The Hammock Papers: Headed north to Hayesville

28 March 2010

Headed north to Hayesville

Last night I went north with my buddy, Frazier, to see a bluegrass show at the Hayesville Opera House.

The drive was beautiful ... north through Mount Vernon (some of Ohio's most scenic landscape ... 100% rural), continuing along 13 through Bellville, Mansfield (our dinner of steamed mussels, striped bass, wild mushrooms over morel linguine was magnificent), and then over to Hayesville.

The Opera House was beautiful. Simple, low lighting. Hand-painted sylvan setting on the backdrop of the stage. Comfortable, wooden seats set in spacious rows, grinning fans aged eight to 80.

We missed the first band, but were fortunate to hear the second group, Copus Hill, perform a rousing set. Lively music played with virtuosity and heart. Their guitar player, a young man with a shaved head and a beard that would make a general of the Civil War envious, sang with such honesty and soul.

Here is a sample of his talent ...

The headliners, a group called Faces Made For Radio, were outstanding ... their bass player made it to the show despite being in a a car accident on the way!

One of the aspects of these traditional performances that I really enjoy is the choreography that must employed in order to share the single microphone the bands use. Some of the performers really get into their spins away from the mic as their band mate steps up, always in the center, to pick away!

There really is no way to fully appreciate the sound of acoustic instruments without hearing them in person. Last night was a wonderful time hearing amazing music in a beautiful space with a great friend. Thanks, Frazier!

One more from Copus Hill ...

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WOLFGANG AMADEUS MOZART

"When I am, as it were, completely myself, entirely alone and of good cheer – say travelling in a carriage or walking after a good meal, or during the night when I cannot sleep – it is on such occasions that my ideas flow best and most abundantly. Whence, and how, they come I know not ; nor can I force them. Those ideas that please me I retain in memory and am accustomed, as I have been told, to hum them to myself. If I continue in this way, it soon occurs to me how I may turn this dainty morsel to account, so as to make a good dish of it. That is to say, agreeable to the rules of counterpoint, to the peculiarities of various instruments etc. All this fires my soul, and, provided I am not disturbed, my subject enlarges itself, becomes methodised, and defined, and the whole, though it be long, stands almost complete and finished in my mind, so that I can survey it like a fine picture or a beautiful statue at a glance. Nor do I hear in my imagination the parts successively, but I hear them, as it were, all at once. What a delight this is, I cannot tell."

MARCUS AURELIUS

"Is your cucumber bitter? Throw it away. Are there briars in your path? Turn aside. That is enough. Do not go on and say, 'Why were things of this sort ever brought into this world?' neither intolerable nor everlasting - if thou bearest in mind that it has its limits, and if thou addest nothing to it in imagination. Pain is either an evil to the body (then let the body say what it thinks of it!)-or to the soul. But it is in the power of the soul to maintain its own serenity and tranquility."

VINCENT van GOGH

"What am I in the eyes of most people? A nonentity or an oddity or a disagreeable person — someone who has and will have no position in society, in short a little lower than the lowest. Very well — assuming that everything is indeed like that, then through my work I’d like to show what there is in the heart of such an oddity, such a nobody. This is my ambition, which is based less on resentment than on love in spite of everything, based more on a feeling of serenity than on passion. Even though I’m often in a mess, inside me there’s still a calm, pure harmony and music. In the poorest little house, in the filthiest corner, I see paintings or drawings. And my mind turns in that direction as if with an irresistible urge. As time passes, other things are increasingly excluded, and the more they are the faster my eyes see the picturesque. Art demands persistent work, work in spite of everything, and unceasing observation."

DAN CAMPBELL