If I had been asked, at age eight, if I could imagine reaching the age of eighty, I would probably have said I could not. My hope for my future was to die gloriously in battle, and with my dying breath to utter words that would prove inspirational for generations to come.
Fortunately, that was not my fate.
Here I am at eighty. I can't resist sharing a story I've shared recently in other contexts. If I recall correctly it comes from the Scottish writer and broadcast executive Moray McLaren, according to whom a collector of folklore visited a remote Scottish island. He got off the boat and, walking along the island's main street, sought to find someone with a long memory. He stopped a man and said, "Excuse me, but do you know if there are any octogenarians on the island?" The man furrowed his brow for a moment, then said, "Octogenarians? ... Ah, yes. There was two. But my brother shot the one and the other flew away. Octogenarians, yes, there was two."
This past Saturday, January 25, was the 266th birthday of the Scottish poet and lyricist Robert Burns (1759-1796), and coincidentally that, of fewer digits, of my wife of almost 34 years, Martha Foley. The Burns birthday, and Martha's, were celebrated at a "Burns Supper" graciously hosted by Frances Stern at her apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side. Her supper included salmon, roasted tomatoes, tattie scones, and delicious shortbread.
The program was provided by members of Repast Baroque, joined by harpist and soprano Anna O'Connell. In the photo Ms. O'Connell is at the left, with her Celtic harp. Repast members, left to right, are: Sarah Stone, on baroque cello; Gabe Shuford on keyboard (at Repast concerts Gabe plays harpsichord; the space here was too small to fit one); and Stephanie Corwin on bassoon. The festivities began with Ms. O'Connell's spirited reading of Burns' poem, "The Flowers of Edinburgh." This was followed by a number of Burns poems set to music by various composers, which Ms. O'Connell sang in her clarion clear and wide ranging soprano voice. She also performed several pieces by Scottish composers inspired by Burns, solely on harp.
It being Martha's birthday, I was delighted that one of the Burns poems set to music chosen for the program was "My Wife's a Winsome Wee Thing." I don't know if this was inserted on Martha's behalf, but the musicians did break from the Burns performance to lead us all in "Happy Birthday," and a cake was presented. The program continued with a lively "There's Nae Luck About the Hoose," and concluded with "The Parting Kiss" and what is Burns' best known poem, "Auld Lang Syne," in which we all joined.
Repast's next concert will be on Saturday, March 15 at 3:00 PM, at the McKinney Chapel of the First Unitarian Congregational Society, 116 Pierrepont Street, Brooklyn, celebrating The Ides of March, at which Sarah, Gabe, and Stephanie will be re-joined by violinist and new mother Natalie Rose Kress and by guest musician Margaret Owens on oboe and recorder. The program will feature music by Handel accompanied by projections of the 1908 silent film Julius Caesar and other early silent films. The concert will be repeated the following day, Sunday, March 16, at 3:00 PM, at the Manhattan Country Day School, 150 West 85th Street.
The photo above is of three stalwarts of the Bells of Hell, a Greenwich Village pub that served as my second home from the summer of 1977 until it closed in the fall of '79. On the left is Barry Murphy, who tended bar and provided lively conversation. In the center is Pierce Turner, who, along with Larry Kirwan, as Turner and Kirwan of Wexford (their Irish hometown), were the house band at the Bells during much of my tenure there. On the right is Peter Myers, half owner of the Bells from the time he and Tony Heyes bought it from its founder, Malachy McCourt until the late weekend afternoon in '79- I was present at the time - when Peter and Tony got into a physical scuffle, started by Tony and Gary Sellers, the first person I met after first crossing the Bells' threshold in '77, and which resulted in Peter making Tony the sole owner while he went on to found Myers of Keswick, Keswick being Peter's English hometown.
The occasion of the photo was a party to celebrate Peter's 80th birthday, given at Myers of Keswick. It was a grand affair, bringing together a sizeable collection of surviving Bells alumni. Specialties of the house, including Cornish pasties, Scotch eggs, and sausage rolls, were in profusion, as were beer and wine. I was able to catch up with some old friends I hadn't seen in some years. The store is now managed by Peter's daughter, Jennifer Myers Pulidore, whom I remembered as a kindergartener. By all appearances she's doing an excellent job. I also had some pleasant conversation with Peter's wife, Irene, whom I hadn't seen since the Bells days.
The photo was taken as the party was ending, and Pierce was singing "The Parting Glass."
The clip above is of an exquisite rendition of this beautiful song by Celtic Woman.
As I was leaving the party, I saw Peter and a friend sitting on a bench outside the store. I stopped for a bit of last minute chat. Peter reminded me that, after his unfortunate encounter with Tony, I had offered my opinion that Tony's words, "It's your f---ing bar!" were not sufficient to transfer ownership, especially given Tony's state of intoxication at the time. Peter was happy with this advice.
