PLUS 17 TO 59 - But Forget The Virus - Listen To Dan Bern Sing Estelle

I first heard Dan Bern sing at Loussac Library - the ticket stub in the CD case says May 25, but there's no year listed.  I'm guessing it was 1997 or 1998.  My son had let us know that we had to go to the concert.  It was one of those magical, intimate  concerts.  I was quickly pulled into the music and at the end when he sang EstelleI was in the music with him.

Figuring out the hardware to connect and play all the different genres of audio I have is on my todo list for this year.  But it looks like the virus is going to push that back a while.  So today I pulled some of the CDs from downstairs and put Dan Bern into the Bose.

I've been feeling really tired all day and my temp is back up to 99 tonight.  So I don't really feel like updating my COVID-19Alaska count tonight.  As it says in the title, we've added 17 confirmed cases and we're now at 59.

Instead, I invite you to let Dan take you somewhere else altogether. Just let it build up.

Why Did The Cellist Use Pillows To Hold Up Her Cello?

When I'm Outside, people often ask me, "So, what's there to do in Anchorage?"  Well, here's some of what I've done the last two days.  And because this is Anchorage, I actually know some of these people.  

Friday night we went to an exquisite baroque cello concert.  Tanya Tomkins (you can hear snippets at the link) was accompanied by University of Alaska Anchorage music professor John Lutterman.  The picture was during a pause when they were answering questions from the audience.

Tanya preempted the question about the pillows.  These are baroque cellos so they don't have endpins like modern cellos.  Normally they are held between the legs as John is doing in the picture, but Tanya had a back problem last year and started using the pillows and she likes it.  And I thought the music was sublime.  So did others in the audience including some who actually know something about music. 

John also raised the question of whether his modern copy of a baroque cello might be more authentic than Tanya's 300 year old cello.  After all, he said, they didn't use 300 year old cellos in Bach's day. 

We heard two Bach suites (1 and 2)  for cello, a Vivaldi sonata, a Geminiani sonata, and a canon by Gabrielli.   The music flowed from the stage and caressed my music receptors. 


Saturday morning I went to a Citizens Climate Lobby (CCL) meeting.  This group is so incredibly well organized and informed.  We meet monthly and teleconference into an international (includes Canada) phone call and each month there are more chapters (92 Saturday.)  The mission is minimize the damage caused the planet by carbon based fuels.  The specific focus now is to get a carbon tax passed.  Local chapters all over the country educate their Congress members and Senators on how a carbon tax uses market principles to correct a market failure - the negative externalities caused by oil and gas.

Anchorage Climate Change Chapter Participating In National Teleconference

The speaker was Sam Daley-Harris on his updated book Reclaiming Our Democracy which will come out this summer.  He's added a chapter about CCL.  In addition to helping members get expertise on the various climate change issues, the group also talks about political strategy, and personal issues like how to get outside one's comfort zone to do what needs to be done.  For those who feel there's nothing they can do to overcome the numerous problems facing humans today, I'd strongly recommend listening to the audio of Saturday's conference call  which you can hear here.  (I couldn't get it using Firefox but I could in Safari.)  The intro to Sam starts about 8 minutes in. 


And Saturday night we walked through the new snow to the UAA concert featuring Ramblin' Jack Elliot, Dan Bern, and Alaskan musician, Doug Geeting.  Here are all three together on stage at the end of the concert.  I've been listening a lot to Dan's 2 Foot Tall album, but he didn't play anything from that.  This was a Woody Guthrie tribute concert. 

Geeting (l), Elliot (c), Bern (r)

It was good to have Dan back in Anchorage again after last October's songwriters' workshop.  

There was an opera and two different small venue plays that we had to skip cause you just can't do everything.  I did manage to bake a couple of loaves of bread. 

Kid Music For Adults - Z and I Bond With Dan Bern's '2 feet tall'

Dan Bern was already my favorite contemporary song writer/singer before I took his songwriting class last fall.  

At that time I bought his CD "2 feet tall" knowing I'd have someone to listen to it with.

It's his first children's album, inspired by his own daughter.

