July 16, 2011 Harry Chapin Memorial Concert

On a beautiful summer’s eve, the Chapin family came to pay tribute to Harry Chapin on the thirtieth anniversary of his tragic death. The overflow crowd exceeded anyone’s expectations. There was a sense of the wonderful in the air. If tears were shed, they were shed privately. Instead, the Chapin family—Tom, Steve, Abigail, Lily, Jessica, and Harry’s daughter Jen—all performed lovingly both Harry’s songs and their own, each capturing the spirit of Harry that lives on through Long Island Cares an organization that he founded, on a stage in Huntington’s Hechscher Park, named after him, the Chapin Rainbow Stage, to an audience who grew up on every song. The whole night made you wonder how much goodness can be compressed into one family who continue to give so much to the larger community. At a time when the nation as a whole seems so polarized and hostile toward the plight of the poor, demands cynically that the poor pay their fair share, and hands out generous tax breaks to the richest one percent who give so little, you grow more fond of Harry who donated a third of the proceeds from his concerts to social causes. It is no wonder that he posthumously received the Congressional Gold Medal for humanitarian work. If there were more like Harry in the world, and fewer like David and Charles Koch, how much better off would the country be? Songs like Taxi and Cat’s in the Cradle, W*O*L*D and Circle brought Harry back to life if only for an evening.

July 10, 2011 Acoustic Long Island’s Annual Outdoor Summer Concert

On a beautiful summer night with the stars visible in the sky and the Deepwells Mansion acting as stage and backdrop, Acoustic Long Island held it’s sixth annual free outdoor concert featuring Reed Waddle, Nini and Ben, Miles to Dayton, and Ari Hest. Dave Dircks, the heart and soul of Acoustic Long Island, characterized these musicians as the best of the 2010-2011 concert series. It is only the hard work of volunteers like Scott Posner and Billy Alexander, the two backbones of Acoustic Long Island, who make this outdoor event possible.  Reed Waddle, who, opened up the night, is great in a small space, but seemed overwhelmed and swallowed up on the stage. At first, I blamed it on the outdoor venue, which can be tough on musicians since you can’t control the acoustics and the sound system to deliver, but I was wrong. Nini and Ben came out with more drive and power with Nini’s voice soaring. While they never achieved those wow moments, what the crowd heard was a very talented band with an excellent vocalist in Nini and a strong song-writer-guitarist in Ben. They were followed by Miles to Dayton who exploded onto the stage. No sooner did they hit the first note than the crowd was riveted, proving that any criticism I had of the sound system and the outdoor venue was false. Miles to Dayton demonstrated the power of having two accomplished vocalists Jonathan and Krista Preddice with their impeccable harmonies and with having two backup singers, Leanne Preddice on violin and Dave March on bass. The blending of Jonathan’s guitar and Leanne’s violin, and the ensemble’s non-stop energy held the crowd in their hands for every song in their set. Ari Hest closed out the evening. At first, I feared that having Ari follow Miles to Dayton was a mistake, but Ari’s melodious voice with his tremendous range moving from deep bass to falsetto was commanding, his ability to connect with the audience through simple story telling compelling, and the warm sensitive nature of his songs such as Cranberry Lake, Bird Never Flies, and I’ve Got You served as the perfect coda to a wonderful evening.

July 1, 2011 Steel Pulse

Prospect Park hosted Steel Pulse for their Celebrate Brooklyn summer concert series and what a concert it was. The band played with energy and excitement for two hours of non-stop music that was sublime, political, spiritual and inspired. At a time in our nation’s history when we are hearing from schlock politicians preaching the oppression of the white race and  religious extremists falsely predicting the Second Coming of Jesus, Steel Pulse radiates a joyous political quasi religious fervor that makes you want to believe in the goodness of mankind even when faced with real, instead of imagined, oppression.  From the opening note, a festival size crowd of every color and hue was up on its feet dancing, waving, and lifting colorful handkerchief engraved images of Bob Marley into the air, as David Hinds pranced and danced across the stage singing all the crowd favorites Ravers, Roller Skates, Chant a Psalm, Worth His Weight in Gold, Earth Crisis, Blues Dance Rave, Bodyguard.  With Steel Pulse you always get the full reggai rastafari experience: the wailing guitars of David Hinds and Basil Gabbidon, the driving bass of Amlak Tafari, and the soaring keyboard of Selwyn “Bumbo” Brown and Sidney 'Predator' Mills. David Hinds never lets you forget that it’s not all about the music, but about the fate of the world’s suffering oppressed people. The concert ended with Hold On 4 Haiti, a song about the forgotten earthquake victims in Haiti where over 200,000 people were killed and where cholera is killing tens of thousands more.  The proceeds are going to the Solar Electric Light Fund. Bob Marley would be proud.