I then recounted an anecdote I'd read some years ago, about an anthropologist who visited one of the remotest of the Scottish Western Isles and sought someone who would have a long memory and knowledge of the island's lore. He was directed to an old man who, when asked his age, said seventy-something. The anthropologist asked if there were any octogenarians on the island. The old man said, "Octogenarians ... oh, yes, there were two. But my brother shot the one, and the other flew away." I suggested that Peter should avoid the Western Isles. "I go there all the time," he said. Good luck, Peter.
I had the pleasure, and honor, of meeting the great Shetland fiddler Aly Bain after a Boys of the Lough concert at Town Hall in the mid 1980s. My introduction was enabled by my date's having been his sister in law. In the video above he's joined by another fine exemplar of the Shetland fiddle tradition, Jenna Reid. They do a segue of two lively traditional fiddle tunes, "Sophie's Dancing Feet" and "Andy Brown's Reel." Backing them is a true all-star group of musicians: traditional Irish music stalwart Dónal Lunny on bouzouki, a Greek instrument that has become widely used in Irish music; Jerry Douglas, whose work on dobro guitar has spanned bluegrass, jazz, and Celtic music; Russ Barenberg, known for his contributions to old time and bluegrass music, on guitar; Phil Cunningham, a many talented Scottish musician known primarily as an accordionist but who here plays piano; and English multi instrumentalist Michael McGoldrick on whistle.
On Friday evening Sarah Stone, on cello in the center of the GIF above, along with (left to right) Francis Liu on violin, Kevin Devine on harpsichord and hurdy gurdy (you can see him cranking it in the GIF), and soprano Madeline Healey, shown above tapping on a small drum similar to what in Irish music is called a bodhrán, gave a delightful concert of English and Scottish songs and instrumental pieces at Communitea, in Long Island City, Queens.
This was not "classical" chamber music, although some of the tunes were by classically esteemed composers like Purcell, but rather "pop" or "folk" music of its time.
The first set began with three songs about drinking and food. "The Wine Was Made to Rule the Day" introduced us to the awesome (an adjective that actually belongs here) voice of Ms. Healey, with its crystalline clarity and precision. "A Song in Praise of Old English Roast Beef" had us joining in on the chorus. "Ye Mortals That Love Drinking" described all, or at least most of all, of us there.
Some of the remaining pieces in the set gave Mr. Devine a chance to show his skill with the hurdy gurdy. The first three of these were selections from the Scottish composer James Oswald's Airs for all Seasons, all of which are named for seasonal flowers: "The Fox Glove"; "The Periwinkle": and "The Rocket". There were five Playford Dances: "The Virgin Queen"; "Young Jemmy"; "Never Love Thee More"; "Coxes Dance"; and "Up Its Aily". John Playford adapted these from an informal folk dance tradition popular among "country" people, who had no time nor money for formal dance instruction. City sophisticates took to these because on a long evening they would tire of the elaborate formal dances typical for their class. A modern parallel to this can be seen in the "urban cowboy" craze of about forty years ago.
Playford dances are still done in England, as the video above shows.
After an intermission, the second set began with three Scottish songs, sung spritefully by Ms. Healey (I was searching for an adjective that would describe her singing while continuing an "s" alliteration; I may have been influenced by my first car's having been an Austin-Healey Sprite). The first song was a lullaby, "O Can Ye Sew Cushions", followed by the mournful ballad "Auld Robin Gray", written by Lady Anne Lindsay, but the third was much sprightlier.
"There's Nae Luck About the House" is a lively ballad with lyrics by the poet Jean Adam, sung in the clip above in its intended Broad Scots, by the Glasgow Irish singer Ella Logan, as it also was by Ms. Healey.
The set, and the evening's program, concluded with a series of short songs recounting the courtship of Jenny and Jockey. I'll quote here from Ms. Stone's notes, which lead to a sad conclusion:
Ending the program is the everyman story of Jenny and Jockey, told again and again by composers throughout England. Jockey is a shepherd. Jenny loves Jockey. Jockey is a wagg and doesn't want to get married. Someone should warn Jenny before her 'Maiden's Treasures' gone or (according to Purcell) 'she'll 'go to London-town... to Kiss for half a Crown'.
As with many a song tradition that has found root in various parts of the British Isles - see, for example, my summary of my late friend Nick Tosches'discussion of the evolution of the Greek Orpheus legend in British folk music (the summary is in the fourth paragraph of the linked post) - the Jenny and Jockey story has many variants. In Scotland,it may have a happier ending.
This was a most enjoyable evening, and we look forward to Ms. Stone's next performance at Communitea. We are also delighted that she has become a regular member of the Repast Baroque Ensemble, whose concerts we regularly attend (and I'm tickled pink that I'm quoted in the second paragraph on their home page).
Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny, known to the world of devotees of British folk and folk rock, of which I'm part, as Sandy Denny, died on April 21, 1978 at the age of 31, following a fall down a flight of stairs. I got this news by radio while driving across the George Washington Bridge on my morning commute from my home in Greenwich Village to my job in suburban Rockland County. I got a lump in my throat, but managed to keep my eyes on the road.
I first heard Sandy Denny's voice coming from the dorm room of my law school classmate John Lovett in the spring of 1970. I was walking past his partly open door when I heard something sounding stately, like Anglican chant, with a lovely female lead and male harmony vocals. I knocked and asked John what he was playing. "Fairport Convention," he said.
The song I heard coming from John's room was "Percy's Song," an obscure Bob Dylan piece I didn't know. It was from Fairport's third album, Unhalfbricking. I didn't buy a Fairport album until after I graduated and moved to New York. The first one I got was Liege & Lief.
"Tam Lin" is a typical example (in my opinion a particularly good one) of the songs on Liege & Lief, which represent Fairport's turn, under Sandy's influence, to folk rock arrangements of traditional English and Scottish ballads, or new songs reflecting those influences.
After Liege & Lief, Sandy left Fairport and joined her future husband, Australian born singer and songwriter Trevor Lucas, in a group called Fotheringay, named for the castle in which Mary Queen of Scots spent her last days and was executed. The group had one, in my opinion excellent, eponymous album.
The album included "Peace in the End," an optimistic song about the then (1970) apparently insoluble "Troubles" in Northern Ireland. Fotheringay broke up after one year, as Sandy decided to pursue a solo career. In 1971 she released a critically acclaimed album, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens.
That same year, at the behest of Robert Plant, she sang with Led Zeppelin on "The Battle of Evermore."
After Sandy left Fairport, it continued as an all male band. Their first album in that guise had the title Full House, which I thought a bit cheeky, although I liked the album nevertheless. In October of 1974 I went to my first Fairport concert, at Carnegie Hall. When the band took the stage I was surprised to see Sandy taking her seat at a grand piano. A man sitting not far from me called out, "Welcome back!" She answered with a chirpy "Thenk you!"
They proceeded to give a riveting performance that included some old favorites from Liege & Lief and earlier albums, but also new material, including the searing antiwar ballad "John the Gun."
In 1975 Fairport released Rising for the Moon, with a stirring title track that showcased Sandy's voice beautifully. Its opening lines -- the lyrics are by Sandy -- tell of the life of a traveling musician:
I travel over the sea,
And ride the rolling sky,
For that's the way it is,
That is my fortune,
There are many ears to please,
Many people's love to try,
And every day's begun,
Rising for the moon.
Also in 1975 Sandy and Trevor Lucas, who were married in 1973, left Fairport. They had a daughter. Their marriage lasted until Sandy's death in 1978.
Yesterday I saw this Chicago Tribune piece by Greg Kot about Sandy, and how her influence lives in the work of groups like Mumford & Sons, Fleet Foxes, and the Decembrists. Kot focuses on the first song of hers to gain wide attention.
That song was "Who Knows Where the Time Goes?" It was made popular by Judy Collins who, as Kot notes, was a shrewd judge of talent, a year or so before Sandy recorded it with Fairport. Sandy's version is in the audio clip above.
I disagree with Kot in one respect. He calls Fairport's first and eponymous album, made before Sandy joined the group, "unremarkable." Its sales may have been disappointing , but I think it's a fine bit of artistry. It was the second Fairport album I acquired, and I was struck immediately by their rendition of the driving rocker "Time Will Show the Wiser". I was also captivated by their rendition of Joni Mitchell's "I Don't Know Where I Stand," featuring the voice of their first woman vocalist, Judy Dyble (unfortunately, no clip of this is available). She has -- she is still singing and recording -- a strong but sweet voice. It was perhaps stronger -- more Grace Slick than Joni Mitchell, although I think she covered Mitchell brilliantly -- than the guys in the group wanted for their turn towards more folk influenced material.
A version of Fairport Convention still exists; they most recently released an album in 2015, and may be the longest surviving major rock band save the Rolling Stones and the Who. Sandy Denny was an essential element in their success.
No, she wasn't the only Scottish singer, but in my opinion she was the finest vocal interpreter of Scotland's traditional ballads, jigs, and reels, as well as music based on the poetry of Robert Burns. I learned yesterday of her death on August 21.
