Aural Tradition (a rambling Fiddle Tunes Camp summary)

[shadesofmauve]

Bass player Tony Mates passes on the tradtion.

It's always good to have a second career option to fall back on. If anything goes wrong with my current path, I'm going to be a wino. And I'll be prepared!



That last night, after I played with the baby-Irish session, danced, and said goodbye to the guys of Entourloupe (who were very patient with my French, and fed me beer*), I walked from the now quiet 204 to the schoolhouse, and through the dark and dark of the schoolhouse to the second floor, where Ray and some other old timey musickers were playing on the sun porch, and the first hint of ruby light was showing over the cascades. And lit only by a spool of christmas lights on the floor, I played Old Timey music for the first time in my life, with old friends whom I'd never met. And we played the sun in. The last session of FiddleTunes.

At5:30 with the sun silvering the mist on the water and the tunes I'd never played before running through my fingers, hot coffee that appeared out of nowhere black in the cup, I hit a sweet spot, and Baby and I sounded beautiful. When true dawn came, and the sun hit the wall behind us, we even made 'You are my sunshine' sound fresh.

And then I had to go home.

It's been odd to be back, and I finally figured out that I'm just lonely. There isn't the bustle of the town at Fiddle Tunes, but there are people, music people, everywhere. There is always a fiddle or accordian in the distance, and someone else bleary eyed pouring coffee. If you wander around the campsites, people feed you. One teenage girl was apparently dropped off without any money for food, and the Mexican contingent took her in and fed her the whole week. One of the Mexican players was gorgeous, in a movie-star-old-enough-to-be-my-dad kind of way. I only found out the last night that though he has very little english and I no Spanish, we can converse almost fluently in French (Chucho's French being way more comprehensible than the Quebecois). But I digress.

The highlights of this Fiddle Tunes are the dawn session on the last night, the look on Dad's face when Marty Dahlgren started "I can't give you anything but love" and continued to improv on it for fifteen minutes, and certainly not least, playing tunes in the sun on the porch of the Colonel Bartlett house (We're sorry, Col-on-er-al Bartlett!) with Paul Marchand*, who is one of the most sensitive guitarists it's ever been my pleasure to share tunes with. And I suppose I can't leave out that hour sometime around 2 am, spent with Rich Levine, a bottle of wine, and whoever happened to pass by at the time...poor Rich.**

Interesting moments: Terri, Elizabeth, and I were discussing what made a good relationship. Elizabeth suggested a good bow arm, to which I objected that I don't want competition, I want an accompianist!***

In closure (for now) -

Folkies hug everybody.
Quebecois folkies hug and kiss everybody.
I miss it.

*The Quebecois faculty, or at least 1/3 of them, which is to say, Paul, are also responsible for the wine in the photograph.
**Rich Levine is an amazingly patient, soft spoken guitarist who's been accompanying faculty for FiddleTunes many times. He should never have to sit next to a half-drunk kid he doesn't really know, but life's unfair, isn't it?
***Accompianist? Is THAT what we're calling it now? *drunk chortle*