Workin'

I'm trying to work on the play, instead of writing about writing the play in this space. But I promised scenes, so... at the risk of being dull, here's a bit from close to the start.

(They leap into their act – Henry playing the bones and Cole dancing. They sing in harmony.)

Both: Five can’t ketch me
And ten can’t hold me,
Ho,...
Round the corn, Sally!
Round the corn, round the corn,
Round the corn Sally!
Ho, ho, ho, round the corn Sally!

Here’s your iggle-quarter
And here’s your count-aquils,
Ho... (etc.)

I can bank, ‘ginny bank,
‘ginny bank the weaver,
Ho... (etc.)

Scene Two

(Later. Henry and Cole are trying to remove their make-up in the back of a moving coach. Cole gives up with the job only half-done.)

Henry: Get it all off. Will you?

Cole: What. It’s mostly off.

Henry: Get it all off.

Cole: Are we going to be in the presence of a lady? (He’s laughing.) Land sakes Henry. Wasn’t even worth putting on in the first place.

Henry: There was that kid.

Cole: He threw an egg!

Henry: Yeah and you caught it. We’re putting food on the table.

Cole: Optimist.

Henry: It gets me by.
...
Cole: I keep meaning to ask you Henry: What is this package you bear so delicately by your side?
(the banjo, wrapped)

Henry: I’ll show you.
(Cole tries to grab it.)
Not now, not now! I’m serious! Everything its own time. Could I just – ple

Cohen by Zoilus

Stolen Whole Hog

Leonard Cohen Has Gone Broke!

Leonard Cohen has gone broke!
I was reading the news and suddenly
everything had gone to shit and shame
and you said it was embezzlement
but embezzlement hits you on the head
hard so it was really fraud and shit
and shame and I was in such a hurry
to tell you but my telephone
was as off the hook as the tax lawyer
and suddenly I see a headline
LEONARD COHEN HAS GONE BROKE!
there is no shame in Hollywood
there is no shit on Mount Baldy
I have been to lots of monasteries
and taken many vows of poverty
but I never actually went broke
oh Leonard Cohen we love you get up

The Canadian government should establish a line item in the budget to give Leonard Cohen $10-million a year for the rest of his life just because. If that requires us to close down the Museum of Civilization or something, fine.

(Apologies to Frank O'Hara. Really sincere ones.)

Wrong-Eyed

Going to see this tonight at the Royal Rep Cinema. 9 p.m. show. See you there.

Beginnings

I remember about two months after I first started playing, I sat down with, Paul Miller, the first guy I'd ever seen play the banjo (at an orientation week presentation during my first week of theatre school, and the song he played was 'Way Downtown') and he told me to play something.

I played one of my rudimentary exercises and he made a sound of great satisfaction and said, "Ah; real music!"
I've always loved that idea of real music.

Hedy West

R. I. P.

Not the Poet Laureate of Australia Either

Well well well... They told me its popularity was growing by leaps and bounds down there in the States.

Cancelled!

The organizer didn't have us on her calendar! She denied everything until Caitriona played back her month-old message saved on her voice mail. The organizer said, "That *is* my voice," and then postulated, "Maybe you didn't call to confirm."

We think she's under 30, and has Alzheimers.
So there was no Old Folks Home show, with the proudly published set-list!
However, I did get a bright orange straw hat, cowboy-style, for the occasion.

2nd gig

I have a gig today with fiddler Caitriona at Sunnybrook, as part of their music therapy entertainment program, or something. It's outdoors, and an hour. The set list as follows (I'm self-consciously imitating music bloggers like my pal Zoilus here):

Merry Blacksmith/Banshee
Foolish You
Song Chris Coole taught me
Cindy
Mole in the Ground
(switch banjos)
You Are My Sunshine
Darlin Corey
(switch banjos, retune - fiddle solo)
Ship Inn Reel
Old Joe Clark
Wildwood Flower
Devil's Dream
Waterbound

And, if we have more time, perhaps there will be a little Lork Frankin and a little Peg of My Heart... Do you think that covers an hour?

I'm In the Movies

For months, Kat and I have had a cheap video of this song I do called WE'RE IN THE MOVIES. Locations include a dancing school, an elementary school gym and the former East Bloc. We're very proud of it. It features the long-neck banjo as well as James Thomson on stand-up bass. We've resolved to get it online sometime this summer, somehow, linked to the 'jar. Stay tuned.

What

I guess history can be pretty boring sometimes. Esp when I just regurgitate without even putting it in my own words. Sorry. Sometimes I need to use the 'jar as just a jar. I'm wondering whether I should be trying out dialogue for scenes here, ot whether that would be a mistake. Hmm. Hmmmmmm. Hmmmmmm.

