A toast to Daisy’s Saloon

I’ve spent a lot of time in San Juan. For four months back in 1966 I actually lived in a small town called Fajardo, a coastal community about an hour’s drive east of San Juan. I started a weekly newspaper there and it was printed in San Juan so I spent an average of two days a week in Puerto Rico’s capital.

Most of that time was spent in the area of town known as "Old San Juan." I didn’t make enough to stay in the tourist section, but even if I did I know I would have found Old San Juan more to my liking anyway. I never ran across a joint called Daisy’s Saloon in Old San Juan. That’s not to say it didn’t exist there or anywhere else in San Juan, or that the bar didn't spring up long after I moved from Puerto Rico to Bermuda. Actually, I prefer to think that Daisy’s Saloon doesn’t exist anywhere outside the poetic mind of Keith Greeninger.

Greeninger (in a classic understatement) is not among the most well known of singer-songwriters, especially around these parts. Here he may be remembered as someone who won the New Folk competition one year in the late 1990s at the Kerrville Folk Festival. He makes his home in Northern California and spends most of his public time touring the clubs, college campuses and folk festivals in that area, especially around Santa Cruz. In fact, I must admit I am not an avid collector or even semi-knowledgeable of Greeninger’s musical output. I do know, however, that this song about Daisy’s Saloon and Eddie and Marshal and Larry and the San Juan Bakery and Merle Haggard and the Mission Café absolutely haunts me and I mean that in a very positive way. Take a listen.

Something to brighten an otherwise dreary day

Just ran across this by accident and it knocked me out -- Sheryl Crow and Emmylou Harris collaborating on a Lou Reed/Velvet Underground song. I didn't even know it existed before today.

Friday music to see you into the weekend

It's difficult to believe I've known her for about 45 years. A great song upon to which reflect on 45 years.

1952 Vincent Black Lightning

In case you're wondering what one looks like. (See next video)

The Waybacks' Richard Thompson Jam

If justice prevailed in the world of music, this band would be one of the world's most popular.

Project Trio hits the big charts

Congratulations to Project Trio. Their latest CD, Random Roads Collection, debuted this week at No. 15 on Billboard's classical music charts and, in a rare feat, simultaneously debuted at No. 17 on the trade magazine's jazz charts.

Project Trio consists of Greg Pattillo on flute, Eric Stephenson on cello and Dallas' own Peter Seymour on double bass. They compose a lot of their own tunes, but have also covered everyone from Beethoven to Guns 'n' Roses. Their YouTube videos have amassed an phenomenal 70 million viewings, making them one of the most viewed chamber music ensembles on the Internet.

The three musicians got together in 1996 at the Cleveland Institute of Music, but it wasn't until 2005 when they actually gathered as a trio for the first time. As conceived by Seymour, the band wanted to become a classical chamber group that incorporated jazz and rock music but also conducted educational outreach programs as part of their performing and touring schedule. As a result, they have performed in concert halls, clubs and classrooms. They have appeared at Montreaux, Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center, South By Southwest, and the Brooklyn Academy of Music, They have played concerts in 35 states as well as in Hong Kong and throughout Europe, Australia and Canada.

I first met Peter when he was a student at the Arts Magnet in downtown Dallas. Somehow, he and my son became the best of friends (they are still best friends today) and that's how I got to know Peter and his marvelously gifted family. In 1997, Down Beat magazine gave Peter its award as the best jazz solist. After graduating from Booker T., Peter went off to the Cleveland Institute of Music and later received a master's from Rice University, studying under the legendary Paul Ellison.

The attached video, a song that appears on Random Roads Collection, will give you a taste of Project Trio.

The best Texas songs

I offer up a number of lists and rankings and such on this journal. This one comes courtesy of retired political consultant par excellance Mike Lindley. It's his compilation of the 10 best songs about Texas, of which he writes: "after #1, which is iconic by itself, - the order from there becomes highly subjective, help me with better choices.."

