“The return of the economic destroyer in chief” (this obviously from a disgruntled Republican who has rewritten history).
“Limousine gridlock.”
The newspapers also get into the act. “Experts” who see the world through their lens and no other, have all the answers for what ails President Obama, the political parties, or the country as the second term begins.
Well, I refuse to play that Washington game. I have a son and four of his college classmates down on the mall today, and they are excited to be a part of history. Andrew and another friend from Washington have spent the last four days touring one friend from California and one from Vermont all around the city – hitting the hip neighborhoods, going to Evensong at the National Cathedral, watching the changing of the guard at Arlington Cemetery, viewing the L’Enfant plan for the city from Arlington House, seeing the museums. They’ve had a wonderful weekend, and they left early this morning – Candice’s turkey sandwiches in tow – to work their way through the crowds to get to the mall to be a part of history.
Inaugurations in the United States are amazing events, and not because of the spectacle. After one of the most expensive, nasty, and divisive elections since…oh, I don’t know, Andrew Jackson vs. John Quincy Adams (at least for the divisive and nastiness parts)…we have a peaceful transfer (or in today’s case, continuation) of power. When one thinks of how power transfers in many countries of the world, it is amazing that we’ve kept this going for more than 200 years.
So I join Andrew and his friends in their excitement today. There will be plenty of days when we can rail against the problems in this world. Today is for the optimists.
UPDATE: Twelve years out, I still don’t miss Facebook, and today’s news (January 8, 2025) is why. As Judd Legum put it on Popular Information, Meta Goes MAGA. Shameful. More to come soon on the Tech Coup of Democracy.)
Before the weekend is out, I will have deleted my Facebook account. I’ve contemplated this change for months. It is time.
Facebook has been great in making initial connections with people I haven’t seen for years. However, I’ve moved quite a bit from how I felt about Facebook three years ago. I will miss hearing from certain friends from across the world. But the changes Facebook has made to their privacy, news feed, photo – you name it – policy have made this a very different platform than I signed up for. I don’t like how Facebook now asks me, “How are you feeling, David?” Really? None of your damn business, frankly. In the end, it is more important that I be present in the moment.
I’m not going to write a long list of reasons why I’m saying farewell to Facebook. There are enough of those online, like here, here, and here.
And I’m not leaving the online world. Many of you know how to reach me at work or home via email (and my phone still works!) I will continue to write on the More to Come… newsletter, for those who want to know what I’m thinking in more than short — occasionally snarky — updates. You can reach me there if you wish. My wife, Candice, is still on Facebook and she promises that she’ll post my MTC writings to her page. I’m keeping my own Facebook page up for the next few hours just so I can post this so some of my online friends can see it.
“You start off playing guitar to get chicks and end up talking with middle-aged men about your fingernails.”
This is just one of the dozens of truisms, cogent observations, and laugh-out-loud lines found in Tim Brookes’ 2005 Guitar: An American Life. Candice gave me the book for Christmas, and though I finished it shortly after New Year’s Day, I’ve only now found the time to say how much I enjoyed this “part history, part love song” to the guitar.
I learned of the book last summer when I met Rick Davis, the builder of my two Running Dog guitars. Rick – along with a new guitar he built for author Tim Brookes – are featured in Guitar. After baggage handlers broke his Fylde guitar, Brookes turned to Davis to build him a new one. In alternating chapters Brookes chronicles the building process while taking the reader through an idiosyncratic yet compelling history of the guitar.
Since the book has been around for a few years, it is easy to find good book reviews online. I’ll content myself with simply repeating some of the great lines from this delightful read. Let’s begin with that fingerboard.
“I’ll often feel intimidated just by looking at the fingerboard. A fingerboard is a curiously disturbing thing, and not especially inviting, a combination of inscrutable rectangular geometry, strings one way, frets perpendicular. What about those inlays on the third, fifth, seventh, ninth, twelfth, fifteenth, and eighteenth frets, refusing to conform to any regular sequence, more perplexing than a Fibonacci series? ‘This is perfectly easy,’ the fingerboard says, ‘but you will never understand it.'”