William H. Robinson

This guy was a banjo player in his youth, but later became a preacher and got to speak of 'higher things' with his fellow travellers rather than being called upon to sing and play. One wonders if a beautiful voice was a prerequisite for preaching. And so whether Nathaniel Paul began his travels as a singing banjo player too. Not likely, but since playwriting is all about conflation...
From Log Cabin to the Pulpit,
or, Fifteen Years in Slavery:
At another time I went to a dance in the woods; the music consisted of tambourine, banjo and bones, but before the dance began they tied grapevines across the road, just high enough to catch a man riding horse back across the face or neck. When they heard the patrollers coming they ran, and the patrollers right after them; many of them were crippled, but not a slave was hurt or caught, So you see, there were some negro as well as Yankee tricks.

"The South and Its People"

by Wm Wells Brown, 1815-1884

THROUGHOUT the Southern States, there are still to be found remnants of the old time Africans, who were stolen from their native land and sold in the Savannah, Mobile, and New Orleans markets, in defiance of all law. The last-named city, however, and its vicinity, had a larger portion of these people than any other section. New Orleans was their centre, and where their meetings were not uninteresting.

Congo Square takes its name, as is well known, from the Congo negroes who used to perform their dance on its sward every Sunday. They were a curious people, and brought over with them this remnant of their African jungles. In Louisiana there were six different tribes of negroes, named after the section of the country from which they came, and their representatives could be seen on the square, their teeth filed, and their cheeks still bearing tattoo marks. The majority of our city negroes came from the Kraels, a numerous tribe who dwell in stockades. We had here the Minahs, a proud, dignified, warlike race; the Congos, a treacherous, shrewd, relentless people; the Mandringas, a branch of the Congos; the Gangas, named after the river of that name, from which they had been taken; the Hiboas, called by the missionaries the "Owls," a sullen, intractable tribe, and the Foulas, the highest type of the African, with but few representatives here.

These were the people that one would meet on the square many years ago. It was a gala occasion, these Sundays in those years, and not less than two or three thousand people would congregate there to see the dusky dancers. A low fence enclosed the square, and on each street there was a little gate and turnstile. There were no trees then, and the ground was worn bare by the feet of the people. About three o'clock the negroes began to gather, each nation taking their places in different parts of the square. The Minahs would not dance near the Congos, nor the Mandringas near the Gangas. Presently the music would strike up, and the parties would prepare for the sport. Each set had its own orchestra. The instruments were a peculiar kind of banjo, made of a Louisiana gourd, several drums made of a gum stump dug out, with a sheepskin head, and beaten with the fingers, and two jaw-bones of a horse, which when shaken would rattle the loose teeth, keeping time with the drums. About eight negroes, four male and four female, would make a set, and generally they were but scantily clad.

It took some little time before the tapping of the drums would arouse the dull and sluggish dancers, but when the point of excitement came, nothing can faithfully portray the wild and frenzied motions they go through. Backward and forward, this way and that, now together and now apart every motion intended to convey the most sensual ideas. As the dance progressed, the drums were thrummed faster, the contortions became more grotesque, until sometimes, in frenzy, the women and men would fall fainting to the ground. All this was going on with a dense crowd looking on, and with a hot sun pouring its torrid rays on the infatuated actors of this curious ballet. After one set had become fatigued, they would drop out to be replaced by others, and then stroll off to the groups of some other tribe in a different portion of the square. Then it was that trouble would commence, and a regular set-to with short sticks followed, between the men, and broken heads ended the day's entertainment.

On the sidewalks, around the square, the old negresses, with their spruce-beer and peanuts, cocoa-nuts and pop-corn, did a thriving trade, and now and then, beneath petticoats, bottles of tafia, a kind of Louisiana rum, peeped out, of which the gendarmes were oblivious. When the sun went down, a stream of people poured out of the turn-stiles, and the gendarmes, walking through the square, would order the dispersion of the negroes, and by gun-fire, at nine o'clock, the place was well-nigh deserted. These dances were kept up until within the memory of men still living, and many who believe in them, and who would gladly revive them, may be found in every State in the Union.

I've never before read an account of the American South that differentiated between different African tribes. This guy also witnessed an event in a church at the moment of emancipation, when a gust of wind thrummed the strings of a banjo that was hanging on the wall, thrilling the congregation.

But I feel I'm veering somewhat away from my subject.

