People Are Giving Less On The Subways

by Little Willy Shakes and Ray aboard the long A Train

I watch twelve o'clock turn to twelve o one a.m.
My mistress I'm misdressed, night mayhem clocks
at midnight but I rock Big Ben

Brother can you spare a stroke

".can you please help a homeless person?"
again dragon's feet and knees, hollow teeth
grey braided hair
fingers long and jaded
pressing a word to the flat floor

) (

I could have helped before the door opened and left him
nothing
did I say

Hello Hi Hey n"Ice E U in Eighties

dungarees nice undegrees

I didn't do nothing, I did worse. Seeing a second time both times in the same mind
he knew I knew the times a'make you loosen your ties, improvise

calling lies
in2
questions
revise
retention
Be
lies in intention
all is one
all is ice
in Hades

Play these, tune awhile
from now be gone and
smile

Courteous curtsy,
bow
wow wow yippee
O ditty say

"Kin' rain again some sunny a'day?"
away from hysteria
the element is clearing. YEah.
I'm so pleased I'll ear in ya mouth
ear in ya mouth

clearing
hearing
speak
in the
south

ear in your mouth
I'll ear in your mouth
I'll earn 20 an hour if i go pro
ear in your mouth, I'll ear in ya mouth
or do my best when I'm all alone
I'll ear in ya mouth

Uses are uselessly calling me home
I'll never go without you
I need to know, need to grow
into your ratatouille
you in my chop suey


"Uses are useless"
:kiln baked motto of a single mind
dead.
An end of a
voyage of nothing

With hat's off like mathematicians
gave it over to the innervisions

joy is a strong thing
to support your moves
find some proofs
and flush the suit

18th Night

Rehearsals for the musician/actors of 12th night began the week of May 12th. May 18th was Mom's birthday. On that evening I left the apartment with Traci's ipod on shuffle.

It started with "Fall"? from Vivaldi's The Four Season's, which was the c.d. I played when I would give her a massage. The next song was an Afro Cuban drum and voice performance of "I Wish You Love". Then, Paul Simon singing "Have A Good Time". Then the Pointy Kitties "So Unreal". Then more Cubano. Ba ba ba.

On October 14th it will have been ten years since Mom left. Mom would be 71 this year.

I always remember the day she died.

This was the first year in !0 I felt the day she was born.

There is a song in 12th Night called "Come Away Death". it is the bulls eye of sad song lyrics, and when we play Hem's version of it, I truly believe that every soul in earshot feels the warm insulation of utter sad despair that Orsinos everywhere will cloak themselves in. it's a drug rush, this kind of sadness. It can become addictive.

"Come Away Death" has in it the saddest line in a song I have ever heard.

"Sad true lover never find my grave to weep there."

It is a lyric that could make Hank Williams mute in a "the rest is silence" kind of way. I used to think "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry" was the saddest song ever written. But Willy Shake put to Hem's melodies, played by the Illyriacs and sung by David, Raul and Annie takes the cake.

A week ago I watched a filled body bag on a stretcher be taken from the house across the street. There were only the medical team members present. it reminded me of when Mom was sick.

"You don't know how lucky she is," Nurse Judy told me. "Many people go through this alone." Judy also told me I was lucky. I got to mourn Mom while she was alive.

One day during tech David Pittu saw the book I'm currently reading and said, "Oh, stop denying death, Ray!"

I did.

12th Night :"Karmic Debt"

The rain is falling nicely on the understudies as they run through the scenes in the roles they have prepared to cover.

Julie is Viola.
Robin is Olivia and Maria. (A dangerous feat to behold.)
Slate is Toby Belch.
Dorien is Andrew Aguecheek
Kevin is Malvolio and Antonio.
Baylen is Duke Orsinio.
Clifton is Feste
David is Sebastian
and Leslie our lovely bandmate is understudy for Olivia's ladies.

Andrew and I are "male swing" understudies, which means that in the event that Dorien, David, Slate, or Clifton are needed to cover a principal role, one of us may have to step in to their roles as soldier or attendant. Kaus just laid the specifics on us: Andrew is tracking Dorien. I am tracking Slate.

Andrew immediately asked Dorien which roles he was tracking. It's a reasonable possibility, suppose, that Andrew would need to know the lines - the understudies are tracking multiple roles and it could happen that on some wild night, two roles Dorien is tracking would need to be covered.

But I think Andrew and I pretty much understand the real possibuilities of such things, so presently I am typing on the computer in the stage manager's office while Andrew plays his guitar and sings in the next room. He is playing songs that a friend of his wrote, songs that would resound comfortably in a singer songwriter spot like Rockwood Music Hall.

"I'm not ready for the spotlight, not quite yet," goes the song Andrew sings. "I'm still paying off this karmaic debt."

