytelling, and for an encore he sang one called "Balloon Man" which was just wrenchingly lovely.
The Kennedys have gotten rather embarrassing in their New Age fervour (really, I feel bad for them -- they actually sound like hippies now, complete with the weird intense and slightly fevered vocal inflections that people make fun of. And, look, when you put Jesus and Buddha and whoever else all together in one song and equate them as basically the same, you are not being Wonderfully Tolerant, you are deftly offending all of the religions at once, not to mention making yourself look rather silly and uneducated, because even the basic tenets of these religions are different enough that it's fairly obvious they do not all lead to the same destination -- but I digress, pet rant, sorry), but they can play mean ukuleles. I mean, great guitars, too, but you don't see people rocking out on a pair of ukuleles very often. And, um. Who else? Gandalf Murphy and the Slambovian Circus of Dreams would have been absolutely stellar if the musicianship and lyric writing were a bit tighter, and are really only mostly "pretty good", but they're fun to watch -- hey, they had a theremin. I mean, really. AWESOME. (Also awesome: the fact that the first electronic instrument was created for -- classical music. And: distributed by Lenin! One fascinating instrument, let me tell you.)
I had other little adventures here and there which have all fled the mind at the moment, so I shall keep them and deftly weave them into later posts when they come to me, I suppose.
The festival was over on Sunday afternoon; we drove most of the way home and stopped at a lodge in a state park about forty-five minutes from here by the name of Black Moshannon (hasn't that got a marvellous tang to it?). The lodge itself was not especially cosy: built in the sixties, and it shows; it's all concrete and lines and corners. But in the great room there was a two-story window like a cathedral's, and with all the lights off at night we could see the stars through it. And oh, what stars! We read that the park's lights were built specially, to direct all of their light down so as not to obscure the night sky. I felt so wondrously alone -- at night, the sky fairly shimmered. I can't describe stars. I keep trying; I can't.
I spent some of Monday feeling rather hormonal and gloomy, until I decided to go outside, as there wasn't anything better to do -- and there I romped until dark. It was so blessedly autumnal -- the winds were chill, and even the sunlight had a pale gold quality to it. I spread my cloak out on the ground and intended to listen to music but just lay instead, for at least half an hour. I wandered down the side of the mountain for a while, until I got my camera and spent two or three hours wandering about and taking photographs of dry ancient tree stumps and sprays of yellow flowers (and being very frustrated with the quality -- or lack thereof -- of my camera). Then I lay on my cloak at the top of the slope for a while longer and listened to Over the Rhine and watched the stars come out.
Later, Dad and I lay out on a picnic table on the back porch and watched the stars, and when Dad left for bed, I stayed for a long, long while, listening to Vienna Teng (there is no more perfect starwatching music than Dreaming Through the Noise), staring at the stars turning and glittering above me, and bats flittering hither and thither above my head. And oh, I saw falling stars streak across the sky like shining vessels.
When Dreaming Through the Noise had ended, and I was cold to my fingertips, I went back inside and made my inaugural cup of cocoa and stood in front of the great window and drank it, still watching the heavens. I thought, how can anyone look at the stars and not believe in God -- some god?
Then I went to bed. (But not before writing myself out in my paper journal!)
The drive home and all that was fairly uneventful, and my back is sore -- let me suffice to say that we got home and aren't dead and got everything unpacked and Bartholomew was overjoyed to see us again. And life is settling back into old rhythms.
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no subject
Date: 2007-09-20 04:32 am (UTC)Still, I adore you for loving both Vienna and Over The Rhine. I live on the Over The Rhine Pandora page.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-21 02:41 am (UTC)Over the Rhine is just...guh. I've had them on my radar for a long time but only really got to loving them properly about a year ago. And it's rare that I like members of a band as much as I like Linford and Karin. I mean, I don't usually dislike people whose music I enjoy, but Linford and Karin are near the top of the list of people I want to have coffee with someday.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-21 02:47 am (UTC)"Now Three" is gorgeous. It took me a while to realize exactly what it was about, but I just fell in love with it. It is so wholly different from her other song about pregnancy, and it's just incredible.
You know, I've only heard a handful of Over the Rhine songs, but I still fell in love. I just wish I could find their albums!
no subject
Date: 2007-09-20 04:37 am (UTC)RE The Kennedys: I won't get comment on the religious aspect of you criticism (I assume you were referring to "Stand"?), but haven't they always been a bunch of crazy hippies? ;) Perhaps I've just grown accustomed to being stopped at these festivals by random women who somehow feel a deep kinship with me (because of my...Threadless t-shirt...) that somehow connects to some profoundly communal spiritual awakening that they had once. It adds to the atmosphere ;)
But I'm glad you enjoyed it. Folk festivals are always a welcome break from reality.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-21 02:51 am (UTC)Hee, yes, the Kennedys always have been crazy hippies (and it's awfully nice to have someone on the f-list who gets my folk music references, for once!), but it seemed to me that they didn't seem to take it quite so seriously in years past. (And by "years past" I mean, like, four or five years ago, but, you know.) I mean, we're used to the more, er, interesting lyrics about "poet fish" and "gospel horses", but this time around it was like every other song was wrapped around some kind of New Age philosophy that we (parents & I, not a haughty royal we, I promise! :D) don't really agree with, and it was a bit uncomfortable. They were getting really proselytising-y, and I don't even like it when Christian musicians do that. But, egad, I forgot to write about their amazing version of "Matty Groves" with the electric sitar! (I want to say "Fairport Convention cover of Matty Groves", because they obviously drew from that arrangement.)
Perhaps I've just grown accustomed to being stopped at these festivals by random women who somehow feel a deep kinship with me (because of my...Threadless t-shirt...) that somehow connects to some profoundly communal spiritual awakening that they had once.
*snort* I haven't had anything quite like that, but last week this one fellow and I were talking about festivals we'd been to, and suddenly, with no precedent, he started telling me all about how he and his girlfriend had recently parted ways, and how sad he was, and -- wow, that was awkward. I tried to look very, very sympathetic, and ran the first chance I got. Something about these festivals opens people up, I suppose...?
no subject
Date: 2007-09-21 08:28 pm (UTC)As for the people...well, that's folk festivals for you! I think that folk music just tends to attract a more...earthy/spiritual/communal type :) I don't mind it, in general, but it's kind of difficult to give anything back to them when you're incredibly introverted and socially awkward ;) w00t.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-20 05:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-21 01:46 am (UTC)I see Someone
-Switchfoot
Glad you had a pleasant journey.
no subject
Date: 2007-09-21 07:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-23 02:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-23 02:59 am (UTC)