A Dance

From the Life of J.D. Green:

I then went into the dance, and told the fiddler to play me a jig. Che, che, che, went the fiddle, when the banjo responded with a thrum, thrum, thrum, with the loud cracking of the bone player. I seized a little Sambo gal, and round and round the room we went, my money and my buttons going jingle, jingle, jingle, seemed to take a lively part with the music, and to my great satisfaction every eye seemed to be upon me, and I could not help thinking about what an in impression I should leave behind upon those pretty yellow and Sambo gals, who were gazing at me, thinking I was the richest and handsomest nigger they had ever seen: but unfortunately the pins in my breeches gave way, and to my great confusion my shirt tail fed out; and what made my situation still more disgraceful was the mischievous conduct of my partner, the gal that I was dancing with, who instead of trying to conceal my shame caught my shirt tail behind and held it up. The roar of laughter that came from both men and gals almost deafened me, and I would at this moment have sunk through the floor, so I endeavoured to creep out as slyly as I could; but even this I was not permitted to do until I had undergone a hauling around the room by my unfortunate shirt tail: and this part of the programme was preformed by the gals, set on by the boys--every nigger who could not stand up and laugh, because laughing made them weak, fell down on the floor and rolled round and round. When the gals saw their own tm they let me go, and I hurried outside and stood behind the house, beneath a beautiful bright moon, which saw me that night the most wretched of all negroes in the land of Dixie: and what may me feel, in my own opinion, that my humiliation was just as complete as the triumph of the negroes inside was glorious, was that the gals had turned my pockets out, and found that the hundred of dollars they had thought my pockets contained, consisted of 24 cents or pennies; and 50 brass buttons. Everything was alive and happy inside the room, but no one knew or cared how miserable I was--the joy and life of the dance that night seemed entirely at my expense, all through my unfortunate shirt tail. The first thing I thought of now was revenge.

His revenge was to cut all their horses loose. Which was dire since it was a surreptitious dance. But then, when he got home, through a twist of fate, he lost his own horse. To cover his loss he let out all the horses in the homestead barn. Then the master came along in the morning and blamed everyone else, giving them all whippings until someone confessed. But no one did, so the man asked our storyteller who was to blame. Our storyteller fingered a man he didn't like, who then got whipped until he confessed.

Meanwhile the loss of all the horses at the party prompted several members to make a run for freedom rather than face the beating they were going to get at home. Only a few made it, the rest were shot.

Maybe this is the sort of behavior Austin Steward is thinking about when he frowns on the music of the banjo.

A Very Reverend Vision of the Ol' Banjo

From Pictures of Slavery in Church and State;
Including Personal Reminiscences, Biographical Sketches,
Anecdotes, etc. etc.
by Rev. John Dixon Long, 1817-1894:

The plantation slaves often suffer with hunger. Despite the common boasts of the slaveholder, the Allwise only knows how much penury and starvation wear out the lives of the slaves. Dancing is one of their favorite amusements. I have often looked at their dances during their different holidays. The banjo is of all instruments the best adapted to the lowest class of slaves. It is the very symbol of their savage degradation. They talk to it, and a skillful performer can excite the most diverse passions among the dancers. Generally, however, they have no instruments, but dance to the tunes and words of a leader, keeping time by striking their hands against the thighs, and patting the right foot, to the words of

                         " 'Juber,' 'Cesar boy,'
                         Ash-cake in de fire,
                         'Possum up de gum tree,
                         Raccoon in de holler."

I have seen males and females dancing, rapidly whirling round, whooping and yelling with brutal delight, alike unmindful of the past and future. I have never known, in a single instance, of a colored man of any moral tone who was fond of the banjo or common dance.

I don't know what these people expect. They suffer from a failure of imagination. In one breath he's describing the anxiety of anticipating starvation, on the other he's questioning the desire to obliterate, for a moment, the past and the future, in a triumph of body and imagination. You might think these arguments have long been settled, but actually, he sounds like the new Pope

However, this seems to also be Austin Steward's view of such entertainments. He seems to have been a pretty temperate guy.

(btw, the work from which this quote is taken, along with the autobiography of Austin Steward, is the property of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text.)

The Story Again

4 actors - two white, two black. The two white guys are a patter-and-bones style act who've come to the 1st London Ontario fair (which, really, took place in October 1836.) One of them is a hard-nosed feller. The other is more idealistic, learning how to play the banjo, and too young to be played by me.

The younger more idealistic one, who's acquired a banjo but doesn't know how to play it, one wants to go the extra 15 miles to Wilberforce to meet a true blue black man - Austin Steward, who runs the Wilberforce Hotel. He thinks, naively, that he can get some lessons from him.

Austin Steward is in the process of wrapping up his responsibilities and his business in order to return to his former home of Rochester NY. He's had it with Wilberforce (a town which was named, btw, by him.)

He's just sent his wife and 5 children ahead,though he's just received word that his eldest daughter caught a bad cold on the way. (from which, sadly, she won't recover.)