I frankly wish Andrew would sing the Over The Rhine song that he covers so well. I've heard the song he is singing now too many times to ignore the fact that I just don't understand how "the spotlight" can be the brass ring of a wistful and breezy introspective 6/8 song. I wouldn't be as beguiled if the word "spotlight" was replaced with "your love", but I would still wonder too much how someone could have such a clear grasp of their karmaic ledger. It sounds really, um, Puritan. So okay - I'm being a dick, which means its hitting close to home, this song of Andrew's friend. Every time I hear Andrew sing it, an uncomfortable knot twists in my gut, and it won't be untwisted by simply railing on what a goofy song it is or name calling. There is an element of the song that is indestructible, which comes from the questionable but grand values of it's writer and the out and out commitment of Andrew the singer who clearly feels every word.

And it's exciting that Andrew has a song like this to pour himself into on the eve of his audition for an international tour of "Fame". Kick that song in the ass my friend! Then please sing Over The Rhine.

12th Night: The Best

I have wondered and continue to wonder as 12th night rolls on... what does Shakespeare think about relationships and marriage in particular? Clearly marriage makes everyone happy at the end of the play. But Feste: "She has no folly. She will keep no fool until she be married."

In the last song, "When I came alas to wife, with hey ho the wind and the rain, with swaggering I could never thrive..."

I relish Raul Esparza's delivery of Orsinio's line: "For I myself am best when in least company." For the past few shows it has come across a little embarassed, but also proud, as if he is revealing a superpower that he knows no one can appreciate because they are simply not there when it reveals its force.

I want to know how a woman could love with a guy like that, partly because I want to know better the woman who sleeps down the hall from me as I write. Part of me is always, for better or worse, unavailable. And the unavailable part is the part that Orsinio says is his "best". Even if no one around him agrees that the best of the Duke unfolds in their absence, this is what he thinks. It is this image of himself that is affecting his reality, and this has to be okay with her.

I love the scene in Act 1 when Cesario/Viola listens to Orsinio go on about what Olivia must be told about his love. I love the scene because at this point the audience knows Viola loves Orsinio, and we see them as they cannot: as a woman and a man communicating to one another. Viola speaks out of love to the man in front of her who is too absorbed in his ideas of his romantic ambitions to see things for what they are. You get the feeling that Cesario could be a woman at this point and Orsinio still would not see. Do we think that part of this not seeing is also part of his attractiveness to her? Is it just me or is Shakespeare rocking some serious relationship dynamics here?

My drummer character in 12th Night is fucked up by what happens in the first minute of the play until he hears Orsinio talk romatically about Olivia's mourning. At that point, the drummer sees in Orsinio the things that Viola will: a guy in need of saving from his own indulgences. Maybe its true that our best comes when we're alone. I certainly can't write with anyone in the room.

12th Night : "Have You Ever Seen The Rain?"

Last night's Hootenanny is still echoing in my head. Early in the evening, Kevin Kelly sat in with mandolin for a few rounds of song and on break, two comics wandered by and gave us a taste of their craftiness. Then The Doctor, his nephew, Jesse, Colin, Robbie and I managed our best Bachata and Merengue before The Doctor's family and Willie took over. A dance floor was made of the dirt and loose wood on the garden ground. Traci's Mac and Cheese, Nash's lentil soup and Israeli cous cous sated the Pot Lucky. Even Pee Wee at the end of the night had a guitar out and sang a few verses.

I set up the instruments under the portico next to Willie's Bodega because after a week of rain in Central Park, my nerves could not handle getting rained out. The night before, 12th Night was cancelled for rain - it was the ONLY night in a week and a half of rain when we didn't manage to do the show.

The way it works at the Delacorte is this: even on rainy nights, management can wait as late as 8:45 to start the show and still have the audience out of the Park by midnight, which is city law. This factors into rain delays, too - every night, our 8p.m. show has 45 minutes in its back pocket to give to the rain.

It was still raining at 8:45 on Sunday when Audra, Annie, Raul and Julie walked out onstage to tell the audience that we had to cancel.

"Couldn't you just start and then stop if you had to," asked one man in the audience.

Backstage, Brian Gold, one of our Production Assistants, had water drops on his glasses and was drying himself off after tending to Stage Right during the rain that started at 7:35 and had not let up. "What people don't realize is the amount of work it takes to make a show happen," he said. I hate to think about the disappointment of a cancellation after waiting in line all day for tickets. It would make it hard to appreciate the factors involved in doing Shakespeare In The Park for free. These matters range from insurance to health and city laws, spot operators in high towers exposed to the elements, not to mention the megafolly of trying to negotiate with Mo' Nature on a minute to minute basis.

By now everyone in cast and crew has learned that iPhone and online weather reports are not trustworthy indications of whether our show will go on. Last week, before our second night of rain, Annie had been sick, and with dark skies at 7:30, she thought for sure the night would be called. "There are going to be six people out there," she said, walking from wigs. "I know three of them," I offered. Actually, I knew six, and I was feeling very responsible to them for the rain that was sure to fall.