Z and I listened to it as much as I could get away with while we were in Seattle with her.  The music sounds simple, but the melodies proved tricky when I tried to sing along, or worse, sing them on my own.  And the lyrics are fine for a baby or three year old, but the parents will hear their own stories.  For instance  'Milk' - has a chorus for the baby and then there's more for the parents which the baby will eventually grow to understand.  Here's a bit:

milk milk milk milk
milk milk milk milk
just milk (slurp slurp)
just milk (slurp slurp)

there’s kung pao chicken and garlic naan
green beans, walnuts, custard, flan
fish that’s filleted and beef that’s ground
but for now you’re a milk hound

And I had great appreciation for this song on Z's 6th week birthday:
you never give me sass or walk out of the room
you never chase the kittens around with a broom
you never say, I’m not coming in from the cold 
perfect little angel
6 weeks old
you never talk back to me
or monopolize the phone
you never say go away leave me alone
you never demand slippers made of gold
perfect little angel
6 weeks old

The 12 year old was too old for this - "why are you listening to this stupid stuff about the monkey and the kangaroo going to tea?"  And Dan's Dylanish voice didn't appeal to him either.  But as I said, the music is surprisingly complex - just try to sing it.  Dan's a very talented, imaginative, and sly singer. 

You grew, you grew, 
You grew you grew you grew
You grew, you grew, 
You grew you grew you grew

No authorities were notified,
No papers were filed
We’ll keep it between us
We’ll keep it on the sly

 But you have to hear these words with the music, and you can listen to short clips here.

Every parent, when alone with their baby, makes up silly songs.  But when a talented singer, songwriter with a wicked imagination does that, it makes a great album.  These are his silly songs.

And there are a lot of songs on this album.  They're each my favorite when they're playing, but here are a couple that have particularly grabbed me:

• 5 Things  - have you ever heard 1-5 sung so sweetly?
• Perfect Little Angel - right through my heart
• You Grew  - great for dancing with your baby to get the milk digested
• Screamin Dreamin - another sweet song to sooth a baby/toddler and any parent or grandparent can appreciate

So, while other people are giving clothes and blankets and Good Night Moon, here's a great gift for new baby. 

And poking around to find the audio I also found out that Dan will be at the Wendy Williamson Auditorium in Anchorage on April 6.   For the rest of you, his schedule (at the link) includes Salt Lake City,  three Colorado concerts, two in Iowa, and Winnipeg. 


BTW, it seems I cut out some of the songs in the image.  Here are the rest:

Watchin Over You

Labor Day

Favorite Cat

Monkey and the Kangaroo

Naked Outside

8 Weeks Old

Tomorrow is Another Day

Lulu's Lullaby 2

As Close As Most Americans Get to Ballet - Dan Bern on Bowling

Part of the charm of a Dan Bern concert is the chatter between songs and the rapport with the audience.  Out North is a perfect venue because it's so small - even with the extra rows in front it couldn't hold much more than 100.

From the Saturday night concert, here's Dan on bowling.

Dan Bern, My Favorite Songwriter/Singer, Packs Out North Friday Night

As I've said in previous posts this week, I first experienced Dan Bern performing in 1997 at Loussac library.  He blew me away. 

He carries on the tradition of Gutherie and Dylan's songs that commented on the state of the world.  Long narratives in a singing style that . . . well the first time I heard him, he came out and sang, then stopped, and said something like, "Some people say I sound like Dylan . . . but  you don't do you?" with a big grin on his face.

What struck me then was how his songs started with  unexpected premises and then wandered through a stream of conscious jumping from topic to topic, all the while telling the story.  Not unlike some of my blog posts.   "If Marilyn Monroe had married Henry Miller" for example.  These are sophisticated musical musings that are funny, thought provoking and musically seductive.  Sure, everyone knows who Marilyn Monroe is, but you also have to know who Henry Miller was and that Marilyn Monroe was married for a while to Arthur Miller (and who he was).

The Wasteland, one of my favorites from early on, wraps up the dilemmas of an age in evocative words and music that starkly express the darker side of American dream.  It starts:

Wasteland

Sound Clip

I saw the best of my generation playing pinball
Make-up on, all caked up 
Looking like some kind of china doll
With all of Adolf Hitler's moves down cold
As they stood up in front 
Of a rock and roll band
And always moving upward and ever upward
To this gentle golden promised land
With the smartest of them all 
Moonlighting as a word processor
And the strongest of them all 
Checking IDs outside a saloon
And the prettiest of all 
Taking off her clothes
In front of men 
Whose eyes look like they were in some little hick town 
Near Omaha 
Watching the police chief 
Run his car off the side of a bridge

 

He just tells the story and let's the audience work out what it means.