Here's his list:

1. LaGrange -- ZZ Top
2. San Antonio Rose -- Bob Wills
3. El Paso -- Marty Robbins
4. Eyes of Texas -- UT Marching Band
5. Red River Valley -- Woody Guthrie, among others
6. Lukenbach, Texas -- Waylon Jennings (Willie, too)
7. London Homesick Blues -- Gary P. Nunn
8. Hill Country Rain -- Jerry Jeff Walker
9. (Tie) China Grove -- Doobie Bros
Does Fort Worth Ever Cross Your Mind -- George Strait

Not a bad list but I would have to include Steve Fromholtz's "Texas Trilogy" in any list of Texas songs as well as something from the incomparable Austin Lounge Lizards, specifically "Dallas Texas" that contains these two immortal lines:
1. "So I'm going back to Dallas Texas to see if anything could be worse than losing you" and
2. "Most cities have soul but Dallas must have been at the bank when they passed it around."

And then there's Jimmy Dale Gilmore's "Dallas" that asks the plaintiff question "Have you ever seen Dallas from a DC-9 at night?"

I also love Tom Russell's "Mineral Wells," David Rodriguez's "Ballad of a Snow Leopard" and Shake Russell's "Travelin' Texas," "Out on Comanche Trail," "River of Innocence" and/or "Something in the West Texas Wind."

But, I got to admit, Mike's list is a great one.

Paul McCartney: If it wasn't for Les Paul, there never would have been The Beatles

For those still doubting whether Les Paul, who died earlier this week, had more influence on popular music than anyone else in the 20th century, you ought to take a look at this marvelous overview of Paul's life and career. What's more you can hear the man himself, especially his guitar playing which was still marvelously fluid right up until the end.

Vaya Con Dios, Les

The death of Les Paul today is not going to receive 1/100 of the media attention given to the death of Michael Jackson. But as far as influencing music, I would be hard-pressed to name another figure that had as much as Les Paul. It's inconceivable to imagine what music would sound like today if there had never been a Les Paul.

Perhaps we can surmise that someone at sometime would have invented the electric guitar and multi-tracking, but that's just an assumption. Les Paul did it and it changed the direction of popular music. If I had to name one person responsible for the advent of rock music, that person would be Les Paul.

First he takes Manhattan, then Grand Prairie

"Leonard Cohen kept returning to the stance of a supplicant at the Beacon Theater on Thursday night, dropping to one knee, or both, to intone his wry and ruminative songs. At the same time, he basked in the rapture of the crowd, artfully courting adulation. His mix of humility and sovereignty felt effortless, entirely true to form. And it girded the concert, his first in the United States in 15 years, with a vibrant and effective tension."

Thus began the New York Times review of Leonard Cohen's Feb. 19 New York concert. It continued:

"Mr. Cohen, 74, left little room for disappointment in a show that lasted just over three hours (with an intermission) and featured more than two dozen songs. The evening doubled as a preview, coming with the eagerly anticipated announcement of a North American tour this spring."

That North American tour has since been announced and the second stop on that tour will be at the Nokia Theater in Grand Prairie. Tickets go on sale tomorrow. "Everybody knows" you should break out your "famous blue raincoat" and see a concert I feel relatively safe in saying won't be coming this way ever again.

Odetta

Harry Belafonte introduced me to Odetta. Well, not personally. It was not Harry coming up to me and saying "Pete, I've got someone I want you to meet." Nothing like that.

It was in the 1950s and as Dick Clark was doing everything he could possibly do to kill rock 'n' roll, I found myself venturing into the realms of folk music. Nothing heavy at first, kinda like my experiments with controlled substances. Harry Belafonte's album "Calypso" was a big influence so I went to see him in concert when he played Carnegie Hall. He had two other performers singing with him during his show, Miriam Makeba and Odetta.

I vividly remember sitting there utterly transfixed as Odetta sang "Water Boy." Spellbinding. I would have followed that voice anywhere. I had a lot of satisfaction learning later that Bob Dylan ventured into folk music upon hearing Odetta sing.

Odetta died earlier today. She was was 77. In this tribute for the New York Times, writer Tim Weiner concentrates on Odetta's contributions to the civil rights movement. I'll always remember her, however, for one song sung one night 50 years ago in Carnegie Hall. That she left such an indelible memory says more than any other words possibly could.

Hang down your head

I just ran across the news that Nick Reynolds, the little guy in the original Kingston Trio, died earlier this week of respiratory failure in San Diego.