But even if our performance could have been called on account of low attendance, this was Queens night. Earlier in the day, Shakespeare Festival had passed out tickets in the borough and Queens had shown up with their rain gear, dressed for a football game. They weren't going anywhere. At 8:05 p.m. drizzle fell on the guy from the Queens Borough President’s Office as he made a quick speech relating Joe Papp's vision for Free Shakespeare to Queens being the most ethnically diverse area in the world. There was some clever wordplay using “Twelfth Night” and “thirteenth night of June”, and then he ended with, “Let’s hope this rain stops.”

That night the rain delay came earlier in the play, during Jay O Sanders’ and Julie White’s first moments in Act 1 Scene 3. Their energy was barely buckling under the downpour when the round and assuring voice of Production Manager Steve Kaus came ver the God mic to halt the scene. The audience cheered when Julie stuck her hands out, huge raindrops exploding in her skyward palms, and shook her head as if to say, “What? We’re stopping for this?”

It seemed miraculous that night when, shortly after 11:30, we made it to the end of the performance.

"I learned my lesson," Annie said later.' The show will always go on."

But there she was, this past Sunday at 8:45p.m., onstage with the rest of the principals and an umbrella, trying to make the audience feel alright about the bad news.

"There actually is no nudity in Act 2," she joked. "That was last summer."

As Sunday's rain shower continued and it grew closer to the time that the show would have to be called off, the cast had loosened up backstage. "We're going to do two shows tonight," announced Hamish Linklater. "A midnight show!" replied David Pittu. Zach Villa stepped into a jam session in our dressing room and played a song he had written that sounded like John Mayer writing an early Springsteen epic. Stark Sands described the odd experience of wearing the brown contact lenses he was given to make him more twinning with Annie. "I have MacKenzie Phillips AND Bonnie Franklin in the audience," pouted Pittu.

Hamish looked at the backstage doppler and Herb said he got a call from people south of us who were slammed by rain. Both reported dismal prospects. Every few minutes, Kaus the Production Manager made an announcement from his cinderblock stage manager's office. When he did, the cast gathered in the hall between the dressing rooms to listen. At one point, Kaus reported that things had cleared up and Pittu walked to the Vom entrance and back to tell Kaus he was wrong. "I'm not going to believe you anymore," proclaimed Pittu. Grinning, Kaus walked to the Vom entrance and back. "I guess it picked up again."

We had endured such a wet performance the night before that when we'd arrived, Kaus had set up a table of baked goods backstage with the note" OK...maybe it WAS more than just a mist. - Kaus" At 8:45p.m. on Sunday night, I am certain Kaus was looking at the sky still wondering if we could pull it off when the clock ran out. Finally, he came over the p.a. with the final call, asking some of the actors to come to the stage to make the official announcement.

"Ya'll should know," said Julie White to the audience, " that most nights we will do the play when it's raining like this, so come back some night when its raining. You can walk right in!"

I felt for Steve and Hamish and others who had family in to see the show. Traci was there, too, but having seen the show last week, she took the opportunity of the rain delay to explore Shakespeare Garden and Belvedere Castle for the first time. She was deep in enchantment mode when we met back up to walk with everyone for drinks that hardly seemed earned.

I was glad for Brian and everyone else who would relish the night off after such an intense week. It was nice thinking of Herb getting an early start with his drive out of town, listening to Chris Layer's cd as he rode.

But it hurt to walk out of the park at 9:30 on Sunday night behind some of the people who had come to see the play. A slow moving portly woman in front of us and another before her in an electric wheelchair both had their Shakespeare In The Park rain ponchos on, the printed skulls upon them looking like a sick joke. It didn't help that in the time it took to walk from the Delacorte to Central Park West, the need for umbrellas was gone and it never rained for the rest of the night.

12th Night : "Forces of Nature"

Every night when I watch Audra McDonald and Anne Hathaway play together through a swarm of bugs, I remember what Lucas Papaelias told me about his time doing Romeo and Juliet 2 summers ago: “Being in the band for Shakespeare In The Park is the best job. Those actors will go through hell being outside. You get to sit and watch it."

Last night was the first night that everyone in the show felt the bells ringing. Even the bugs gave their best performance yet. Entering at the end of Act 1 Scene 5, they clearly had their choreography together, sending to the stage a fraction of the numbers that have flown around the actors on previous nights. In the moment when love overtakes Olivia, they formed a perfect dazzling thought bubble in the air around her.

Perhaps Mimi Lieber our choreographer had worked with the bugs on their moves earlier in the day or perhaps after showboating for the past week, the bugs finally decided to leave their egos backstage and be a part of the ensemble. But I suspect they finally realized they are no match for the force of nature that is Audra McDonald...

It's the final moments of the same scene on Tuesday night. Olivia gives Malvolio the ring and sends him off after Cesario. Then Audra McDonald turns strongly to give the audience the totality of Olivia's feelings in her final lines.

"I do not know what - " she starts, her eyes wide with the wonder of love. Her next inhale perfectly takes in an air born marauder.

