I've said it before, but I don't mind repeating myself: it's a kick to hear 75 voices sing your song! I'm here with the Nelsen Middle School Concert Chorus from Renton, WA, directed by bandmate and dear friend Brian Hoskins and the only middle school choir invited to perform at this year's Northwest American Choral Directors Association Divisional Conference. They're including a revamped arrangement "Carry On" in their program, and I'm tremendously honored.
I know folks' eyes glaze over when they hear about kids' choirs, remembering the excruciating experience from when their neighbors dragged them to see their kids or the last saccharine offering from church. But this is different: these kids bring it, not in a nice-for-a-bunch-of-kids way, but in a real, present, 'wow' way. Brian chooses music from myriad cultures and traditions, which is nice both in comparison to other programs and given the diversity of the choir itself, a reflection of its hometown. They sing, they move, and we do our best to keep up in the backline.
Thanks, as always, to Don Shawe (1917-2007), whose story is the song.
As you may recall, WW Band member Brian Hoskins spends his days turning the voices of Renton's south-end youth into some of the most vital choral sounds you're likely to hear in a school auditorium. He sees nearly 300 students each day, spanning seven grades, including a Vocal Jazz Ensemble that meets beginning at 6:20am. Having just flown in from Chicago yesterday, I've dragged myself down to Lindbergh for a barely more reasonable 7:20 call to listen to the Ad Astra Choir take a crack at "Sing to Me," the song they commissioned me to write for them this year.
A few years back Brian had me arrange "Carry On" for his middle school group, a tremendous experience that has yet to fade away. But this is different: a completely new song, choral-focused from the start, for them; the group's one explicit request: tell a story!
We finish the second run through and one of the students I know fairly well tiptoes up to me. "Is it okay?" he asks. I nod. "It's just, well, you haven't said much that's been positive, and we're worried you don't like our performance of it." Oh, shoot... I'm blown away. The thrill of having sixty voices sing your song--a song they asked you to write specifically for them, no less--has knocked me over, and 'utterly blown away' (combined with feeble attempts to be an educator and offer workshoppy-feedback when asked) is reading as 'concerned.' I set everyone straight.
The evening performance is a gas...one great moment among many as the choirs give their last performances of the year. I tell Brian after: "I didn't hear anything that wasn't my own fault."
Though I can name many different musi-performance roles I embrace regularly and eagerly, this one caught me a bit off-guard: sole speaker at a school Veteran's Day assembly. Yes, you are correct: I am not now, nor have I ever been, a member of my country's armed services.
WW Band organ/keys player Brian Hoskins spends his days teaching choir (brilliantly!) in the Renton schools. A few years ago, his middle school kids premiered--and later reprised (audio/video)--my choral arrangement of "Carry On," a wonderful experience for me and nice tribute to the late Don Shawe, a World War II veteran and the song's inspiration. Many of those kids are now at Lindbergh, and Brian's Ad Astra choir chose to perform the piece (they all apparently remember it!) as their selection for the school's Veteran's Day assemblies. I, of course, happily agreed to accompany the group and perhaps say a few words about Don.
Somewhere in between, however, I became not just a component of the Leadership Class' program, but the featured speaker! So Don's life and words got center stage for a few moments this morning, along with my 'this is one story--every veteran and servicemember has his/her own (as do their families!)' disclaimer. So it goes...
Thanks to Brian and the kids for getting it up on its legs with such scant notice. I will never tire of hearing that many voices sing my song! (And honor Don and those whom his experiences represent...) And I will get to experience it all over again next spring as the LHS Ad Astra group has commissioned me to compose a new, original work for them to premiere! (More details coming soon.) Honored, excited...and ready to get to work am I!
A few years ago friends of mine had a baby, who emerged with an awfully-full head of sandy hair that at times seemed to showcase frosted tips. People often asked my friends which stylist they used for their newborn... If they had needed to go somewhere to trick out the little guy, though, they might’ve wanted to check out this place, my venue tonight for the fabulous first-Friday BeatWalk event. Holiday displays (buy! buy!) have displaced us (brought Dave and Erin along) from the front window, but there’s nice space in the back—only catch (aside from low visibility): one of the items for sale in the store is the classic egg-shaker, and the kids on hand’ve found ’em (more snare, Dave...).