He also has a lot of baseball songs - including one about Pete Rose, the Hall of Fame, and betting, and another one I heard the first time Friday on Armando Gallarraga's perfect game stolen by umpire Jim Joyce's bad call on what should have been the last out.  Another on the golden voice of Vin Scully. 


 These photos were taken at Friday night's concert.  The purple shirt was before the break. 

Patrick McCormick stood in for his Dad Mike, the founder of Whistling Song productions which has been bringing up folkish musicians to Anchorage for a long time.  Mike's knowledge of music and hospitality has been the main reason we've had so many good musicians playing here.  Many, like Dan, have stayed at the McCormick's house when they were here.  Dan's talked about it being a wonderful change from most tour stops, being able to stay with a family.  And he's watched Patric grow up over the years he's been coming to Anchorage.   Patrick told a story about Dan coming to one of his basketball games when he was in the third grade. 

Having spent a good part of the week at the songwriting workshop and two concerts, I've got lots more to write and not enough time.  Rather than write one long, long post that won't get up til Wednesday or Thursday, let me stop here and I'll add more later.

Dan Bern Songwriting Workshop Anchorage Evening 2

 I took Mariano's digital art class after seeing what he did digitally to photos.  I thought, I can take photos and then play with them.  What I didn't quite realize was that it was an art class and the other students were serious artists.  An early assignment was to use a couple of the photo shop tools to draw a picture.  I started with a very simple round flower with roundish petals and a simple stem.  But I noticed the screen next to me had a perfect cowboy boot with all the details.  The screen on the other side had a great human figure.  I realized I was out of my league.  But Mariano encouraged me saying these people have to adjust from their normal medium (oil, or water colors, or charcoal) to digital and I would be starting with digital.  In the end it worked out reasonably well.

Dan's standing on the left

But at least I believed I had a visual sense, even if I couldn't execute what I had in mind, at least I had something in mind.

Music is different.  I don't think aurally.  Tunes don't pop into my mind.  I'm just not musical.  But the song writing workshop is forcing me to confront one of my own stereotypes about myself.  Don't get me wrong, there are serious song writers and musicians in this class and compared to them, my musical talents are, politely, in the most formative stage.  But I didn't completely bomb in the workshop Monday or last night.

Monday Dan talked about how little children go around merging words and melodies that they spontaneously create.  It got me thinking.  He talked about speech and singing not being that far apart.  Certainly not opposites that some imagine.  He said I should just relax.

I thought about students I've had who told me they were 'just not good at math.'  I'd always ask them, "Which teacher did this to you?"  and 90% could give me a name and a grade without a pause.  I still remember one student holding out his hands for the ruler as he said, "Sister Margarita in 5th grade."

And the light went on that I've been going around saying I'm just not musical.  OK, I admit the oboe and I were not a good match, but I shouldn't have given up on dating music.

All this is preamble to my fortune cookie based song.  (See the previous post.)

This group's work sparkled

I ended up choosing the numbers in the fortune rather than the words.  The first three in the sequence were 03 14 29 which I immediately translated into March 14, 1929.  I googled it and came up with obituaries of people born on March 14, 1929.  The first was just birth and death dates with locations of each.  Toronto and Desert Hot Springs.  I imagined a song that filled in the gap.  I found a woman who was born and died in Lufkin, Texas.  There was a little more about her.  A guy born in England who died in Santa Maria, California with a whole career and family.  Who were these people, did their lives cross paths?  There were all sorts of possibilities.

Getting further into the google results brought the fact that Mickey Mouse's 4th cartoon was released on March 14, 1929 - The Barn Dance.  Clearly, Disney had no idea who Mickey would become and Minnie ditches him for Pete, when Mickey can't stay off her toes.