There is a most dramatic pause. Olivia's face hardens and her eyes dart to the ground. In the instant, you can see Olivia confronting an uncontrollable wave of anguish following the love that's just bloomed in her. With yellow flower in hand and watering eyes, you can feel Olivia, terrified, asking her brother if it is okay to proceed towards the possibility of new life before her. She is stiff, still, holding herself together, and you imagine that Olivia's time of mourning has now reached it's end.

You can experience these things most completely if you do not think of the bug that presently wanders the rich interior of Audra's golden throat. Like a tourist at Notre Dame Cathederal, I imagine it tiptoeing around, appreciating the warm acoustics, taking pictures and calling home to say, "Guess where I am!"

Then Audra McDonald as Olivia swallows hard. She continues, eyes still to the ground.

"-and...fear to find...Mine eye too great a flatterer for my mind"

I marvel at the display of focus and control it must take to deliver these lines while suppressing a gag reflex. The effect gives Olivia an angry truth, placing her thoughts even more within the shadow of loss.

At this instant, I become aware of the Hem score which will come up in a few seconds to transition the scene. It's a bright and uplifting melody that perfectly suggests a progression out of melancholy. So no matter what the dramatic possibilities might be for Audra to end the scene within her present painful response to love, she knows we're headed to happy land. Audra, the amazing actress and singer that she is, knows this.

"Fate, " she says, a harsh address, "Show thy force".

...Olivia, tired of mourning has grown impatient, and speaking to fate as she might a servant. But then her body relaxes. A greater, natural sense seeming to overcome her.

"Ourselves we do not owe," says Olivia roughly, but with her head now raised, her eyes returning to search the bright places in the distance before her.

"What is decreed must be -" A brilliant musical note rings within the word "Be" and cuts though the humid air. Audra and Olivia are singing again.

"And be this so!"

The music comes in, perfectly in synch with the world thanks to the timing and rhythm and tone of Olivia's last words. And Audra McDonald as Olivia exits the Delacorte stage as she does most every night...to great applause.

12th Night : "Rain Delay, Part 1"

It’s raining in Bushwick an hour before I have to leave for rehearsal. I am never sure about the weather, but from the outset, this looks to be the worst day of weather for our play since previews started last week. I don my Kentucky Colonel rain jacket and head for the train, forgetting for ½ a block to check if my backpack is open. It is unzipped, proud rain drops chilling in the firewire ports of my laptop.

So far we have had two nights when our performance has been delayed for rain. The first rain delay occurred on the night of our second show, moments after Andrew Aguecheek’s arrival in Act 1 scene 3. As he and Toby Belch spilled their drink following Maria’s exit, the voice of Stage Manager Steve Kaus came over the "God mic" to interrupt the scene.

"We are going to pause for precipitation," Kaus says, asking the audience to bear with us.

The announcement of the delay is met with discernable laughter from the audience. On my way back to our dressing rooms, a woman walking behind me says, “Pause for precipitation! That’s the funniest thing I ever heard!” I can’t tell if she is leaving or going to the wine vendor.

Once the ensemble is backstage and dry, Kaus comes over our in-house speaker, this time asking us to bear with stage management. “Once the weather clears and we clean the stage, we will return and pick up from Cup of Canary, Cup of Canary.” The protocol for returning from a rain delay is to pick up at the previous beat or from the top of the scene, whichever makes the most sense.

The rain stops. Johanna, Brian, Maggie and Buzz hit the stage with squeegees and wring the set as dry as they can while the sky continues to spit. Backstage Kaus asks us to take our places to reenter for “Cup of Canary, Cup of Canary”.

Waiting on the wheelchair ramp for our cue from Buzz, we hear Kaus over the God mic once more requesting that the people in the audience close their umbrellas. Down go the beaten colorful things to reveal faces that pucker in anticipation of the raindrops that quickly hit them.

Buzz says “Standing by” and leans into her earpiece for the message that comes over her headset. Then she nods a pleased co-conspirators smile and says, “Ah, you may go.”

The band return to the stage to deep and gracious applause befitting a baseball game or rock concert. I want to applaud back. Hell yes - we are doing this. Then Hamish and Jay come back out to even greater applause. Andrew and Toby drink their second cup of canary and things roll proudly forward.

Steve “Tally” Curtis leans over his guitar and says, “The audience looks bigger.” I look around and take a deep breath. During the delay, people moved down to take the empty seats closer to the stage, heating the area around us. I am awed feeling the will of the audience, cast, and crew to make the night happen. It cuts through any and all bullshit. This is it. The collaboration. Make the space for it to happen, and with nature's mercy it may be so.

12th Night : "Parade"

Somewhere past the turtle pond and behind the castle, the thundering rhythms of the Puerto Rican Day Parade - it's deep bass rumble soaked in the sound of yelling and cheering so steady and strong that it seems like a recording. You feel the sound emotionally whether you acknowledge it or not - a whole people are gathered close by, shaking their skin from their bones. Puerto Rico has gone for a walk today and Puerto Rico is very excited. I decide that for this year, imagining the parade through the sound it makes will be better than seeing it. Next year I will seek out Boricua weekend first hand. This year I'm sitting on the edge of stage of the Delacorte Theater rehearsing.