Sat., November 15, 2008 Boise, ID: House Concert
A house concert just as it should be: good folk (& good food!) filling a good room. Great hosting helps, too...!
I suppose this is a good economy to have work (especially in my field), but I’ve been worried my scrambling around will lead to a slip-up sooner or later, and tonight it happens: I can certainly get by without the forgotten tuner, and could get creative without capos (capoes?) if I had to, but I didn’t askAmanda to come all this way not to be able to play the songs in her keys... Thank goodness this’un starts on the early side (and traffic wasn’t bad!), and perhaps the two new capo(e)s I now own will live in my car’s ashtry near the extra cable, mic stand, guitar stand, and D-I that travel with me after having at one time or another been a ‘forgotten item.’ Otherwise, nice show/crowd...!
Ah, the Hustle. Gotta show up now just to remind folk that I’m still around and at it. Kept plenty-busy this time running the Puget’s Sound Presents showcase room, playing numerous others, backing the versatile Rain Perry and former Leonard Cohen vocalist Julie Christensen (who also had original Stone Poneys member Kenny Edwards in tow—that was a fun collaboration!), stealing some baseball time with delightful roommate Pat Wictor, and avoiding the Crossroads Gun Club gathering happening concurrently. Not a lotta time left over for sleep...
Did learn this to pass along, however: if you’re gonna run from one showcase to another, flouncing into the second just a bit late to back up another singer, make sure the folder of charts you have is really full of your charts and some a similar manila folder full of someone else’s e-mail printouts. Just FYI.
Seriously? 85° & sunny...in Chicago?? With co-bills bailing left and right (is it me?), couldn’t ask for better last-minute luck than FARM-fatigued (Sandy) Andina & (Stephen Lee) Rich. And the guilty friends making up for a half-dozen years of blowing me off by driving from Lansing (where a mutual friend just got hitched) to catch the show doesn’t hurt, either... Nice room (is an annual visit now tradition??), sound, and crowd—I’m content! (UG records and streams shows there—check out the ‘Radio’ links if you like...)
“Almost too nice for church,” one woman says to me slyly while soaking in a ray or two on the stoop before the service. Hard to find strong fits with the Association Sunday plug—though community, as ever, abounds and folk’re willing to go with me—so what’s the harm in plugging my dear Reverend-cousin’s own work here? Now, off down the road...
Sun., October 5, 2008 Big Rapids, MI: House Concert
It’s a delightful family affair again, with one young removed-cousin wishing it were her show. Great visit, potluck, and after-excursion to the family farm...
Ominous to see a road sign pronouncing Flint, MI, “CLOSED” on the drive up (perhaps it referred only to a stretch of I-475...couldn’t snap a pic in time, though we’ll see how the ones of the giant, in-transit pumpkins turn out). I do love neat spaces, and the White Crow is certainly that!—converted church with stage, studio, teaching spaces, in-house store, and fearless cat. Veeerry mellow pace to the evening.
Well, I feel bad about this: I put a photo of the wrong “Boston to Austin” group on the poster—but hey, no one else made a poster... These B2A gals make a fine co-bill, as does the velvet-voiced, improv-skilled Robert (Sarazin) Blake, an old chum of Amanda’s...speaking of whom, after finally memorizing her new last name re: on-stage reciting, gotta start over with Erin. Interesting crowd/room tonight, but after so many Thursdays here we wanted to see what we might be missing.
In my family, it only takes once for something to become a tradition (in fact, I’d wager we have some ‘traditions’ that we’ve never actually carried out), so mychoice of shirt this year is an obvious one. And though they tried their darndest to get me double-time Saturday when the performer scheduled before me cut it close re: arrival time—and then effectively yelled “psych!” when the stage-power went out just as I was to go on (the blender from the smoothie-hut overloaded the breaker, I later hear...thought about announcing “smoothies on me!” during select others’ sets just for grins)—the extra slot comes Sunday when a projected no-show really doesn’t show... Nice to get at least as many positive comments on the performances themselves as the emcee work this year (I think folk’re just really used to bad emceeing at folk festivals...). Still a favorite event of mine.