June 18-19, 2011 The Clearwater Great Hudson River Revival Festival

The annual Clearwater Great Hudson River Revival Festival at Croton on the Hudson was held this past weekend. It is that unusual eclectic mix of activism, music, food and vendors that has come to characterize it. The demographics of the attendees speaks volumes about the reach and scope of the Clearwater Festival: families with children in tow, young people, old people, people with disabilities, veterans, and activists. The festival has something for everyone--story tellers, children’s music, folk music, rock music, dance music—all going on at four separate stages around Croton Park with the backdrop of the Hudson River and the Hudson River Sloop the Clearwater's noble symbol of the organizers' ongoing effort to remove toxic PCPs dumped by GE into the river. There is variety of food spanning the global palate and vendors selling wares of every nation, activists’ booths educating the concert goers to everything from local issues like the Hudson River clean up, the aging Indian Point nuclear reactor, the proposed fracking for natural gas in New York that threatens our water supply, to world issues like the four wars our nation is currently engaged in as the economy sinks toward a new recession or worse. Of course, it is the wide variety of music that draws people forcing the concert goers to make choices they’d rather not make with so much going on during the same time slot. On Sunday, when I was there, the listeners were torn between John Sebastian, James McMurtry or Joe D’Urso; Jorma Kaukonen, Tao Seeger or Buskin and Batteau; Suzanne Vega, David Amram or Jeffrey  Broussard and the Creole Cowboys. How do you choose?  Like a fool I ran around trying to get a taste of everyone. I was disappointed by John Sebastian whose voice has seen better days, lifted up by James McMurtry with his driving sound, mesmerized by Jorma Kaukonen fiery fingers, vaguely interested in Suzanne Vega who has become the standard bearer for Carson McCullers, wished I had spent more time with the Creole Cowboys, and ended the night with Drive-By Truckers who have captured the unique voicing and intonation of Richard Manuel as they eloquently sang about the hardscrabble life that typifies the heartland of America. All in all, the Clearwater Festival was a great success thanks to Pete Seeger who proves that the total of a life can be greater than the sum of its parts.  

June 04, 2011 War Horse

For any of you who want to have a thrilling theatre experience, then you should see War Horse, adapted by Nick Stafford based on the novel by Michael Morpurgo at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre at Lincoln Center. The play has everything that makes for good theatre: a great cast, a wonderful set design,  a story line with a deep emotional core, a musical storyline (although this is not a musical) and of course the horses, in particular Joey, brought to life in the style of the Lion King by the Handspring Puppet Company. The first half of the play is absolutely gripping. The play pulls at your heartstrings as you watch the alcoholic father with his deep-seated inferiority complex wreak havoc on his family and ironically create a lasting bond between his son, Albert Narracott, and the colt, Joey. This relationship remains the very core of the play as we witness both boy and horse mature and grow. The second half of the play depicts the horse going off to war, The War to End All Wars. We witness the untold story of horses on both sides of the battle front, German and British on French soil, and in this case Joey, as Albert searches for him. Here, the emotional core is severed through a series of vignettes that are designed to capture the uses and abuses of the many horses that were used to ferry men into war, pull the wagons, and carry the injured, even as the war itself becomes more technologically sophisticated with the introduction of machines guns, armored tanks, tear gas and mustard gas. Joey is the sole cohesive core to the second half. While we care deeply for animals caught up in manmade wars, and particularly for Joey, we care more for human beings, who unfortunately are reduced to cutouts, as in war itself, and therefore lose our emotional connection. Still, the play is a marvel to behold, a theatre experience to know first hand, and an account of WW I that needs telling. Go see it.