Onstage the ensemble members involved in the finale dance are storming through their new and improved choreography. They cook in wet sunlight and keep time with the recorded portion of Hem's song, "The Rain it Raineth", the title of which I imagine Hem might have thought twice about in a band meeting: Steve pipes up from behind his coffee “Uh, guys, what can we do with this? I just wonder if ‘raineth’ really our best option here? Anyone have a Thesaurus?” Then Gary drops his fist on the top of the piano making the meteronome fall in Dan’s lap. “Dude, these are Shakespeare’s words you’re talking about. You don’t fuck with the Shakespeare!”

The band is called onstage to add our parts. I grab my bodhran, my tipper, and my shaker and meet Steve, Leslie, Andrew and Chris at the top of the fantastic stage-crafted hill. Chris and I have monitors that we wear in one ear to make sure that the live band stays in time with Hem’s orchestrations. Except for a technical glitch on the first night where the volume of my earpiece was compromised and the audience, dancers and band played the whole finale a half beat off, we've had no problems. From our present position onstage the thunder of the parade through the trees is actually giving the recorded track a run for it's audible money.

"The Puerto Rican Day Parade is the best parade in the city," Christopher says. "Much better than the St. Patricks Day Parade." These are serious words coming from a man with bagpipes. "So boring," he continues. I tell him that by comparison to what we are hearing, I can easily imagine St.Pats Day as far less fun. No pulse to dance to, boring colors. "Plus, they don't let in gays," Chris adds. Well, there you go. 

Unreal

Tim called today to tell me that the Bill Gates Foundation came by his Salvation Army outpost on Saturday with a glistening new tractor trailer decorated and filled with computers to give away to needy foundations. Tim and I have been biting our nails trying to get internet into his kitchen for our COHR streams - I immediately identified with how cool this could be. 

"They were all set to give us computers and then they told us that they wanted to wait until Monday so they could get better press," Tim said. The SA director in charge of this matter is a young 25 year old guy who was hyperventilating all weekend preparing for today's visit and the press conference that he would have to participate in. 

But the Gates Foundation never came back. No calls, no nothing.

"They must have found someone else to give the computers to," Tim said, an audible smile in his words. The total absurdity of the whole scam. 

I have noticed that when you commit to things the way one does when working for Salvation Army, you develop a sense for savoring the ridiculous that plays out as you try, by any means made possible, to do your work with what the world can give you. People value so much the idea of charity that the government created whole new tax laws to inspire big businesses to buy big busses, load them with computers, and go around looking for all the free press and tax write-offs they can get. Maybe Bill Gates Foundation deserves a better shake than this, but prioritizing their effort based on media coverage makes them open for the shot: Douches! Every rock star has long since known the best press is NEWS! You reach more people and its free. Just ask all the new pr firms popping up that specialize in benefit operations and non-profit operations. 

Even Kind Monitor got some juice out of an idea of making a benefit cd where they decided afterwards (by asking the artists) what organizations to give money to. 

I'm gonna knock my balls around the chinashop here for a minute more ...Tim and I have had many discussions about the ideas of non-profit work. I think that soon the matter is going to have to be held in different regard. Non-profit is, or was, the 8th largest economy in the world. And it is highly unregulated. It has been a haven for people who have abuse tax laws, but it is also a choice for people looking to be creative in their business structuring, a viable means to an end. The problem is that the title "Not for profit" suggests a kind of benevolence, as if the NFP business got certified as official do-gooders and are therefore to be trusted. You're then not just playing with people's money, you are playing with their trust.

In planning Motherlodge, the theater people I spoke with took it as a foregone conclusion that I was or would soon be a non-profit. And no wonder! We would not have what meager theater there is in this world if not for people using the non-profit fundmaking to support their program. No harm in that, but I have to say I am interested in seeing what comes from the independent theater once the effects of the funding dry-up pulls the financial carpet out from under and we see who still can't stop writing, producing, and performing. 

Makes me think of Mike's lyric in "Unreal"

"It's so thoughtful when billionaires are philanthropic

our cultrual landscape might wither and die if not for their help"

I lit a candle so I can fart to the darkness, and this soap box won't be a polarized position. If non-profit big money funding can make possible something as incredible as Shakespeare in Central Park, it won't be hard to get me to kneel before the concept from time to time. I have no axe to grind, really, except with pompous bullshit. I am just curious why a benevolent for-profit business that works to break even don't get the same respect as a lazily conceived concept waiving a 501(C) banner? This is a casualty of unexamined anti-capitalist feelings and an easily abused system called Not For Profit. 

What are we saying about the value of building community when businesses labeled as "community building" are non-profit? I don't know about how it works in Peoria or Illyria, but in Bushwick, a little profit can build community just fine. I guess it just doesn't seem as trust(news)worthy. 

Night off, nearly.

