| Islands of Song |
| The next was called either "Oppression" or "Depression." I didn't think it was either oppressive or depressive, just a darn good song. Ken and Mark had written a song together and that was next on the docket. It was called "Voices in the Stream" and they handed off the vocals to each other and overlapped vocals. Very, very nice! |
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| Mark |
| Ken |
| "All I Could See" was about people trying to step on your "guile." Now this was totally strange. The only people prior to this that I had heard use the word 'guile' in a song were Newfoundlanders. I know the people who live on the Avalon are mainly of Irish ancestry, but that is just too weird. But as Jim says - no coincidence. Mark's last song was called "Names." You know, the things that won't hurt you when sticks and stones can break your bones. It was a song about school. Talk about angst! Surprise at the end when Mark began to 'scat!" This man really surprised me. When I had seen his bio up on the site I figured I wouldn't like his music. Hmmm. Just goes to show you should never judge a book by its cover. He is good! |
| Ken came back out to announce intermission. He exhorted people to stick around for Jim Fidler from NewfoundLAND. Wow! Finally! Someone said it correctly! He credited Jim for teaching him the right way to say Newfoundland. "Something to do with 'Understand Newfoundland!'" That was tough this week, listening to everyone say the word incorrectly. The thing the Irishmen found curious was why don't the Newfoundlanders introduce themselves as being Canadian? It was explained that Newfoundland was the last province to join Canada and that vote was by a very slim margin. That it had once been a country all to itself and the British Empire had sort of ignored it after the war. Newfoundland had never identified itself with Canada but was firmly entrenched in the British culture. Britain didn't know what to do with it and they didn't want Newfoundland associated with the USA, so the push was to join Canada. Many of these musicians were the first generation of "Canadians" in their households. The Irishmen said they had noticed the "Newfoundland Liberation Army" and the "Free NFLD" T-shirts and had wondered about them. We mentioned we had seen "People's Republic of Cork" tees in town that afternoon. Knowing smiles greeted us then and a bit of an understanding. Jim's first song after the intermission was Rising of the Moon. Good choice. Written a dozen years ago, it was something the Irish people could identify with plus, it's just good music. I don't know how he makes one guitar sound like 2 or 3 when playing live! |
| Jim called on Ken to accompany him on the bodhran for Rhythm of the Goat. Jim spoke about writing the song after trying to learn to play the bodhran and suddenly having a breakthrough. "Everyone tries to get those triplets - they tell you just stroke her nice and throw in the top part of the stick. But it just wasn't happening. I was playing and playing and as soon as I forgot about making the triplets, I was able to do them. But it wasn't me - it was the Rhythm of the Goat!" This was the first Jim Fidler song I ever heard and it's still one of my favorites! |
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| Jim has a knack of making playing the guitar look so simple. This was one of those times along with Rising of the Moon where his fingers just flowed over the frets and sounded so good! |
| Up That River is one of my current favorites. It's a song about not being content with "having those upstream making decisions for you." A call to do what is right, not what is popular or sanctioned. So upbeat, so uplifting, such a call to revolution! |
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| Finale Fun! |
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