Can’t believe they’ve let us do this for ten years! I’ve never seen a crowd so big for any UUCP summer service (others concur), and though Dad and I’ll happily claim it, I’m sure it owes for to the imminent departures of one-time UUCP Music Director Cathy Green and Gospel Sunday Celebrant (and co-founder) The Rev. and newly-Doctored (maybe newly-‘Doctorated’—no plastic surgery involved...) Tami Moore, headed to Oklahoma...along with the Sonics... Love it when they come to sing!
The best-laid plans... Drew up two sets tonight, plus a special five-song attention-grabber to insert whenever the mainstage show let out, but in hindsight I recognize two fatal assumptions: one, that we would have ample time/space to set-up; and two, that the esteemed mainstage headliner would not wrap before we were even underway (or all assembled for that matter...though nice of him to stick around for some of the set!). Once we settled some—which likely took me longer thaneveryone else given my personal makeup and the fact that I’d just come from a memorial service (R.I.P., Jim; glad to have known you)—’twas a nice evening in a fun room with a good (if occasionally over-enthusiastic) crowd. Whew!
People come to Seattle and remark: “Wow!—water and mountains everywhere!” But all through my first twenty-four hours here in Alaska I find myself exclaiming: “WOW!—water and mountains everywhere!!” What a neat, unpretentious event in a marvelous setting (as billed) where one can walk anywhere (even to the airport to hop a John Deere ‘bush-plane’ back across the bay) and a tremendous community feel (even before a ton of family showed up!). Can’t wait for my next excuse to head back!...though the daylight plays with the sleep schedule quite a bit...
My problem is that I don’t exaggerate like others do. I don’t drop ‘-est’ tags on everything, proclaiming each item I encounter in daily life the best, worst, or most-incredible thing ever, yet people shrug off my judicious superlatives as bombast or white noise just the same, assuming I’m like them in that respect (I’m not). I have, as folk point out regularly, a pretty good understanding of the English language, and if I need to use particular words—especially in writing—I will...so pay careful attention: whatBrian Hoskins is doing with his choir program at Nelsen Middle School is nothing short of remarkable and unlike any other comparable outfit in the region and likely beyond. What other middle school director is commissioning original works from internationally-renowned composers, flying others across the country (twice!) to deliver Gospel goods to people who need to be told, tackling works last seen by the Seattle Men’s Chorus...and premiering works by a local singer/songwriter who thinks he tells it like it is better than you do (he does)? What other seventh-grader gets to sing at Seattle’s Paramount Theatre without American Idol-style humiliation? What a gift to the community and to the lives of these students and families!!
A treat to hang with Pete Malinverni, Jody Sandhaus, Scott Warrender—and, of course, the kids!! Amanda joins for “Carry On”.
And a big raspberry to the punk(s) who bashed in the window of Pete’s and Jody’s rental car...
Again, if I could get these folks insurance (and convince ’em that their own abundant, additional undertakings should take a back seat) then I’d conscript all to WW band life full-time. Alas... Alicia opens with a set of her own and then the full outfit takes it the rest of the way for a nice house (and one local celebrity-type—who might’ve proved helpful at the other in-town attraction this evening) kept up past bedtime on an almost-springlike Thursday in the Northwest-People’s Republic. I’m happy to bring this group in any time; wonder if the film turned out...
Sun., April 20, 2008 Oysterville, WA: Oysterville House Concert
The entire community of Oysterville lies on the Register of National Historic Districts (and has since 1976), and my host (Oysterville gentry herself) has much to do with the town’s present presence and preservation (say that three times fast). Great crowd, enthusiasm, and all-around gig, and I much enjoyed the walking tour (Sydney and Nyel live in No. 13, across from the church) and visit afterward. I eagerly await a return: ‘Oysterville’ is not just a clever name.
