Elves invade Folklife, film at 11

[annathepiper]

I have been in a very strange, very stressy state all weekend. This is not a terribly good state to be in when Folklife is going on--and at the same time, having Folklife going on is actually a pretty damn fine antidote to stress. solarbird and I have attended the festival for the last two days now, and both times, it's been pretty awesome all around.

We'd already decided to do the Celtic Band Scramble again this year, although I almost backed out of it due to my weird frame of mind. I waffled back into it though and I'm glad I did. Even if it turned out that this year, there were only six, count 'em, SIX people in the Scramble--so we had only the one band, myself and Dara and four other people.

On stage, we wound up doing three songs; "Old Black Rum", an instrumental cobbled together from a couple of ditties the guy with the recorder knew, and something called "Maid on the Shore" that the other guitarist in the group knew.

I went first, with "Old Black Rum". And lest you not grasp the significance of this, people, I sang a Great Big Sea song on a stage at Folklife. In front of actual people. To wit: EEE! The only possible way that could have been any scarier is if members of Great Big Sea had been in the audience. Or maybe on the stage. Yeah, that would have been scarier. And by scarier, I mean "the coolest thing in the HISTORY OF TIME". I think I babbled out something into the microphone to the effect of "this is a song by a band who's way better than we are, and I hope we do it justice; it's called 'Old Black Rum'".

The instrumental was way shakier than it should have been, in no small part because the recorder guy played the A part for an extra time through and I changed keys on Rags too damned early. Oops. But I did figure it out and I did keep going because On Stage Now Can't Stop. Again, EEE!

"Maid on the Shore" was last and that went better, and it wasn't a half-bad little song. Kind of a downbeat thing to end on, though, and I hadn't really had time to pick up enough of the lyrics to sing along much with the other guitarist. But all in all I was pretty damned pleased to be up there on the stage with my little Rags.

However, today's activities were even more awesome than that. For the first time in our lives, Dara and I busked.

We did every GBS ditty I could play and sing at the same time ("Old Black Rum", "Lukey", "Mari-Mac", "Trois Navires de Ble", and "Jack Hinks", with one attempt to go through "Goin' Up" even though I'm still kinda shaky on the lyrics), Meg Davis' "Elf Glade", and several of Dara's pieces. People stopped to look at us. One girl went WHOOP as I was belting out "Elf Glade". A couple other young girls sashayed past us in the middle of one of Dara's flute pieces... and another one made an elaborate point of gifting us with a stuffed horse toy which she laid in the case.

That was pretty neat, even though it turned out that the toy had been dropped by some poor kid whose mother recognized it when they went past later. So of course we let the kid have the horse. But we were kind of sad to see it go. ;)

And we actually were given MONEY. A couple of older folks made a point of hanging around to listen to entire songs, too. Dara's pieces got the best attention in general, especially when she whipped out Splinter, the big flute. We made a whole $6.50, just enough to buy me a piroshky. Hee!

We're going to do this again next year. Maybe even more formally. I've already told Dara that if we're doing that, I need a guitar with more muscle to it. Rags is a scrappy little guitar, but just does not have the carrying power to busk at Folklife. And if we get on a stage again... well!

So yeah. Busking at Folklife: AWESOME, with a heaping helping of WIN on top.

ETA 5/26/08 8:42am: Oh yeah, we played "Captain Kidd" too while we were busking. I left that one out!

Comments

[ceallaighgirl.livejournal.com]

Ooh, "Maid on the Shore" as in "There was a young maiden who lived all alone, she lived all alone on the shore oh . . . "? I LOVE that song. Great versions by Stan Rogers as well as Eliza Carthy! :-)

Also good to know you didn't get shot.

[annathepiper]

That's the one, yeah. The other guitarist dude specifically mentioned Stan Rogers as his source for the song. :)

And yeah, we apparently left before the brouhaha with the shooting! To wit, massive relief there. Dara and I read the full article that went up about that on seattletimes.com, and saw that the dude apparently was being a jackass during a fight he was having and whipped out his gun with the intention to pistolwhip the guy he was fighting with, only to have it go off. Hopefully they'll yank his concealed carry permit. Permanently. You pull that kind of stupidity at a festival, you do not get to carry a weapon.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Yeah. If gun clears leather, it's because you're prepared to use it for its intended purpose, and (a) you'd better be able to prove to the jury that you killed the guy because you reasonably thought he was about to kill you, and (b) you darn well make sure of your target and its backstop.

*sigh* this was wrong from the getgo; yes, his CCW is toast for keeps, as is any other licensage that requires good moral character, and his right to vote. Heck, depending on how they classify the victims, he could be a three time loser right here. I wouldn't be too sorry to see that happen; the Charles Schumers of the world are gonna seize on this and scream "SEE LOOK WEAPONS BAD BAN BAN BAN AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH THE SKY IS FALLING!!!!!" and frankly, he should bear the full brunt of that karma.

