Music

Okay, so I wasn’t going to post until things settled down a little around here, but changed my mind due to a great concert last night.

As I previously reported, Mary Chapin Carpenter was performing in the area. I splurged on a ticket, and attended the concert last night.

It was held at the Weesner Family Auditorium (how Gayle and I used to joke about the name when we were very young—we’d make it really nasally and draw out the e’s: Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesner) at the Minnesota Zoo. This was my first time at the venue. I’m not sure I entirely approve of the location. As Mary Chapin herself pointed out, it is situated overlooking a lagoon, a prime breeding spot for “Chernobyl-sized” mosquitos (her actual words—she had a can of OFF up on stage with her). But the real issue to me is the animals. While I think the treefrog who joined the performance a couple of songs in, didn’t mind us, it was clear that we ruffled the feathers of at least one mallard duck. The duck, a female, started quacking loudly and sounded in distress. Then it suddenly dove into the open ampitheater and circled around and around trying to get out to the lagoon, even practically nose-diving into the performers. Finally it found a route through and landed safely in the water.

This is *NOT* the duck family I saw last night, but you get the idea...

This commotion occurred while Mary Chapin was discussing her new song “Mrs. Hemingway.” She started the song, but soon there was more commotion. I’m not sure she was even aware of what happened during the song. A line of maybe 10 zoo people clutching ducklings streamed down the far right aisle toward the water. They zoo-keepers walked out of sight, but by the next song, we in the right bleacher seats could see that Momma Mallard had been joined in her swim by her little ducklings, now trailing behind her. It seems to me that she had been trying to lead them to the water, but her pathway was obscured by some 1400 people. Ah well, I’m glad they made it okay in the end.

Anyhow, the concert was wonderful. Mary Chapin played a good mix of her earlier rollicking hits and more recent introspective pieces. Her latest album “The Age of Miracles” is terrific. I especially like the bonus track I got for purchasing at Barnes and Noble, “All the Sad Songs.” It’s a pity not all versions included this song.

“I Have a Need for Solitude” is another favorite. It really seems to fit me:

I have a need
For solitude
I’ll never be
Safe in crowded rooms
I like the sound
Of silence coming on
I come around
When everyone has gone

I have a need
For cool, verdant spaces
Beneath the trees
Secret empty places
Nobody knows
So no one will intrude
I have a need
For solitude

But you can find me, when the light is changing
At that time of day when there’s
Little day remaining
You can find me where I’ve been waiting
Waiting here for you

I never was
The pretty girl in school
I never was
Fast, tough and cool
All I was
All my life it seems
Was hard to love
Harder now to keep
But you can find me, when the light is changing
At that time of day when there’s
Little day remaining

I have a need
For solitude
I’ll never be
Safe in crowded rooms
I like the sound
Of silence coming on
I come around when all the rest have gone…

It also a perfect accompaniment for tonight’s INFJ Meetup…

I just found out my FAVORITE singer/songwriter is coming to town in July.  Woo-hoo!

Mary Chapin Carpenter doesn’t tour much anymore, but she’s got a new album coming out the end of April (Woo-hoo #2).  She sings beautifully and plays the guitar beautifully as well, but it’s her songwriting that really sets her apart.  She’s a national treasure.

This is one of my favorite songs.  She paints such a clear picture with the lyrics.

I’m a town in Carolina, I’m a detour on a ride
For a phone call and a soda, I’m a blur from the driver’s side
I’m the last gas for an hour if you’re going twenty-five
I am Texaco and tobacco, I am dust you leave behind

I am peaches in September, and corn from a roadside stall
I’m the language of the natives, I’m a cadence and a drawl
I’m the pines behind the graveyard, and the cool beneath their shade, where the boys have left their beer cans
I am weeds between the graves.

My porches sag and lean with old black men and children
Their sleep is filled with dreams, I never can fulfill them
I am a town.

I am a church beside the highway where the ditches never drain
I’m a Baptist like my daddy, and Jesus knows my name
I am memory and stillness, I am lonely in old age; I am not your destination
I am clinging to my ways
I am a town.