Brookes, on a day when he has to have his snow tires taken off and his summer tires put on (he lives in Vermont), takes his guitar to the shop’s reception area and plays Django Reinhardt and Scott Joplin for the receptionist.
“When the tires are done and I stop playing, the two women break into smiles. ‘Very relaxing’ is the verdict. I’m tempted to hear that as ‘very boring,’ but I think, no, live instrumental guitar music probably is relaxing in the context of work, artificial light, the smell of artificial carpet and Naugahyde, oil and gasoline drifting in faintly from the shop. They agree that it beats canned music.
‘I’ve never had someone come in and play music in all the years I’ve worked here,’ says the receptionist, and I think, ‘What good is a guitar if you leave it at home?'”
And a final excerpt, this time around the question, “How do those guys play those chords?”
“Playing guitar is as much about the hand as it is about the guitar, perhaps more. Which is one reason why it’s a conservative art: the hand wants to conform to the shapes it knows. Advanced classical and jazz guitar ask the hand to make shapes it only ever makes during electrocution or in the last contortions of strychnine poisoning, which is why those guys develop spidery fingers – long, thin, oddly spread apart. The rest of us stick with the shapes we know, shapes that feel right.”
The guitar is an amazing instrument – simple, complex, versatile, fascinating – and I’m fortunate to have three wonderful guitars made by two luthiers of the highest order. If you have a life-long love affair with this instrument, or are just getting to know it, you’ll enjoy Guitar: An American Life.
On a bright, clear, and wintery Sunday morning — December 20, 1992 — two infants, each barely over 5 pounds in size, entered and forever changed our world. Of course, we didn’t know it at the time, because we wouldn’t learn of their birth from the adoption agency until the next morning. But when I heard that they were born around 11:50 a.m. (and Claire will know who came out first and how much older that twin is than Andrew), I recalled that at the very moment of their birth I was singing the ancient carol There Is No Rose of Such Virtue on the last Sunday of Advent.
Knowing that their birth mother could deliver at any time, we were certainly – in that Advent season — looking forward to those births. And we’ve been singing ever since.
Claire and Andrew came home with us on January 14, 1993. They received a royal welcome from friends and family, who decorated the house with balloons, left strollers and diapers on the front porch, and brought food over by the boat load. It was a good thing, because we were outnumbered. Twin infants and two adults…thank God the reinforcements arrived soon! (Candice’s mother was on the scene within the week, followed quickly by my Mom and sister Debbie.)
A good friend – and mother of twins – told us the story that on her girls’ first birthday, she took her nightgown – which she had rarely taken off over the past 365 days – and burned it in a rite of passage ritual on the backyard grill. We didn’t do anything so drastic in December 1993, but we certainly understood the impulse. What a handful twins can be when they are young!
Through the years it became obvious that we were blessed with two wonderful, talented, beautiful, and intelligent children. I can say all of that without sounding boastful because they don’t share my genes! But I can’t imagine loving any child – biological, adopted, step, or otherwise – anymore than I love these two beautiful people.
To watch them grow into the wonderful adults they’ve become has been the joy of my life. I remember each phase of that growth, knowing that it wasn’t always easy (for them or for us), but secure in the knowledge that they were surrounded by love.
Our traditional birthday celebration – once we got past the “invite over the entire pre-school” phase – was to go to a Japanese steak house for dinner. This began in elementary school, when Andrew and Claire visited their local restaurant while studying Japan. They thought it was the neatest thing in the world to see the chef toss an egg in the air, break it with his spatula, and then cook it right before their eyes. And the great thing about these guys…they were still clamoring for the traditional celebration when they were 18 years old. They have a wonderful way of holding on while still moving forward.