I'm exhausted but I know I'm going to wake with my heart pounding.  I finally sent the last Motherlodge press e-mail with the full schedule today....now I get to turn and see the stacked-up pile of "need to's" that has been sitting next to me while I was down that rabbit hole. 

Like, "need to be all lovin' with my lay-day"...

Hay hay.

A quick list:

1) next year, take into account SxSW when sending press stuff. Too many out of office replies today...

2) Make packing list - clothes...taxes for Dad..band equipment...merch...uh....

3) Call the performers and say hello. 

4) Now that I got a social security card, get a photo i.d. 

5) Facebook my brother.

6) Birthday invitations for Dad's dinner next week.

7) Send Chef Tim his DVD so he can prepare for his CNN interview on the 28th.

8) Sip bourbon. 

9) Have sex with cat.

10) Surf porn, erase history.

11) Beg every human I know to come to Motherlodge Louisville.

...I met with David Van Asselt today from Rattlestick Theatre on Waverly. We talked for 10 minutes about getting together with Scott Morfee at Barrow Street and laying plans for Motherlodge West Village in January 2009. When I texted Bob this news he texted back, "God spoke to you on the vernal equinox and declared you a New Yorker for the indefinite future. And an artistic direc"[cut]  

Does that go in the bio? 

I know, but...

It's hard to explain, but some of the ideas that I couldn't get together for this Motherlodge were not necessarily time consuming. Some of them are a matter of a phone call. But they are, as I often say, "one call too many" - if I numbered the great suggestions I've got and then considered how easy they would have been if the person suggesting them had started with, "How bout I do this for you..." what a change that could have made. 

I dunno. Maybe I'm blowing it up because I am someone who from being so over extended all the time can easily spot someone who is too consumed to ask for help. These are the people upon whom it's easy to try out one's generosity and helpfulness. "What can I do", I'll ask them (like so many people have asked me lately) even when I know that they are too overwhelmed to know where to begin in answering. So I feel like I offered, and don't have t sweat being expected to follow through. 

Here's my list for anyone who is reading this and has good follow through ...

We need a morning show! Terry Meiners, WHAS!

We need posters to go up for Taylor Mac and our opening concert on March 29th.

We need big audiences!!! (If for no other reason than because it makes it more fun. But there are other reasons as well...)

Today I planned the last Motherlodge event. It will be a panel discussion about ideas of profit and not for profit with regard to artists getting funding, making a living, and having freedom to do so. I don't know if it will be a discussion open to the public or just something we broadcast on our soon-to-be network channel. But 3 speakers are confirmed: me, Julia, and a puppet.

  

Curation Creation Motherblog Paddy Day

If you were a flower bud in the ground, how would you know the count of your pedals or even what color they'd be before you bloomed? If you were  bacteria in a skin pore on the nose of a 13 year old, how could you predict what you'd come to look like in the mirror until you became a zit?

These are the kind of wise rhetorical questions my attempts for complete understanding of Motherlodge have brought me. Every once in a while I'll have a moment of "Oh, so this is what it is going to be!" Sometimes the realization catches me off guard. Other times, it's the incarnation of my earliest hopes for what could happen.

Yesterday, mogulus.com contacted me and they are very excited to partner with Motherlodge in time for Motherlodge Louisville. So one of my very earliest ideas for Motherlodge - a network channel for the greater creative community around me - is going to happen.

Then, today, Mark Langley of Clifton's Pizza called me to tell me that after many years and numerous attempts, the kitchen crew at Cliftons finally has a bona fide cover band. "We're playing our first paid gig this weekend at Longshot Tavern". Motherlodge on March 30th after Less the band will be their second. (Now if only I could get them on a double bill with Chef Tim Tucker's Shelby Park Soul Stew... ahh - next Motherlodge.) 

The Clifton's Kitchen Band settled some questions for me regarding what I have been up to with Motherlodge. (Aside from upturning the schedules of my friends and risking complete financial ruin for my family.) What I'm doing is multi-tasking, but that's hardly news - I've been multi tasking since I learned to suck a nipple and shake a rattle - it's the tasks themselves that have been hard to identify. Now, a nearly fresh realization of what I have been up to...

1) creating Motherlodge, but also, especially for this first Motherlodge Louisville, I have been 2) curating Motherlodge Louisville. 

People like to throw titles around as if it says something about themselves that they need to convince other people of. I tend to come from the other direction hoping that the work will make it obvious, but that's not always been the sanest approach and here lately, I've learned that a fair grasp on naming your tasks helps everyone understand what's going on. I sent an e-mail to everyone who appears to be on the Motherlodge team to write me back with descriptions of what they are doing. I had failed to respond up to this point. This seems like a good place to start: I'm creating. I'm managing/producing. And I'm curating.  