And then there was this post on a German Einstein website:

In 1920, after Einstein's achievements had been widely recognized, Ulm also wanted to honour him. Thus, for example, in 1922 the decision was made to name a yet to be constructed street after him. Even though in Nazi-Germany this street was renamed Fichtestrasse (after Johann Gottlieb Fichte, 1762-1814, a German philosopher), it was named Einsteinstrasse again in 1945. On the occasion of his 50th birthday on March 14, 1929, Einstein was informed in a letter of congratulation by the then mayor that the city of Ulm had named a street in his honour. With respect to the Einsteinstrasse Einstein remarked in his reply: "I have already heard about the street named after me. My comforting thought was that I am not responsible for whatever is going to happen there." Between 1920 and 1929 a lively exchange of notes between Ulm and Albert Einstein developed which, interrupted by the political situation in Germany, was only resumed in 1949.

In 1949 Ulm wanted to grant Einstein the rights of a freeman of the city. Einstein however declined, pointing to the fate of the Jews in Nazi-Germany.

But how to put this all together?  I could focus on the day, but I also wanted to trace the paths, beyond the day, of those born on March 14, 1929.  And I had to try to sing it the next day in the workshop.

I ended up focusing on the Einstein story.  The line about taking comfort knowing he wouldn't be responsible for what happened on the street had a bittersweet sensibility.

Dan had told us Monday, in answer to a question about the problem of writing a song and finding out that someone had already written the melody.  The difference between a real songwriter and everyone else, is that the real songwriter will simply change some things here and there and call it his own.

And using the Mexican hat dance as the tune for our moose encounter songs Monday also showed me 1) how useful it was to have some structure, a skeleton,  like that to hold the words onto and 2) how hard it was to mesh - in my head -  the rhythm of the existing song to the rhythm of my newly created lyrics.

So, I decided to lift a Dan Bern song as my skeleton.  His songs are mostly stories put to music, but they do have melodies.  But I have to listen a few times to get them into my head. I picked Dan's Rome, from the "Dan Bern" album.  I tried to write lyrics, but the words from the Einstein website didn't flow with the music.  I had to start chopping back, finding words that were shorter, that had some rhyme.

I figured with my singing ability and the extra syllables here and there, no one would know where it came from.  Here's part of what I did compared to the lyrics of the original song.  I think I need another week to get this working.   But it's as far as I got before class.

March 14, 1929	Rome
Einstein got a letter from the Mayor of Ulm On the fourteenth of March Nineteen Twenty nine It wished him a happy Fiftieth  Birthday They gave him a street on which kids could play. Ulm was his birthplace Ulm was his past Ulm was the city That’d he’d return to last.	We pulled into Rome With blood in our eyes After days of travelin' Months of lies Taking our various Turns at the wheel Taking booze And pot and cigarettes. . . Rome was a bust Rome was a scream Rome was the final Rapid eye movement To this dream

HTML Tables

The Rome link gets you to the song so you can hear how it goes.

My last lines, which I left out here, just never could capture the Einstein quote.  Again, I need to find a totally different way to say it.

I also tried to throw my inhibitions to the draft and just sing.  Just as I'm doing here posting these lyrics on the blog.  This is a learning activity right?  The only lines that really work for me are the first two.  The rest need lots of massaging.  I stuck in the Ulm lines after listening to the Rome lines and I think musically, that worked best.  Clearly I have to toss the date altogether, it's just too clunky, and rely on it being the title.  But I guess that's part of the evolution of a song.

Dan asked if I played guitar, then pulled out his and gave me the perfect back up; that helped a lot.  Did he know what I was doing?

I did explain how I got to this point and read the class enough of the Einstein article to understand what I was trying to convey.

I asked Dan during the break if he had any idea what original song was my crutch.   He didn't and when I told him, he more or less congratulated me on a successful steal, "If I couldn't tell, no one else could."  I suspect that means I was so bad, there was no resemblance at all, but I'll humor myself. 

Musically,  mine was the shakiest.  The others in there are real musicians.  But they were kind, and I got credit for being the only one who found a way to use the numbers from the fortunes for the song.  Others were amazing, among them one who used a plastic cup and her hand for great backup percussion. 

Saturday, some of the members of the workshop (not me, I assure you) will present their songs at 2pm at Out North.  It's a pay what you like donation.  There are some gifted folks in the class and it should be fun.  I'm feeling a little like George Plimpton.

We had a series of interesting new exercises, including a group activity as you can see from the pictures.  I've got homework for tomorrow, plus my Chinese class meets again on Thursday.  So good night. 

"Picture Michelangelo with a briefcase and a beeper" - Songwriting With Dan Bern in Anchorage

Click To Enlarge

We had to write and sing a one line song to introduce ourselves.