In the video above, made in the 1960s when she was living in Greenwich Village with other young folk singers, she's sitting at a table with Pete Seeger and Roscoe Holcomb (with hat), and sings five songs. "The Beggar Laddie" is a lively ballad about a beggar wooing a pretty woman; it's one of many variations on this theme found throughout Britain and Ireland. "The Skye Fisher's Song" has a slow melody that evokes the landscapes and seascapes in and around the Isle of Skye; on the video it's accompanied by a montage of photos. "I Lost My Love" seems the title of a mournful ballad; actually it's a sprightly dance tune that ends in a port a beul, or Gaelic mouth music. "Miss McLeod's Reel," of which only a short portion is on the video, is another dance tune that's the source of the old-time American song "Hop High Ladies". Redpath does all these songs a capella; on her last number, Robert Burns' best known song, Auld Lang Syne, Holcomb and Seeger accompany her on guitar.
I had the good fortune to see Jean Redpath in performance at a small venue near Washington Square Park sometime in the late 1970s. There were only about twenty of us in the audience. It was a magical evening.
Today, June 28, 2014 is the centenary of the assassination in Sarajevo of Archduke Francis Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg. This started a series of events that led, within two months, to the outbreak of a war unprecedented in its ferocity and breadth; one that would cause about ten million military and seven million civilian deaths. It may have created the conditions that led to the 1918 influenza pandemic that is estimated to have killed between fifty and 100 million people; perhaps as much as five per cent of the world's then population. The war's economic and political aftermath certainly contributed to the outbreak of an even greater war two decades later. It caused the breakup of two empires: the Hapsburg Austro-Hungarian Empire in central and eastern Europe, and the Ottoman Empire that encompassed much of the Middle East. The carving up of the latter by victorious Britain and France, as described in David Fromkin's A Peace to End All Peace, resulted in the creation of the existing national boundaries in the Middle East; many of which boundaries are contested today.
World War I also helped to precipitate two revolutions: the Russian and the Irish. British recruitment of Irishmen to fight in the war (see poster image above) was a factor leading to the Easter Rising of 1916. As the rebel song "The Foggy Dew" declared:
Right proudly high in Dublin town Hung they out a flag of war. 'Twas better to die 'neath an Irish sky Than at Suvla or Sud el Bar.
"Suvla" and "Sud el Bar" were disastrous amphibious landings on the Turkish coast in which British troops, including many Irish, took terrible casualties. Another verse, not included in the lyrics on the linked post, has the words
'Twas England bade our wild geese rove That small nations might be free.
The second line is ironic. One of Britain's appeals to prospective recruits was to fight for "small nations," in particular Belgium (again see poster above) that had been or might be invaded and occupied by German troops. The irony is that Ireland was a "small nation" that wanted to be free, but Britain would not allow it to be. The term "wild geese" in the first line was originally applied to the Irish Jacobite army that was allowed to go to France following its defeat by the army of King William in 1691. It was later used for Irish soldiers who served in the Royal Army in European wars.
"The Green Fields of France," sung in the clip above by Liam Clancy and Tommy Makem, is one of the saddest songs I know. The line "Did the pipes play 'The Flowers of the Forest'?" at first suggested to me that Private McBride served in a Scottish regiment, as "Flowers" is a traditional Scots lament, but the notes to this YouTube clip say it has become "[t]he traditional lament for the fallen in forces of the British Commonwealth." So, the song was co-opted, after excising the lines
Sad day for the Order, What's happened to the border? The English, by guile, For once won the day.
We all live in the world the Great War (I still call it that; the Second World War was vastly more destructive, but the effects of the First include the Second and much more) created. I pray we do not have to see its like again.
Addendum: When I posted this, I speculated that Private McBride was likely Protestant, because William would not have been a popular name among Irish Catholics given the unfortunate role of King William in their history. Dermot McEvoy corrected me on this, noting that William was a common name in his (Catholic) family, and that Liam Clancy was christened William, later changing his name to its Gaelic version. William is a popular name among Ulster Scots Protestants, probably because they revere King William for his victory over the Catholics. Many Ulster Scots emigrated to America, where they became known as "Scotch Irish." Many of these settled in Appalachia, and the term "hillbilly" reflects the prevalence of the name William among them.
During the summer of 1975, after driving down from Ullapool, taking the ferry from the Kyle of Localsh to Kyleakin on the Isle of Skye (there was no bridge until 1995), and spending a long day touring around Skye, I checked into a hotel at Portree, had dinner, and retired at about 9:55. At 10:00, I was on the verge of sleep when the public bar downstairs closed, and the local people who had spent the evening there came out, gathered in the parking lot not far from my window, and sang "Flower of Scotland" in lovely, ale-and-whiskey-aided harmony. The version in the clip above, thanks to Iain40, is of the Corries doing the song, probably during that same year, in a fairly intimate setting in front of a fire that may account for the hazy quality of the video.
November 30 is the feast day of St. Andrew, patron saint of Scotland.