Austin is the farthest thing from a music instructor you could possibly imagine, and he quicky discovers the boys' cork cans (for blacking up.) He's offended, though perhaps a little intrigued by this introduction to big city folk, and asks them if they want to find out what it's like to step into a real black man's shoes.

The play unfolds primarily as the story being told by Austin to the younger, more idealistic type, with the other two playing various quakers, landowners, lt govners, Canada Company Reps, fellow ex-slaves, grifters, etc., who provide the spurs and hurdles of Austin's Wilberforce effort. His primary black nemesis is Israel Lewis, who is trying to enrich himself through colony-fundraising. His primary white nemesis is Thomas Mercer Jones, primary rep of the Canada Co., who is the Patrick Farrell of this story (but does not die.)

N.B. Patrick Farrell is the feller who claimed the land that James Donnelly had cleared. The latter killed the former during a fight at a work bee.

Fateful Meeting

From Austin Steward's Memoir:

Mr. Israel Lewis made his way to Canada, and having obtained permission to establish a colony, he bargained with the Canada Company for one township of land, for which he agreed to pay the money demanded, in a few days, and then returned to Cincinnati, by way of Rochester. The poor, persecuted colored people, had in the mean time made ready for their flight from their homes, their native land, and from this boasted free Republic, to seek a residence in the cold and dreary wilds of Canada; to claim that protection from the English government which had been denied them in the land of their birth; and like the overtasked Israelites, "they went out with their wives and their little ones," but with smaller possessions.

During the stay of Mr. Lewis in Rochester, he reported there and elsewhere, that eleven hundred persons were then in the dense woods of Canada in a state of actual starvation, and called upon the humane everywhere, to assist them in such extreme suffering.

To me he also told the story of their destitution, which affected me deeply. I had at that time just made a public profession of my faith in the christian religion and my determination to be governed by its holy precepts. I felt for the distressed and suffering everywhere; but particularly for those who had fled, poor and destitute, from cruel task-masters, choosing rather the sufferings of cold and hunger, with liberty, than the meager necessities of life and Slavery. I concluded to go to Canada and try to do some good; to be of some little service in the great cause of humanity.


N.B. there were actually somewhere between 150 and 200 residents - nowhere near the 1100 Lewis claimed. Lewis wasn't after new colonists. Only funds. He got a new colonist though. And a nemesis.

Plenty Room on That Porch

The Toronto villa of Thomas Mercer Jones (at the corner of York and Front, you'll have to plug in the streets yourself on the map), the Canada Company Director who refused to sell any land in Wilberforce to the colonists, despite all the gruelling work they did, over several years, to clear it and make it habitable. He didn't even sell to Austin Steward.

I find it interesting that, despite all the information online about Thomas Mercer Jones, there is not a single mention of the fact that he refused to sell land to Austin Steward, President of the Wilberforce Colony, because Austin Steward, President of the Wilberforce Colony, was black. He remained a tenant in his own colony. The two names are never mentioned together on any web page I can find.
"Mister Jones," as Austin Steward refers to him, had been ripped off by Israel Lewis, and despite the fact the Lt. Gov. John Colborne had informed the Wilberforce settlers that in Canada, "so long as they remain true and loyal subjects they would have every privilege extended to them that was enjoyed by any of her Majesty's subjects, no distinction being made on account of colour," the same sentiment would not be expressed, or certainly not felt, by the Shakespeare-loving director of the Canada Company.

Plunk & Stars

Classic hyperlink style entry: Nice piece in Plunkthumping this morning about inexpensive banjos. Reminds me of something Pete Seeger once said. The banjo has no Stradivarius, despite what the Gibsons might say. There is no proper sound of banjo greatness. You mine (or pluck) each instrument for its own distinctive voice.

Also this morning, Celestial Monochord writes with the very good news that Pete's half-brother Mike Seeger has released some of his field recordings, rather than just spot-on imitations of them. And just below this essay is a piece on salt.

October 1836

...was London Ontario's first fall fair. Wilberforce was only 15 miles away. And elsewhere, in the States, P.T. Barnum was just getting started...

...with Joice Heth, a 161 year old woman who claimed to have been a nurse to little George Washington. Later, when she died, it was revealed that she was about half the age she claimed for herself. Which is, you know, still pretty old for those days. But the act fell apart anyway. For a bit.

But that was the Big Top. Or, the precurser to the Big Top. What did they have in fall fairs in those days? Besides horse-drawn merry-go-rounds? And was it possible to throw up a stage and create an act that hadn't been planned by the presenters? Like, say, a couple of intepid Ethiopian Delineators? Or did they have to get ready to run if they were caught? How well organized was a fall fair in 1830's London Ontario?

No More Stalling

Time to get this show on the road.