From Sunday's  Opening concert at Salvation Army to Molly Rice's Saints Tour.... Taylor Mac and A Boy Called Noise....Lady Rizo and Big Diggity....live theater in Ear Xtacy records....Joe Hanna, Tom, and Opus Ditty's children's concert....RONNIE DORSEY (you will have to meet her to understand) and Adam Rapp having a week to do everything he does except maybe a game of basketball (next Motherlodge, Adam!)....no one could be more pleased by the universe that is coming together than me. And having Less the band and Clifton's Kitchen Band share a bill takes the cake.  (That one kind of curated itself.)

Every exciting new understanding of the mechanics of Motherlodge comes joyfully with a task to mark for the not too distant future...CURATORS for the next Motherlodges!

skeleton of an invisible man

Adam texted at 3:30 that he couldn't make 4:00 rehearsal. He was pissed, but two conference calls with HBO "came up". I texted him back asking him to make sure HBO had my new number and proceeded to Dumbo where our already skeleton-crewed Less rehearsal was down to Rob and I. 

I've been tired of playing drums so I pulled out the Guild and found a space in which to maneuver with some ideas Rob had. At the end of our second burst of energy, I started thinking of Aaron Stout, and I felt a vastness stirring in me, with words to say and melodies to spit.

You left at dawn to be first in line for the beheading. You came back wide-eyed and asked me do you realize where we are heading. It's been hard to talk to you.

The words are not the thing yet. It's the feeling. Here's some more:

.......(uh)......

Okay, I can't think of it now, but this line - the one I can't remember -  woke me from my sleep the other night and it was good. And it's somewhere in the dusty apartment I call my head.  It went something something something something, "over the bridge unabridged, from 1 to 5."

Today was a day not to think about Motherlodge too much. I got up at 5:30 a.m. and went to the Fulton Street Social Security Office to apply for a Social Security card.  With my birth certificate and marriage license I was approved. If I'm lucky I might get it before we leave for Louisville.

On the way out of the building, I was mocked by the security man at the door for not holding the door for a blind man. But I was confused. I'd just gone through applying for the SS card feeling like no one was going to be convinced that I was who I was. Walking out to see the blind man who had no regard for me, my first reaction was to feel even more convinced that I was not there. And on top of this, the guy was going in the wrong door. So I didn't know what to do - Do I help him go through the wrong door, or direct him to the - "HEY!" (before my thought was complete the security guard was on me) "That's great, sir! Thank you. Thank you for holding the door for him! Can't you see the man is blind?" 

I had my reasons, but reasoning aside, as they say, the facts the facts: Today I stood aside and made a blind man open a door himself. I did some cool shit, today, too, but this is the story to end the day with.

And this completes today's blog from Ray - the guy who still sometimes thinks more than he acts.

Motherblog 12 Mar. 2009

Needs for the day: 1) help with contacting for Louisville High Schoolers who WON'T be leaving town on Spring Break. We need volunteers. We need actors. We need responsible drivers.  2) someone to contact potential food sponsors for our meals. 3) someone with printing capabilities to help with programs the week of Motherlodge.

Commence naval gazing...

We lost Moby a few days back.

Okay. That's just fun to write. Really, we never had him, he's just cool enough to have considered coming to Motherlodge. He thought it sounded like fun, and said he'd check his schedule. I can't argue with him passing us up to play a benefit for transcendental meditation with Jim James and Sir Paul McCartney.

"Hopefully next year!" said Moby. 

Yes Mobes, yes.

I can see why J.K. McKnight visualizes a ship for his Forecastle Festival. Organizing our humble first Motherlodge feels like equal parts witnessing and navigating the balance between natural systems and structures that have uniquely different behaviors and rhythms. (Like ships to water, venues to bands, or, say Brigid Kaelin and Shannon Lawson.) Yet somehow amidst the crashing of seemingly unrelatable manners, THE VESSEL that is the thing takes on shape and a direction.

Seriously - this wasn't the best Motherlodge for Moby. Or Jim James or Paul McCartney for that matter. This is the year for me, Traci, The Rud, Melanie, Bill, Derek, Myron, Matt, and everyone else who is going to be involved in Motherlodge to discover what it is.

Motherblog #1

Bill had another great idea. 

"Why don't you blog about the Motherlodge as its coming together, that way next time you'll have notes on what happened and what to improve on."

My first note of what to improve on has been with me since day one - never schedule as many shows with me in them again. But there was no way of avoiding that this year. To start, the only way I could imagine filling 8 days was to think of the people and ideas within my reach. 

The Opening Concert is going to be the last thing that ultimately comes together, which figures, because it is the mission statement of Motherlodge. And like every good mission statement, it eludes containment like a dolphin covered in vaseline writhing on the deck of a tuna boat.

To start, the centerpiece of the concert is meant to be the audience, not the performers, but how exactly do you get people to come without a good reason? So tonight, a little over 2 weeks out, I am scrambling with the list of performers to advertise. The poster has yet to be made (!) It is going to say "10.00 suggested cover. Pay what you can. Just come." The emphasis is on just come. It stems from an idea that Chef Tim at Salvation Army and I feel strong about - everyone at some point can use a free meal. But for some reason, we attach a meaning to the kind of person that accepts a free meal. And this is block one in us being able to understand ourselves and anyone else in the context of our community. I hope some people who can barely afford the cover pay, because we will give them something worth paying for. And I hope some people who can afford to don't, so they can enjoy being taken care of. Don't get me wrong - we need to make money from the show. Quite a bit of money would be great, because the idea of Motherlodge is that everyone gets paid as well as possible. But for this, our opening concert, it is more important to stress community. There are nearly 1300 seats to fill. Just come.

