All posts filed under: Random DJB Thoughts

NYC: Continuing a Spring Break Tradition

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This is a tradition that begins with an oft-told story. When Claire was in fourth grade, she returned home from school one day to announce that the teacher had asked everyone to tell the class what their parents did for a living.  So I asked Claire, “What did you say?”  She replied, “I said my father signs papers and goes to meetings.” In her own straight-forward, fourth grade sense of the world, she was correct, and I told her so.  But I also said that meetings and papers were not why I worked.  And from that conversation, the annual Spring Break trip to get to know Daddy’s world was born. A few weeks later I spoke to my then-boss and said I’d like to take one child with me on a trip during Spring Break to see the work of the National Trust.  Dick blessed the idea, saying he had done something similar when he worked in the White House. My rules:  it had to be a legitimate work trip where they could see some …

Nashville Skyline Rag

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The third installment of my “Music Fit to a T” series of songs honoring Tennessee doesn’t technically have the state’s name in its title. But it is my series, so who’s quibbling. Since my daughter Claire and I are heading to Nashville this week, I thought I’d include Nashville Skyline Rag as the third song in my tribute. The original came from Bob Dylan’s Nashville Skyline, but I primarily remember the song as the opening tune to every Earl Scruggs Revue show I saw in the 1970s (and I saw several).  I liked it so much that my high school and college bluegrass band also played a version of Nashville Skyline Rag. Given that this has become known as a banjo tune, it is fitting that I’m featuring a video with banjo pioneer Tony Trischka and the Czech bluegrass band (yes, you read that right) Druhá Tráva. So here’s a little Nashville Skyline Rag to celebrate Tennessee.  Enjoy. More to come… DJB

The Brand New Tennessee Waltz

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Jesse Winchester wrote The Brand New Tennessee Waltz for his first album, released in 1970 while still living in exile in Canada where he had moved to avoid the draft.  He wasn’t able to tour in the US until much later in the decade and isn’t as well-known as some other singer-songwriters. The Brand New Tennessee Waltz — the next edition of my “Music fit to a T” series — is a sad yet lovely song. Oh my, but you have a pretty faceYou favor I girl that I knewI imagine that she’s back in Tennessee And by God, I should be there tooI’ve a sadness too sad to be true But I left Tennessee in a hurry dearIn same way that I’m leaving you Because love is mainly just memoriesAnd everyone’s got him a fewSo when I’m gone I’ll be glad to love you Chorus: At the Brand New Tennessee WaltzYou’re literally waltzing on airAt the Brand New Tennessee WaltzThere’s no telling who will be there When I leave it will be like I …

Tennessee Plates – Music Fit to a T

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I’ve been thinking about Tennessee recently, as both Claire and I head there next week.  Claire’s high school choir is in Nashville for a series of concerts, and I’m heading to town later in the week for work and then to connect with Claire.  We’ll end the week with a short visit with family. With all that on my mind, it was appropriate that John Hiatt’s Tennessee Plates came on the iPod as I was heading over to school to pick up Andrew tonight.  I get a big kick out of John Hiatt, and I love this song. The original video I posted was a terrific acoustic version, but it has since been removed, so I encourage you to check out the version from the album.  To keep the good feelings going, I’ll make this the first in a series of “Tennessee” songs over the next few days.  I have a Facebook friend who is posting a series of videos entitled “Music in the Key of Joe” (as all the artists are named Joe).  So …

We’re not dead yet!

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Cynics (or my children) looking at last evening’s twin bill at the beautiful Strathmore Music Hall would be tempted to title the show, “We’re Not Dead Yet!”  In response, the current edition of the Seldom Scene (one original member) and the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band (with a whopping three of the five original members) could respond with the same motto:  We may be older than dirt, but we can still fill a concert hall! The Scene (photo at the top of the post) played first, with mandolinist extraordinaire Jimmy Goodreau sitting in on a half-day’s notice for the ailing Lou Reed.  This isn’t your father’s Seldom Scene…the vocals don’t match those of Starling and Duffey, and no one can play those Dobro licks like Mike Auldridge…but this is still a good bluegrass band.  Dudley Connell is an expressive lead singer, Ronnie Simpkins — who along with Goodreau was a long-time member of the Tony Rice Unit — can play bass with the best of them, and 70-year-old Ben Eldridge provides the link to the original …