From day one, Andrew and Claire had their different personalities and interests. We always called Claire our “outdoors girl,” because she loved being out of the house. We still call her that today. Claire, the swimmer, is up at 6 a.m. to get in two hours of practice with her college swim team in an outdoor pool in Southern California before breakfast. As for Andrew, I always said that he had perfect pitch coming out of the womb. He loved music, melody, and rhythms, and we spoke of his “math/music” mind that got the theory but also the art. Every time he opens his mouth to sing – and he’s doing a lot of that in college – I am transported by what comes out.
When they headed off for kindergarten, I somehow knew that college wouldn’t be far off. But the time has flown by even faster than I could have imagined. My advice…hug, laugh, cry, savor every chance you get.
Claire and Andrew will be thankful that I’ll spare you many pictures of the middle school years. I’ve just included the one above because it captures us in 2004 – when they were 12 – with our old girl Lilly. Claire was the instigator of getting a dog, and Lilly – a Sussex Spaniel – was a big part of all our lives for about 9 years. Saying goodbye to her in 2009 was one of those life lessons that every child works through, but it was especially hard on Claire and Candice. Everyone loved Lilly, but they had special bonds.
Claire took up a strong interest in photography when she entered high school, and one of my favorite pictures of her is the self portrait above that she took in 2008. She has always had the most expressive eyes. As an infant, friends and family would comment on how those eyes would fix on you and capture you with their intensity and beauty.
I’ve often said I want to change lives with my children. Before they reached 20, they had traveled to South Africa, Sweden, Spain, Northern Ireland, Mexico, Costa Rica, and all over the US. Hell, I’d never flown in an airplane until I was in college! Life is different these days, and I’m so glad we were able to give them the opportunity to learn more about some of the other people who inhabit this planet.
So here it is, twenty years later. And guess who won’t be home for their birthdays. Yes, the crunch of exams and the desire not to fly cross-country on her birthday pushed Claire’s arrival home back a day. Once he heard that his sister wasn’t going to be around for their birthday, Andrew bailed as well and went to visit a friend in Boston. We’ll see them both on Friday, and who knows, we may even find ourselves in a Japanese steak house over the weekend.
As I was lamenting my fate of having the children out-of-town for their 20th birthdays, a very wise friend told me the quote, “When they’re little, you can manufacture quality time. When they’re older, you just need to be there when it happens.” This is a passage for Candice and me. But I do know that they will appreciate it when we are there for them.
So Happy 20th Birthday Andrew and Claire! You can’t imagine how you’ve enriched my life over the past two decades. I love you and can’t wait to see you on Friday – the 21st. I’ll apologize now for putting up these pictures you’ll hate and for telling the world how wonderful you are, but I don’t really mean it (the apology, that is). And I’ll end this post with the same song that brought you into the world.
If it is early December, you can count on “Celtic Guitar God” Robin Bullock heading up a holiday concert for the Institute of Musical Traditions. So tonight, Candice and I joined about 150 other traditional music fans for the 2012 edition of the IMT Celtic holiday concert.
Bullock was joined this year by Scottish champion fiddler Elke Baker and hammered dulcimer player Ken Kolodner. The evening was filled with traditional Christmas carols as well as Scottish and Irish old time music, all played with great enthusiasm and musiciaenship.
Baker and Kolodner played several beautiful duets, including two of my favorite holiday tunes: the haunting In the Bleak Midwinter and the French carol Bring a Torch, Jeanette, Isabella. All three joined together for extended sets of Cape Breton, French Canadian, and Celtic fiddle tunes.
However, my favorite parts of this concert each year focus around Bullock’s solo guitar work. Tonight he had beautiful arrangements of The Wexford Carol and a great mash-up of classical carols as played in the style of Mississippi John Hurt. But one of the most moving arrangements was of It Came Upon a Midnight Clear, where Bullock quoted the seldom-used fifth verse and opined that while it was perhaps seen as harsh, it still fit in these times:
Yet with the woes of sin and strife, the world has suffered long; Beneath the angel-strain have rolled two-thousand years of wrong; And man, at war with man, hears not the love-song which they bring; O hush the noise, ye men of strife, and hear the angels sing.