The Crossroads contract reminds performers that “our audience takes offense to comments like ‘I can’t believe I’m playing a mall’ and other put-downs of the venue”—which is perfectly appropriate given the wonderful,previously-espoused live-music-model-in-unlikely-setting this particular mall has maintained for sixteen years—but you try keeping your cheeky, in-the-knowrhythm section in line for two full sets...on Brian’s birthday, no less! Good crowd as usual, and fun to debut a few new numbers/arrangements: Bon Jovi was meant to take the form of an acoustic waltz...
Not much one can do when the whole town has the flu... Still, sometimes the connection one makes to those in modest house-concert attendance—especially in such a strikingly-comfortable setting—is worth more than trying in front of scores in a noisy barroom. Fun, woodsy conversation before and after (learned about the Miner’s Cat), and figured this would be as good a time as any to attempt this forgotten chestnut, recovered a few days earlier whilst visiting an old friend who had unearthed a film from 2002.
Wed., April 9, 2008 Oakland/Emeryville, CA: Strings
What a cool model!: like other societies, etc., Strings members for their dues get great live music in a fabulous space and the chance to visit with one another at the regular events, hosted for fifteen years by one Joey Lent. Splitting a bill with Doug Blumer—late of The Westerleys and a truly great songwriter/entertainer/personality/presence—and pleased to be doing just that; nice pairing and fun night. These folk came to sing!
If the spirit and benevolence it takes to host a house concert aren’t asking enough by themselves, TrueWind hosts Bev Barnett & Greg Newlon are doing it mid-remodel...and hosting a potluck and post-concert song-circle too! (Well, the potluck helps when you have no operable kitchen...) Nice in-the-round grouping/sharing, but the highlight comes after when the gathering becomes an episode of This is Your Life ambushing co-bill Ginny Mitchell, who finally discovers that the amiable gentleman who has sat right in front of her all night is in fact the very fellow whose dubious cover band played her eighth-grade graduation thirty-plus years ago and whom she has been trying to track down for more than a year. Love it. And better than thelast time I was in-area.
Night Two with the fearsome foursome. Happy to pull double-, producer/performer duty, though glad to do it on the back end. Got all into road-mode and now I find myself back after ~26 hours.
PFS and my cronies with Seattle Folklore Society have collaborated some with bookings this season, and this month comes a special Portland/Seattle songwriters in-the-round billing in both cities: me; Val D’Alessio; Dan’l McIlhenny; and Joni Laurence. Always interesting to trace the musi-conversational thread in ITR settings—didn’t think we’d stay on goats for two full passes...
Yes, greater-Vancouver is effectively tropical Canada, but I still think all Canadians should know how to drive in the snow as a requirement for citizenship (though it is really coming down). Still, some hearty souls make it out to Pam Southwell’s welcoming abode—likely winding (or sliding) their respective ways there more efficiently than me (how many darned Dewdney Trunk Roads are there?!)—and a nice night is had by all.
Another Gospel-y MLK service with Rev. Jim-Bob at UUCP. Got a title this time: Guest Soloist (with the choir).
Sat., January 12, 2008 Seattle, WA: House Concert
Took away from the recent FAR-West conference the sense that house concert presenters want some video content...so I thought I’d film one. Thanks to Dustin Patterson (camera) and Alicia Healey (sound):
12/6/06 After a good-sized wait, Wes’ new Songs to Get You From Here to There album arrives, offering twelve original songs at home on the road.
11/7/06 The Concert Chorus at Nelsen Middle School in Renton, WA, premiers Wes’ own choral arrangement of “Carry On” to honor Veteran’s Day. Wes performs with the choir.
Another ‘regular gig’ in-the-making...especially if they let us do it twice a year! Dad and I are reprising last year’s service (with a new addition or two) for the Martin Luther King celebration. No summer potluck this time (just some good discussion), but rumor has it that Rosauers in Moscow may have Moon Pies...