Then we had to write lyrics in a

2

2

2

7

8

8

8

8

pattern - haiku like, 2 syllables, 2 syllables, etc - about a moose encounter.

And then sing it to the group.

Regular readers know that I can listen to music, but making it?  That stopped when I hung up the oboe in high school.  My talents clearly lay elsewhere.  But Dan Bern is such an incredible songwriter/singer, that I signed up for this songwriting workshop with the expectation that I'd just get to know more about him and where all the songs come from.

He writes and sings in the troubadour style of Woody Gutherie and Bob Dylan.  Long song stories that take you to on  unexpected places where you meet a surprising cast of characters.  And when it's over, you often have to gulp as you realize what it was all about.  He even has a song about Guthrie handing the torch to Dylan from his deathbed and how he (Dan) climbed in to sing to Bruce Springstein on his deathbed.  Here are the lyrics and here's a short audio clip.  He's written about lots of celebrities including Charles Manson, Marilyn Monroe, Tiger Woods, Joe Van Gogh (Vincent's son),

He writes songs about important issues of the day - True Revolutionaries, Gambling in Sports (he's a big baseball fan), Alien Abduction,  AIDS,  or Dan's first ten days as  President. 

Check out any of those songs and you'll see his imagination is not ordinary, and he's got music in his genes.


And Dan was Dan last night and everything he did  - including the introductions - was part of learning songwriting.  So I had no choice but to sing my intro, and while it was more talking than singing at first, I began to realize during the class that I've just had this image of me as not a singer all these years.  And there's no reason why I shouldn't liberate my inner singer.  Songwriter at least.

He also answered questions - about where inspiration comes from, writing groups, - with advice that's good for any creative process, like writing a blog even.  Like, you could write three lines (or three days) and when you hit the fourth, you nail it.  And have to toss all that came before. 

I first heard Dan long, long ago.  I'm not even sure, except it was at Loussac library and it was probably 1997 (When Dan Bern  - the CD came out.)  My son had heard Dan open for Ani DiFranco in Anchorage and essentially told us we had no choice but to go hear Dan Bern who was coming back to Anchorage.

And he was right.  By the last song of the evening - Estelle - I was in the zone. Such a wild and crazy adventure lament. (The link goes to a YouTube of it.  Still one of my very favorites.)  We've gone to quite a few Dan Bern concerts since, including the great pair of shows at Cyrano's November 25 (Mike, there's no year listed on the tickets, just the date).  In the last few years I haven't kept up with Bern's music so I'm looking forward to the Saturday night concert at Out North.  (There are concerts Thursday and Friday night too.  Check at OutNorth 270 8099 X 203.)

But I'm rushing this post out, even though it reflects my being tired, because there are still a few spots in the song writing workshop Tuesday night and Wednesday night.  While people are going to all three, you can go to just one or two.  Call Out North at 279-8099 extension 203 to get your space.  This guy is the real deal. 

If you look carefully at the second picture, you'll see we all got fortune cookies.  Our homework is to take something from the fortune and make a short song - use the fortune itself, or just one word, or the thought. 

I've put a lot of links to song lyrics (many of which have a 30 second audio clip and Estelle to a video and a lot can be found on YouTube) but this one - Art on the Run - seemed appropriate for a blogger who is trying to get this up so people can see it while they can still act on it. 

Take the best idea you got sprouting from your brain like cauliflower
Stick it in the microwave leave it for a quarter of an hour
Write poems on the freeway, write screenplays in between submitting faxes
Draw pictures at the Wendy's drive through window, on your way to do your taxes

Because you're not a child you're not a child
Days flash by, like numbers on a TV dial
Forget that novel, man; could be haiku is more your style

Making art on the run, art on the run, art on the run
Art on the run, art on the run, art on the run
Chopin in his Chevrolet and digital machine
Singing melodies while pumping gasoline
Picture Michelangelo with a briefcase and a beeper
When's the last time that you had a really good night's
SLEEEEEEP?   (All of Art on the Run is here.)

For those of you outside of Anchorage, he'll be in Palmer on Sunday.  And if you're Outside (of Alaska), here's his tour schedule.

Barbara, he'll be in Toronto October 18. 

It's late.  I'm going to open my fortune cookie now.

Let's see, do I write about loyalty or should I do one on numbers?