Theatre Rebirth

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I knew that I had become my father when I found myself telling a friend a few years ago that “I paid more for my last car than I did for my first house.”  It was one of those lines that my father used when I was young – and here I was repeating it!  (Just to set the record straight, our now 10-year-old car wasn’t that expensive; it just happened that as newlyweds, we got a great deal on a 1910 townhouse that needed a lot of work.) Another story that I heard from my father when I was young was how he spent nights and weekends taking up tickets and serving as the back-up projectionist at the Franklin Theatre in his hometown of Franklin, Tennessee.  Daddy knew all about the movies and stars from that era, because he had a free seat. So it was no surprise to me that Tom Brown would be in Franklin last Saturday evening when the lights in the marquee of the historic Franklin Theatre were turned on …

2010 in review

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The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health: The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow. Crunchy numbers The average container ship can carry about 4,500 containers. This blog was viewed about 16,000 times in 2010. If each view were a shipping container, your blog would have filled about 4 fully loaded ships. In 2010, there were 68 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 329 posts. There were 207 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 385mb. That’s about 4 pictures per week. The busiest day of the year was December 20th with 145 views. The most popular post that day was Our Year in Photos – 2010. Where did they come from? The top referring sites in 2010 were facebook.com, netvibes.com, en.wordpress.com, happiness-project.com, and mail.yahoo.com. Some visitors came searching, mostly for monument valley, bratislava, farnsworth house, samuel beckett bridge dublin, and samuel beckett bridge. Attractions in 2010 These are the posts and pages that got the most …

Old-Time for the New Year

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The coming of the New Year is always a time to look back and look ahead.  I’ve done both the past couple of days as I’ve enjoyed seeing some new video of the “progressive” old-time banjo work of my buddy John Balch. John and I played together in high school and college under a couple of band names – the best one being The Fiery Gizzard String Band (which we used about 20 years before another band from the area took it up).  The name comes from a beautiful and wild area in the South Cumberland region of Tennessee that I’m pleased to say has recently been saved by my friends at the Land Trust for Tennessee (winners of a 2010 National Trust for Historic Preservation Honor Award). But I digress.  I’m talking about new style old-time music. John is a terrific clawhammer banjo player, with two stellar CDs out under his own name.  Clawhammer is known as an old-time style, but John’s music sounds as fresh and current as anything coming out in the …

18 Years, Yet Seems Like Only Yesterday

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Today began a new era.  Today was the first day after Andrew and Claire’s 18th birthday. The twins were born mid-day on a Sunday.  At the moment of their birth I happened to be singing There Is No Rose in the church choir for the last Sunday in Advent in 1992.  Because we adopted Andrew and Claire, we didn’t know they had been born until the next day after receiving a call from the adoption agency.  Eighteen short years later, Andrew, Candice and I were spending December 20th sitting in the Strathmore Music Center listening to Claire and her high school choir join the Cathedral Choral Society in a wonderful Joy of Christmas concert (blackberry photo at the top…don’t expect to see great detail).  It seemed a fitting bookend:  they came in to song, and they entered “adulthood” singing. When friends ask how it feels to be the father of 18-year-olds, I don’t offer any profound insights.  I usually say, “It seems like only yesterday…”  or “Time flies….”  The years and the associated memories have …

Running Dog Guitar Ought-3

Fretboard Journal: The 20th Issue

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The 20th issue of The Fretboard Journal showed up in my mailbox a couple of weeks ago.  Any time a big package shows up in the mailbox these days, the kids get excited as they wait to hear back on their applications to college.  But I’m the one who shouts for  joy when I see the package that turns out to be my favorite magazine. I’m glad to see The Fretboard Journal make it to 20 issues, as I wasn’t sure they could sustain this model.  But the editors keep putting out the best guitar porn on the planet, with stories about both players and builders. Readers who like North Carolina’s Avett Brothers will want to check out this issue.  As always, there are great introductions to builders and players I’ve never heard of (see the Joe Veillette article and his beautiful creations).   I enjoyed a Bobby Long piece about how Dylan’s Gibson J-200 on the front of Nashville Skyline (see photo at the top of the post) inspired a life-long passion.  Paul Mehling, founder …