June 01, 2011 Jeff LeBlanc and Mike Krum

Jeff LeBlanc and Mike Krum both headlined at Acoustic Long Island on the first concert of the summer series. Jeff LeBlanc singing style can best be compared to the talented Chris Ayers and Tim Blane. And while his songs were well crafted, they never reached the highs that characterized those two artists. Instead, LeBlanc’s songs can best be described as pretty, the kind of songs that you could snuggle up to with someone you love while sitting by the a fire and want to complete the mood. His songs never reached deep into your soul or lifted you off your seat. For the first half of his set he was accompanied on the duel keyboard by his talented philosophy professor from Sacred Heart University, a man who made you want to go back and reread Socrates, Aristotle and maybe Henri Bergson. For the second half LeBlanc went solo incorporating a music loop machine into his performance. While it was amazing to watch his pyrotechnic footwork as he looped riffs and rhythms and voiceovers, he slowly drifted off into a solipsistic world, where like an onion when you peel back the layers, the core seemed empty and lonely. These machines must be addicting to musicians, much like gazing into two mirrors toward infinity. Unfortunately they produce endlessly layered repetition which contradicts what real music is all about where musicians, not machines, play off each other. This isn’t to say that Jeff LeBlanc doesn’t have some wonderfully rendered songs. Until We Get It Right has a nice vocal reach and emotional pull. His song Believe in a Chris Ayers style is a simple lyrical ballad. He ended the night with the return of his college professor to the stage and their rendition of Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing in the Dark, a sing-along that the audience loved and sang enthusiastically. The keyboardist was driving and inventive, and they played off each without the raw passion of Springsteen, but with a much needed, rousingly closing to the set. More of that please.

Mike Krum was a complete surprise. His singing style evoked Vance Gilbert with all of Vance’s soulfulness and sincerity; there were even shades of Kenny Rankin hidden deep within. There was something real about Krum’s songs that made you want to sit up and listen. On stage, he was often playful and even silly, sometimes self-deprecating and somewhat scattered. However, when he sang, he was transformed into a true artist with something to say about things that mattered: his girl friend, his friends, the breakup of a musical friendship and his generation. That generational theme he captured honestly and reverentially in his song Slacker, certainly something he is not. It would have been nice if he had brought his own guitar instead of playing an instrument that he picked up out of the Acoustic Long Island grab bag closet because the guitar was barely audible. Fortunately, he was accompanied by a wonderfully inventive electric guitarist who filled in all of the gaps, always lingering in the background, augmenting Krum’s voicing and his reach. Mike Krum ended his set with a beautifully soulful song sung in the Vance Gilbert tradition, No More, which is destined to be a classic in its own right.

May 14, 2011 Suzzy and Maggie Roche; Julie Gold

Last night in Port Washington, the Landmark Theatre, with it’s new topflight sound system, headlined Suzzy and Maggie Roche along with Julie Gold as their special guest.  Julie Gold best known for her hit song From a Distance made famous first by Nanci Griffith and then Bette Midler, is a song that stands up there in the pantheon of great songs.  Her performance of this song displayed all of her talents: a crisp clear voice along with her stylish piano and, of course, those lyrics. Julie Gold at the Grammy’s said that it was a song that she had been writing her whole life and this audience loved it. It deservedly catapulted her into fame, a song that has been read into the Congressional record, played on the space station when the Americans and Russians linked up for the first time. Sadly, everything else that Julie Gold played last night paled by comparison. Her lyrics, though well-meaning and filled with love and compassion, seemed trite and uninteresting, almost like Broadway show tunes. I’m happy for Julie Gold’s one enormous hit and so is she.

The Roche sisters were nothing less than wonderful. The quirkiness that has characterized their style, their incredible harmonizing, their unique songs were alive and well in living color. What amazed me was that the audience, now in its dotage, and the Roche Sisters, not afraid to show that they too have aged, still connect through their music as if somehow from the opening note, Maggie and Suzzy were able to transcend age and tap into something greater than our lost youth, but instead a well-spring of beauty and truth that is ageless. It was remarkable how timeless their voices are without props and reverb, but two acoustic guitars, a Steinway concert grand piano and a talent for harmonizing that is unparalleled in the music world. They made us laugh, of course, they made us cry, and why not, but there were so many wow moments throughout the night as if there were six people on stage and not two. They played some of their old standards, like Hammond Song and The Train. They sang from their Zero Church album that they created at Harvard, giving a musical voices to people’s heartfelt personal prayers. They performed Jesus Shaves a blasphemously funny, but honest song about a modern day Jesus looking for work and love.  They sang songs from other artists, including Dylan’s Clothes Line Saga which they elevate to pure theatrics. They ended the night with a rousing rendition of the coasters Yakety Yak. For those unfortunate not to know the Roches, there’s still time. They are nothing less than wonderful.