Not Your Average Tuba and Accordian Duo

I have become obsessed with Flickr. I enjoy posting photos there and seeing how many people view them. One feature I discovered is the ability to create galleries. You can pick other Flickr users' photos and put them together in groups of eighteen. My most recently assembled gallery is "Tuba Madness." Why? Because I'd already done sousaphones ("Sousaphones Through the Ages"). When I searched Flickr for tubas, one of the pictures which turned up was titled "The Itinerant Locals" and showed a family posing with a tuba. One thing led to another, and I found out the band is based in Hot Springs, Arkansas, and plays in a local establishment called the Brauhaus, and they also tour. They are getting ready for a national tour by train! So, ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, I present this video of the Itinerant Locals, an example of unbridled self-confidence.



Link to my Flickr galleries.

Pinetop Perkins

Last week, Mary, Dan, and I had the opportunity to see a musical legend perform. Pinetop Perkins, 96 years old, played at a local club. Unfortunately, due to technical problems, his electric piano wasn't working when he came out on stage, and even after it was allegedly fixed, it didn't come through in the mix very well. Even at that, it was a pleasure to see him. He began his career in 1927 and has played with the likes of Sonny Boy Williamson, Earl Hooker, and Muddy Waters, among many others. As Dr. John says in the video below, Pinetop plays gutbucket blues. He was honored with a lifetime achievement Grammy in 2005, and in 2009, his album, "Pinetop and Friends" won the Grammy for best traditional blues.

3 Guys: Byron and Shelley and Goethe

Bust of Lord Byron, Nottingham Castle
Photo by David Cory, October 1, 2008

During my fourth year of medical school, we lived in an apartment across the hall from a dermatology resident from Alabama who made us aware of the Red Clay Ramblers, among other musicians. At the time (1980), Mike Craver was a member of the group, and he wrote a brilliant song based on Franz Schubert's "Freuden Sonder Zahl" (Seligkeit D. 433). The lyrics follow. I'd encourage any interested readers to download the song from iTunes. It appears on the RCR album "Hard Times."

You really have to hear it to fully appreciate it.

"THREE GUYS"
words and music by Mike Craver
Joy and bliss and love
Come from Heaven above
Schnitzel and filet mignon
Come from the animal kingdom
Byron and Shelley and Goethe
Were finishing up their dessert-a
When the garcon came to reckon,
Byron to Shelley did beckon
"You stall the waiter, I'll give the slip
Goethe for certain will hide in the curtain
And think up a jolly good quip"
These Three Mousketeers thought it outre
To travel about on the subway
Pedestrians get there too slowly
And buses are common and lowly
They hailed down a nice yellow taxi
Climbed grinning and gay in the backseat
The fare came to over a fiver
So they replied to the driver
"We have no money, we have no tip
But we can see by the love in your eye
That you'll let us get by with a slip"

They snuck in one night to the Bijou
Drinking vodka and Milk of Magnesia
They littered the balcony boxes
Grinning like toothless old foxes
Saint Peter was watching the action
With a dim view of dissatisfaction
He pinned up a sign on the portals:
"WE KNOW LONGER TAKE IN IMMORTALS"
Oh you stall the waiter,
I'll give the slip,
Goethe for certain
Will hide in the curtain
And think up a jolly good quip
Goethe for certain
Will hide in the curtain
And think up a jolly good quip

RIP Buddy Holly

Today is the 50th anniversary of the plane crash that claimed the lives of Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, and the Big Bopper in Iowa. I refuse to repeat the lyrics of Don McLean's "American Pie," which have been used ad nauseum in headlines today. The music didn't die that day. It lives on. I'm listening to Buddy's music as I write this. Rock and roll lives on. Stratocasters live on.

Rave on.