A wonderful night of great music. Enjoy the video below of Robin Bullock playing the Irish tune Lord Inchiquin at last year’s IMT Celtic holiday concert.
Three of the founding members of the pioneering urban bluegrass band the Seldom Scene gathered this evening in Silver Spring to pay tribute to their ailing partner: dobro master Mike Auldridge. Original Scene bassist Tom Gray, shown at left onstage with fellow alumnus John Starling, alerted me at this morning’s Farmers Market that the folks at the Maryland State Arts Council had added the tribute to their annual ALTA (Achievement in Living Traditions and Arts) Awards show as a way to honor Mike’s 2012 NEA National Heritage Fellowship.
The tribute came at the end of an entertaining and informative night.
The Old Bay Ceili Band from Baltimore opened with a spirited Irish set in memory of former ALTA award winner Joe Byrne, the late proprietor of J. Patrick’s Pub. Flutist Laura Byrne told of hearing the master traditional flute player Chris Norman while she was studying classical flute at the Peabody, asking him where she could learn to play that style of music, and being told to go to J. Patrick’s.
Then the current members of the Seldom Scene, led by founding member Ben Eldridge on banjo, took the stage to kick off the tribute. The first tune began with a recorded version of one of Mike’s beautiful Dobro instrumentals, with the live band and dobroist Fred Travers taking over on the second pass. Starling and Gray soon joined the other members on stage for a heartfelt tribute to their fellow band mate – who played with the Scene for 24 years – and the ground-breaking music they made together.
Starling’s voice was strong as he took the lead on Scene classics such as Dark Hollow. Mandolinist and fiddler Rickie Simpkins added his always tasteful licks throughout the set. Gray told the story of Mike’s slide guitar playing uncle Ellsworth Cozzens, who performed with Jimmie Rodgers in the 1920s, and then sang the Cozzens’ composition Treasure’s Untold. The full band ended the evening with the first tune the Seldom Scene played in public, the Vic Jordan instrumental Pickaway.
Auldridge was too ill to attend tonight’s tribute, but his presence was in the auditorium throughout the evening. His old band mates recreated the magic of his music onstage, musicians such as Mark Schatz were in the audience to pay tribute to his influence, and fans from across the region came together to honor a master musician and a real gentleman.
Thanks to the Seldom Scene – past and present – for a moving, meaningful, and music-filled evening. And to remember Mike’s playing, I’ll end with Auldridge, in a backstage moment, playing – what else – Pickaway.
On the Friday following Thanksgiving, we decided to spend the day in Los Angeles. We were on the west coast to holiday with our daughter Claire. Candice, Andrew, and I had flown cross country so we could be together.
The Los Angeles portion of the trip was one of those decisions made after discussing options that would appeal to the entire family. In the end, we toured a place that had something for everyone…but the family was kind enough to also allow me to indulge in a bit of roots music fantasy along the way.
The Getty Center was the place on everyone’s list. I was the only one of the four who had previously visited Richard Meier’s masterpiece of modern architecture set in the hills above LA, but we had enthusiasm on all fronts. Claire wanted to see the buildings and gardens, and instantly found the photographic exhibit on display as well. Andrew and Candice wanted to wander the campus and soak in Meier’s vision. I was eager to savor the passions everyone brought to the trip.
As soon as we walked onto the campus, Andrew began pointing out features of the building and the architect’s plan that built upon his modern architecture study in Spain last summer. We couldn’t turn a corner without Andrew or Candice commenting on the architecture – either the juxtaposition of the classic Meier white exterior with the rough-hewn travertine stone that helped set the campus in context, the wonderful view lines, or how the stone was generally set in squares and rectangles while the curves were executed in the aluminum cladding. Candice became a Meier fan when he designed the High Museum of Art (1983) while she was studying architecture in Atlanta. Andrew saw Meier’s Contemporary Museum of Art (1995) in Barcelona this summer and was eager to immerse himself in more of the architect’s work. Candice and I — who have both studied our share of architectural history — loved having a passionate guide in the family.