So much I could write about the 18th International Folk Alliance Conference—overstimulating as usual, but 180° different from the last one of these I did (which is good!). Suffice it to say for now, at least, (I’ll maybe add more stories later...), that to be in Austin when the story broke that our beloved Vice President had shot—in the face—a man from the Texas capital was worth the trip alone.
“Lunch With Folks” host John Sincock couldn’t get Folklife ‘headliners’ Jay Ungar & Molly Mason on the show, so the interview-call fell to me (plugging tonight’s set)—not bad company for finishing second...
“What kind of music does this stage usually feature?” asks Gerhardt, the amicable emcee for the McCaw Hall Cafe Impromptu stage this evening, who, it appears, can somehow sense that I’m the type who knows what’s coming in environs such as this. “Um, ‘white-people’ music,” is my cheeky-but-overly-honest reply. In stitches, Gerhardt decides against working that into his shtick. So begins another year of singer/songwriter stages at Fabulous Folklife...
There may be a certain irony to my hosting a “Live Music in the Community” panel discussion—for which a number of articulate and qualified members of the ‘community’ hold an open discussion about how to sustain our venues—in front of precious few souls. But it’s early!...and it appears it might rain... Deep thanks to John and Micki Perry (Three Rivers Folklife Society), Sandy MacDonald (Seattle Folklore Society/KBCS-FM), Reggie Garrett, and Joshua Powell (The Vera Project) for their participation.
Sun., June 4, 2006 Everett, WA (Posession Sound): KSER Adventure on the Sound
My good friends at KSER 90.7-FM have asked me to appear on this benefit cruise aboard the stunning schooner Adventuress. A short set singing is gravy to get to wander the deck (and below!) of this 74-foot beauty, built in 1913. The whole Sound Experience crew do a nice job with we community-radio-types, and I learn upon disembarking that one of the hands is an old colleague of my mother’s, well-disguised in the out-of-context encounter: big boat, small world...!
TSA has had a thing for me lately. I don’t mind the searching of my beat-up blue duffel bag every trip, but slicing the cord on my cell-phone charger in two (quite cleanly...)??
Luna’s is a nice little spot in downtown Sacramento, though I realize we’re in trouble when the posse splitting the bill with me pulls up its second pickup with the full drum kit. Pleasant, supportive turnout, though, and Scott Rodell & co. prove a fun pairing...especially given the double-‘Dell’-bill angle.
105°-weather is a tough sell for most, but throwing a heavy canopy on top and asking a fellow to sing three sets on a dusty beer-garden stage with competing-activity loudspeakers on either side makes for quite the scene... But you gotta love a fair.
Phone’s ringin’, dude. “Are you back in Seattle,” asks KSER Music Director (and charming citizen) Ann McCoy; I answered that I was. “Wanna come on the radio with me tomorrow?” Can’t turn that down. Ann is always a hoot—anyone listening the time I was on with Jencks and she suggested that Joe called me ‘Wishbone Wes’ (his blues-sideman name for me...that he’d just thought up) because I had “that microphone jammed between [my] legs”?—but she’s also thoughtful and attentive in ways that frequently lead to great interviews. I enjoyed the chance to talk about my specific style of guitar playing and the ways in which I use it to fill space as a solo performer, something I don’t get to do much in the standard ‘where-you-playing-next?-okay-sing-us-a-song’ visits. Once again, thank goodness for KSER!
After last Sunday’s fair-sweltering, the low-80s-clear-with-light-lakefront-breeze setting for today’s set is confrontationally pleasant (Larry Murante, performing later in the day, will threaten to ‘never leave this stage!’ in the middle of his performance...which itself was awfully pleasant, too). And I’m getting some fun interactions with passerby-listeners: one fellow takes me aside (an awkward undertaking when I’m onstage performing) after“Happiness Fulfilled” (the ode to Virgin-Mary Gilled-Cheese) to share that he and a buddy had sold a Cheeto resembling baby-Jesus to GoldenPalace.com, buyer of the famed sandwich (the Cheeto, it appears, sold for more than 1,000-times less $$...). And another gal working with boats nearby really gives me looks during“Ballad of the Whitman Greeks” —a song that often gets quizzical attention in festival environments where folk-in-motion may not have heard the intro—turns out she’s a Whitman grad herself. An utterly comfortable day!