I’m a town in Carolina, I am billboards in the fields
I’m an old truck up on cinder blocks, missing all my wheels
I am Pabst Blue Ribbon, American, and “Southern Serves the South”
I am tucked behind the Jaycees sign, on the rural route
I am a town
I am a town
I am a town
Southbound.

This is the same band that did the famous treadmill video.

A Midwinter Night’s Dream by Loreena McKennitt

A nice mix of familiar favorites, traditional songs that had faded into obscurity, and beautiful new songs, like Snow (3:57). I also like the Eastern flair she puts on some of the better-known carols.

My dad is always looking back on the 40s and 50s as a kind of golden era (minus WWII of course). Today’s music, for example, can never compare. I’m not sure that this clip from 1944 proves his point musically, but the Ross Sisters sure were limber.

Some people like their taters Lyonnaise, some prefer French fries.
I prefer mine with mayonnaise, cole slaw on the side.

Solid potato salad, that’s solid salad, Jack,
Solid potato salad, boy, take a plate, fill it up, bring it right back.

Solid potato salad, and let’s have no Yak Yak
Solid potato salad, boy, take a plate, fill it up, bring it right back.

The farmer said to the spud, your skin looks slightly pallid,
So I’ll dig you later bud, with some solid…potato salad.

Solid potato salad, that’s solid salad, Jack,
Solid potato salad, boy, take a plate, fill it up, bring it right back.

Take a plate, fill it up, bring it right back.
Take a plate, fill it up, bring it right back.
Take a plate, fill it up, bring it right back.

Solid potato…salad, it’ll be so fine that you better latch on,
Solid potato…salad, whatever it takes get a plate before it’s all gone.

The farmer said to the spud, your skin looks slightly pallid,
So I’ll dig you later bud, with some solid…potato salad.
Solid potato salad, that’s solid salad, Jack,
Solid potato salad, boy, take a plate…fill it up…
Take a plate, fill it up, and bring it right back.

Thought I knew my mind like the back of my hand,
The gold and the rainbow,
but nothing panned out as I planned.
And they say only milk and honey’s gonna make your soul satisfied!
Well I better learn how to swim
Cause the crossing is chilly and wide.

Twisted guardrail on the highway, broken glass on the cement
A ghost of someone’s tragedy
How recklessly my time has been spent.
And they say that it’s never too late, but you don’t get any younger!
Well I better learn how to starve the emptiness
And feed the hunger

Up on the watershed, standing at the fork in the road
You can stand there and agonize
Till your agony’s your heaviest load.
You’ll never fly as the crow flies, get used to a country mile.
When you’re learning to face the path at your pace
Every choice is worth your while.

Well there’s always retrospect to light a clearer path
Every five years or so I look back on my life
And I have a good laugh.
You start at the top, go full circle round
Catch a breeze, take a spill
But ending up where I started again makes me wanna stand still.

Up on the watershed, standing at the fork in the road
You can stand there and agonize
Till your agony’s your heaviest load.
You’ll never fly as the crow flies, get used to a country mile.
When you’re learning to face the path at your pace
Every choice is worth your while.

Stepping on a crack, breaking up and looking back
Every tree limb overhead just seems to sit and wait.
Until every step you take becomes a twist of fate.

Up on the watershed, standing at the fork in the road
You can stand there and agonize
Till your agony’s your heaviest load.
You’ll never fly as the crow flies, get used to a country mile.
When you’re learning to face the path at your pace
Every choice is worth your while.

—Emily Saliers

I had never really listened closely to the lyrics until this week. I knew of the Indigo Girls back in high school, but was more of a hard rock/metal fan back then (with some country for variety!) There’s no way I could have appreciated it at 16 anyway. It kind of sums up my early thirties though.

Below is their performance on the Tonight Show in 1991. Worth it to see Jay Leno with dark hair, if for nothing else!

In keeping with this week’s theme of photos from years past I wanted to include one from me from 1991. I can’t find any though, so this high school graduation from 1992 will have to do. My sister Michelle is with me.