When we entered the photography exhibition, Claire’s passions took over. We all marveled at the Ray Metzker photographs of the city (usually Philadelphia or Chicago) and were glad to see the newest acquisitions of Robert Mapplethorpe’s works to the Getty collection. Claire’s photography training came to the fore as we discussed textures, lighting, and subject matter. I was reminded once again of what a special eye she has for lighting and composition as she called out features of both artists’ work that I simply didn’t see on first glance.
It is a wonderful thing to see your children (and wife) excited about their passions. And since we were on a day trip devoted to fulfilling our passions, I suggested we stop at a special place in Santa Monica to allow me to scratch a certain itch of mine.
I’ve written before about my desire to visit McCabe’s Guitar Shop in Santa Monica. It is one of those legendary music venues and stores in the roots music world. My fascination goes back to Norman Blake’s Live at McCabe’s album of the late 1970s. This album – recorded in the music hall at the rear of the shop – is a gem.
What has made Live at McCabe’s legendary among Blake’s fans is that it is the best showcasing ever of his flatpicking guitar skills. So much of Blake’s attention over the years has gone into other aspects of his music that it is possible to wonder why he is mentioned in the same breath as Doc Watson, Clarence White, and Dan Crary as one of the finest flatpickers ever. The reasons can all be heard on this great record.
So we pulled into a foggy Santa Monica, skipped the restored pier (because we couldn’t see it – or the ocean) and headed straight for McCabe’s. For the next 30 minutes, I roamed from room to room playing Martins, Collings, and Taylor guitars. In the last two years, I’ve bought a parlor guitar and a 000-sized instrument. I was amazed to find more than a dozen of these small guitars hanging on the walls, just waiting for me to pull them down and play a tune or two. Thirty minutes later (not wanting to push my luck with my patient family), I left satisfied that my two guitars were the ones for me. Thank goodness there was no buyers remorse after checking out a number of other options (after the fact).
One of these days I’ll get around to setting up a bucket list. And when I do, I’ll be able to check off “visit McCabe’s Guitar Shop.”
Friday was a great day to remind me of the joyous parts of following your passions. I was fortunate enough to indulge in three: great architecture, my family, and roots music. What a lucky man!
To leave this post, enjoy a bit of Norman picking Randall Collins and Done Gone with the Rising Fawn String Ensemble.
On Thanksgiving Eve, I’m continuing my recent tradition of posting pictures of the past year on More to Come… 2012 has been a year of healing, growth, and — yes — thanksgiving. We’ve worked through health issues, visited with an amazing group of friends from all around the world, spent time with our extended families, and savored the blessings we’ve received.
Claire and Andrew finished up their freshman years in college and have settled in to busy lives as sophomores on their respective coasts. Candice and I have adjusted to the empty nest, and are finding new richness in our relationship after celebrating 30 years of marriage. The photos below give a brief glimpse of all we’ve encountered during 2012.
Take your cursor and hover over the picture to pick up the caption. We hope you enjoy the photos, beginning with the one at the top of the post of the four of us on Christmas Eve 2011. As we enter this new holiday season, Thanksgiving blessings to you and yours.
Since I was young, I have been drawn to the 19th century utopian communities that seemed to spring up like wildfire across America. Rugby, Tennessee, was a place that sparked the preservation interest which would lead to my career. The Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill, Kentucky, has been a community I’ve visited numerous times and have always found fascinating.
So when the National Trust for Historic Preservation listed the Village of Zoar, Ohio, on its 2012 listing of America’s Most Endangered Historic Places and named it one of our National Treasures, I couldn’t wait to make a site visit.