I can't say I really knew Nick Reynolds. I met him a couple of times when I was playing drums in a blues band in the early 1960s in Austin. Back then there wasn't that much of a club scene in Austin and we were like the house band at a club along Lake Austin. The club was out in the country then; it probably doesn't exist today and, if it did, would be regarded as being in the heart of town. But the Kingston Trio often played Austin in those days and would hang out at the club where we played for two or three evenings after their Austin concerts to give the women a chance to flock around them. And flock, they did. During our break, Nick would come over to say hello to the band, sit down and chat. Those were my only real encounters with Nick Reynolds.

I do know this, however. I have a whole lot of Kingston Trio songs on my iPod. And you can say what you want about those guys (too many claim they were folk poseurs more than they were folk purveyors) but they left their mark on the music scene. Both Dennis Wilson and Mike Love of the Beach Boys told me in separate interviews that the Kingston Trio was their major musical influence and, in fact, they wore striped shirts as a salute to the Kingstons. Stephen Stills and David Crosby also told me that the Kingston Trio was who Crosby, Stills & Nash initially imitated.

Reynolds played the clown of the group. Actually he played tenor guitar and congo drums and sang a third above the melody line. I'm afraid most of the music world won't pay a lot of attention to the passing of Nick Reynolds and that's a shame. Nick and the rest of the trio, Dave Guard and Bob Shane (and later John Stewart, who replaced Guard) were not great musicians, but they were a whole lot of fun and they left a mark. And their success made it a lot easier for the likes of Bob Dylan and Peter, Paul & Mary to gain attention. Would there have been a folk music "boom" without the Kingston Trio? Who knows. But there is no doubt that a time when rock 'n' roll was in some desperate straits (Elvis was in the Army, Jerry Lee Lewis and Chuck Berry had been banned from the airways, Dick Clark was trying to destroy rock 'n' roll), the Kingston Trio permanently refocused the music world in a new and refreshing direction.

Harris in the Hall

I remember the first time I heard Gram Parsons's first solo album called "GP," early in 1973. I was a big fan of The Flying Burrito Brothers and thought their album "The Gilded Palace of Sin" was one of the great LPs in the history of rock. But then Parsons left the Burritos to go solo and I was more than just a little bit anxious to hear the results.

The first time I heard the "GP" album I was startled by this woman's voice of amazing purity that was featured on harmony vocals. I asked my brother if he knew who this woman was. He looked at the album's jacket and told me "Someone named Emmylou Harris."

That began my fascination with Emmylou Harris, a fascination that reached its apex one evening at the Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles when I enjoyed several dances with Ms. Harris at a post-Grammy Awards celebration.

Now today comes this word that Emmylou Harris is to be inducted this year in the Country Music Hall of Fame. I am happy for her--she has earned this recognition. However, it leaves me with the same feeling I have when, strolling through an antique mall, I see something, stop and want to scream: "That can't be an antique! I actually used one of those!"

What is this world coming to?

According to this, U2 has been scared off by Hannah Montana, of all people.

Good news from Her Tallness

Let me just say at the outset that it's next to impossible for me to be objective when the subject of Marcia Ball comes up. I have known her for close to 40 years now, even before she formed Freda and the Firedogs, the band that, for all practical purposes, started the so-called "progressive country music" and the "Austin music scene." Sure there was music being played at clubs in Austin but it was played by old-line country folks at places like the Split Rail or by rockers like the 13th Floor Elevators and Shiva's Headband at the Vulcan Gas Company on Congress. Freda and the Firedogs was the first band of "long-hairs" to play semi-traditional country music in Austin, which was strange coming from Marcia because I knew then her first love was the New Orleans-styled blues she grew up with in Louisiana.

But all this is extraneous to the real purpose of this post which is twofold. First, there's a possibility that Marcia will be playing at Poor David's Pub Saturday, March 22. The date is not set in stone yet, but I've got my fingers crossed.

What is more certain, however, is that Marcia's latest album, called "Peace, Love & BBQ" ("three of my favorite things," she says) should be released in April. It is produced by Stephen Bruton and features, among other guests, Dr. John and his band.

It's enough to warm my heart on a cold, cold day.