I thought I was being so clever arranging “Running On Empty” and “Born to Run” for my appearance this (early!) morning at the SEAFAIR Marathon (“Born to Run” is tough for solo voice/guitar...!), but when the contract specifies your performance location as a four-block stretch of road (“Look for the orange traffic cone...”), one ought to keep expectations in check. To be sure, there were plenty of other distractions—including intermittent traffic going up the other side of the road (and let’s not forget the focus and stamina it takes to get 8+ miles into a marathon!)—but I think I coulda played anything for the hour and received the same response (which was exhaustedly-cheerful when it wasn’t sweatily-apathetic)...
After eight years, how you improve a comforting summer ritual of singing and chicken-potluck? Why, with mini-Moon Pies and Pecan Tarts, of course! (Some great guest combos and inspired solo selections help, too...)
In 1893, Frederick Jackson Turner published his famous essay entitled “The Significance of the Frontier in American History” in which he proclaimed that the American frontier was, for all intents and purposes, closed. “To the frontier,” he wrote, “the American intellect owes its striking characteristics.” But now, 113 years later, true closure has come to the subject with my discovery of the, um, closure of Richland’s marvelously tonk-ish Frontier Tavern. Progression, we remember, does not always bring progress.
The rest of the festival, of course, is its usual, delightful self. The folk at Three Rivers Folklife Society really know how to offer an event accessible to all: good food, company, and tunes abound as the mighty Columbia rolls along nearby. To have been selected to perform with such a particularly deep field in the Songwriting Contest is itself an honor, and to emerge as the winner, with “Carry On” judged the top song on the subject of community, makes for a truly great weekend.
I’ve admired Larry Murante’s singing and writing for years, and it’s a treat to share an evening with such a talented and heralded performer. Also fun to collaborate: I think we may have respectively peaked with our guitar-and-djembe rendition of A-ha’s ‘classic’“Take On Me.”
Fun to return and play a quick opening set here after Tumbleweed in the cozy (and revamped) Highland Grange Hall, and back R&M intermittently the rest of the evening. Also great to catch a quick visit with John and Micki Perry, go-getters and lifeblood of the Tri-Cities’ Three Rivers Folklife Society.
Earlier this year my good friend Brian Hoskins, choir director at Nelsen Middle School in Renton (and organ player on Songs To Get You From Here To There), asked me to arrange “Carry On” for his concert chorus, with the idea that we would perform as part of the school’s efforts to honor Veteran’s Day. And finally, after weeks of working with the kids (and arranging the song before that, fun and challenging exercise well outside my usual work-realm), the performance date has come. STGYFHTT cellist Amanda Larson and I will be the only accompanyment—unless you count the complimentary slide show put together by Nelsen’s multimedia classes, featuring this picture of Don Shawe, the song’s inspiration—and, I must admit, it’s a real kick to hear ~70 voices singing my song!
The response is overwhelmingly positive—also nice!—though I’m still unable to shake the subtle-but-persistent worry that the ‘wrong’ hands might someday find this song: the narrative of Don’s experiences as a B-17 bomber pilot in World War II is decidedly not a these-colors-don’t-run offering. Many gracious interactions follow, as do three more performances for the Nelsen Veteran’s Day Assemblies the next morning. Brian has done remarkable work with his program (I told the largely-parent crowd this, repeatedly), and it’s truly been an honor to do this!
December 8, 2006 Everett, WA: House Concertwith Joe Jencks
Haven’t seen Joe since our Austin collaboration, and I’m glad that we can squeeze tonight’s event into his visit—my first with the NEW CD in hand! Ed Bremer, a great KSER personality and advocate, and his wife Lucia expertly host an awfully pleasant evening of song and visit.
Songwriting Contest Winner 