Yesterday I joined colleagues and partners in this small Ohio village founded in 1817 by a group of German religious dissenters. The Zoar Separatists were persecuted in their native country for refusing to join the state-sanctioned Lutheran Church, and they immigrated to America with the help of English Quakers. Using funds borrowed from the Quakers, they purchased 5,500 acres on the Tuscarawas River (the mayor says you have to visit the town at least 3 times before you get the pronunciation right), and established the Village of Zoar. The village’s name comes from Lot’s biblical refuge (see Genesis 19) following his wife’s unfortunate demise into a pillar of salt after she looked back at Sodom. The residents of Zoar lived in their communal setting from 1817 until the 1898 dissolution of the Society of Separatists.
The current inhabitants of Zoar treasure what remains of the self-described “most successful Utopian community in America.” More than 40 historic buildings in the midst of a beautiful rural setting, the garden that is the centerpiece of the community, and the traditional street layout all come together to transport the visitor to the refuge of the Zoar Separatists. The 200 residents (down from a high of 500 in the 19th century) have worked to restore most of the historic buildings and support the events and tours of the dozen or so museum buildings that are owned by the State of Ohio.
So why, you may asked, is this place endangered?
The problem – as problems always are in utopias – is man-made. In the 1930s, a large levee was constructed along two sides of the village as part of a regional flood control project. The levee probably protected Zoar from sprawl as well as from the water that was occasionally impounded in the river when floods occurred in the region. Zoar was spared the fate of other nearby communities, which were bought and relocated, because even then it was known as a special place of high historical significance. For more than 60 years, all worked well.
But a 2005 flood that kept water impounded for more than four weeks resulted in water seepage through the levee, and a subsequent flood had the same result. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began a study to determine how best to deal with the issue. Among the alternatives that were to be studied – move or demolish Zoar.
So a man-made problem that was created because our government had the foresight in the 1930s to recognize the special nature of Zoar now threatened this unique place. Preservationists joined with the townspeople to spring into action, and the National Trust – where I work – elevated the issue beyond Ohio. Our team has been working closely with the Corps staff, state preservationists, the mayor and townspeople, and many others over the past months. I visited Zoar yesterday to see the work first hand, meet our partners and the key Corps staff, and to continue to raise the issue nationally.
I was encouraged. Everyone involved knows what the engineers and politicians knew in the 1930s – Zoar is truly a unique National Treasure. The groups around the table are working hard to find the right solution. Everyone wants to do right by Zoar and the vision it represents. Not only the vision of the Zoar Separatists, but the larger vision of living in a country that welcomes dissenters and allows them to thrive instead of living under the government-imposed sanctions of a king. It was why America attracted immigrants in the 19th century, and why we must continue to welcome immigrants in the 21st if we’re to live up to our ideals. A place like Zoar helps us remember those American values.
My very talented assistant — before her last day on Friday — put together a transition memo for her successor that I have taken to calling, “A Users Guide to DJB.”
The ten-page paper goes through recurring meetings (I have a lot), travel preferences (aisle seats, please), electronic filing (I do most of it from my iPad)…all the things that one needs to know about in the modern-day office. I was impressed.
But then Section #15 — the final one — is titled “Miscellaneous DJB Facts and Preferences.” Oh my…what would I find here?!
Well, the following are some of my favorites (while the other half have been deleted to protect the innocent):
Miscellaneous DJB Facts and Preferences
David’s wife’s name is Candice. Everyone spells it Candace, which is not her name.
David likes to drink unsweetened iced tea at lunch, and red wine at happy hour.
David does not like beets or olives. ( I underlined that one myself. She could have added that when he gets lunch, David tends to find one thing at a restaurant that he likes and he almost always orders that item when he visits that particular restaurant. It is easier than thinking!)
David likes honesty. If you have an issue, go to him with it. If someone else is having an issue that you can discreetly get fixed, go to him with it.
David dislikes rumors and confidentiality breaches. You are going to hear a lot of confidential information. Keep it all to yourself, and you’ll be the most valuable assistant around.
David is on a quest to visit every major league baseball stadium in America. Get him to give you a list of those he has left, and make suggestions of ones he could visit while on work travel – he’ll love you for it!
Today is Inauguration Day 2013. Cue the oh-so-tired Washingtonians.
MORE TO COME... 