(What needs to happen Real Soon Now is for some duly licensed carrier to interrupt an armed robbery *and not have a shot fired*, just calm, cool, collected, freeze, m-f'er, put it down real slow, on the ground, c'mere and tie him up and call for the fuzz... and have it get LOTS OF PRESS.)

[annathepiper]

Soon as I saw that news item come over the Breaking News email list for the Times, I was all "DA HELL?!" So yeah, glad to have missed that then!

But yay Wiscon! I've seen rumblings about that on some of the blogs I follow, and I'm delighted to hear you've been having a good time. And yay for coming back with books!

[ceallaighgirl.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Stan Rogers definitely has an awesome version (it's on his Northwest Passage album). It's originally Irish.

Pistolwhip a guy??? What a moron. And for it to accidentally go off . . . geez, if you don't know how a gun works, you shouldn't be carrying one.

[annathepiper]

Cool, I may have to see if I can find that album then. I'd already wanted to find one of his just because there's a Heather Alexander recording of "Witch of the Westmereland" that I really like, and I wanted to hear his version.

And yeah, the magnitude of stupidity of the guy with the pistol is just staggering!

[ceallaighgirl.livejournal.com]

I think you'll really like his music. If he was alive today, I'd totally marry him just for his voice.

[annathepiper]

Hee, well, that's a ringing endorsement. :) I'll add that album to the other one on my wishlist!

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

I really like that icon.... it's got a lot to say. :)

[ceallaighgirl.livejournal.com]

Why thank you. (And unlike the guy at the Seattle Center, I don't accidentally shoot people.)

[framlingem.livejournal.com]

"Maid on the Shore" downbeat? You need to hear the Hadrian's Wall version. It's BRILLIANT.

Also, I love buskers. I'm glad you had a good time doing it.

[annathepiper]

The way we wound up doing it, yeah, it was kind of downbeat. (And I admit to a tiny glimmer of disappointment that we didn't close with "Old Black Rum". ;) ) But I'm willing to be sold on a perkier version! It was a pretty solid song anyway!

We'll see if we can do more of the busking thing at the local Farmer's Market as the summer progresses, too. Which would be full of awesome, albeit smaller scale than Folklife!

[cruisedirector]

So please tell me someone took video of this!

[annathepiper]

Video may well have been taken, but sadly not by Dara or me! We were too occupied playing stuff on the stage, and we didn't have anybody with us who could have shot something from the audience.

If we do this more formally next year, we'll have to remember to station somebody with a digital camera!

[solarbird]

I even brought my stupid microrecorder and didn't turn it on, being too involved with the actual performing and stuff.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Hopefully your voice is not totally shot.... :)

but, YAY! PONIES even! :) (Even if they ran away.... ) And Piroshky!

Now you see why I wanna do a 2x10 with the jammers at Conflikt? :)

I still think Rags is an excellent instrument _for you_ for filking and jamming.... but then a lot of performers use different guitars for different things. But, yeah, something specifically set up for onstage (which would also be useful for laying tracks) would definitely be useful.

It's a port of call, home away from home for songwriters, hustlers, entrepreneurs and wanderers. Humans and strings wrapped in five hundred tons of bricks...downstairs off Fremont Avenue.

It can be a dangerous place, but it's our last, best hope for music. This is the story of the last of the indie guitar shops. The year is 2208. The name of the place is Dusty Strings.

:) :) :) :) :) :)

[annathepiper]

My voice is less shot than I would have expected, actually. :)

Re: Conflikt... heh. I'm not opposed to playing there, though that's a little far out for me to think about planning that right now. Thinking about busking with Dara at the LFP Farmer's Market is about more my speed at the moment.

Rags is a delightful instrument for jamming, sure--in the relative quiet of my living room, or at a housefilk. In a bigger and more crowded environment, though--not quite so much. Especially at Folklife, where we had to compete with much louder nearby sources of music. And hell, Dara was frequently drowning me out on the mandolin. So yeah, for those situations, I'd need something with more oomph.

And heh, yeah, if I sell something, I'm totally going to Dusty Strings to see if I can get me another guitar. Or maybe wherever Betsy went to get that delightful new baby of hers!

[solarbird]

The "several of Dara's pieces" were "Thought You Knew," "Leaffall," 「桜木町」 ("Cherry Tree Station"), "Dream of an Incomplete Flute," one attempt at 「もののけ猫」("Spirit Cat") on the wrong flute (b/c I did not have the right flute with me), and I even broke into "Militant's Song" for about a minute before remembering that oh yeah, I have no idea how to end this yet.

[media-babe.livejournal.com]

Woot! Maybe next year I can join you with the busking and we can do Mari Mac! ;-)

[annathepiper]

That would be AWESOME. :) And the busking proved surprisingly easy to arrange--all we had to do was show up and claim a spot and start playing! You only have to register with the festival if you're actually selling CDs.