The name of the opening concert is a tricky bugger, and I imagine at this very moment our co-organizer Todd Hildreth stretching his best German Mother Frown across his face as he reads some of the titles we have come up with for the opening concert.

But I should share some ideas before I get to the title options (which, by the way, are only options in my head because Tim and I settled an hour ago on a title - I'm just still pondering in my usual Ray way.)

So, some backstory - a few years ago - 15 or so actually, Craig Wagner and Joseph Castriota and I came up with a concert idea for our jazz trio. We were students at Bellarmine at the time and in our short jazz careers we had what I now think was a surprising knack for arrangements of spiritual songs. We also loved the soundtrack to Jesus Christ Superstar (the funky one with Ian Anderson and Murray Head). So Bellarmine College (at the time they hadn't found their way to University status) could only say yes to our idea to do a themed concert of music that turned a secular eye to the last story of Jesus.

Keep in mind, this was long before Mel Gibson or Southeast Christian. 

I'm not sure what I mean by pointing that out, but there it is.

We never ever addressed the idea of Jesus resurrecting because we thought it was the part of the story that sold out the intelligence of the people who found inspiration in the man's story. In terms of song selections, we had some missteps. I really had no business singing "Simple Song" or "They Won't Go When I Go". And one year, when Craig failed to edit down a video we borrowed, the program ran with 4 excruciatingly long minutes of a televangelist hitting his peaks accompanied by overdubbed fart sounds. 

But by the third year, there was a focus and drive to what we were doing that made for some of the best theater, music, and live art that I've ever participated in. 

These days we are post Gibson and present Southeast Christian (a Louisville Church that has the budget to take out full page adds for their Passion spectacular show that sells out their church which seats thousands). With the Jesus story staying current with the modern temper, I don't see anything wrong with the next gospel contextualizing Jesus as an X Man, or a South Park character for that matter. But what has changed for me since our last concerts has come from living in New York: whatever you believe had best be of use to your neighbor or else it's not worth a shit. And by neighbor I don't mean the neighborhood, the demographic, the high school. I mean everyone sharing this world with you. 

In his poem "Motherlodge", Kipling writes, "We met upon the level and parted on the square". He talks of the distinctions of religions recognized in the outside world, but of the little consequence they had inside the Motherlodge. (Which was, by the way, a Free Mason lodge).

Sure, Kipling didn't speak of women or homosexuals, but giving him the benefit of the doubt, we arrive at what I hope will be the core of the concert on the 29th - a warm, inviting place where everyone is welcome and encouraged to belong. Because of this it is my hope that Jesus stories are just part of the meditation, and that we land more firmly in the contemplation of everyone's story.

Tim and I like the title: "The Passion Fruits". I also like "SUP". Whatever it's named will taste and sound marvelous.    

Spacemen have Orbituaries

Published yesterday by the Indy Sun...

Aaron Joshua Stout, 29, died February 27, 2009. He was a loyal and cherished friend, brother, and son. He was a singer, songwriter, musician and composer, poet, artists, actor, and filmmaker. He is loved and missed by his parents, Stephanie and Jim Stout; brother and sister-in-law Simon and Liz Stout, James and Shalonda Cheatham; girlfriend Amia MAdole; grandparents Ronald and Carolyn Sue Doak, James and Eileen Stout; uncles and aunts MArk and Christi Doak, John and Gloria Comstock, Tim and Joan Doak, Doug Stout and Jill Warvel, Bob and Penny Stout, and Beth Coleman-Valdettaro; cousins Liz, Loren, Andrew, Tim, Christopher, Anna, Jordan, Betsey, Colleen, Bobby, Jeff, and AJ. Born August 6 1979, Aaron graduated from North Central High School in Indianapolis and attended Indiana University and University of Prague, Czech Republic, and wandered the world making music. He was blessed with rare creativity and passionately pursued his dreams. Aaron had thousands of friends. He brought much happiness and inspiration with his wacky humor, kind heart, remarkable intelligence and his wonderful talent. Aaron leaves a body of artistic works as his legacy. Many knew him by his art and we are left with sadness that we will not be able to create the new music that was his vision. He never knew how amazing he was. In lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to the Indiana Organ Procurement Organization or The United Way. Donations made to the family will support Simon's congregation Adonai Roi in Israel. Come visit with friends and family at the Conkle Funeral Home, Speedway Chapel, 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday March 3, 2009, with a service to celebrate Aaron's life at 7 p.m.

Before/After

Tomorrow night Corporal will play with Caithlin DeMarrais. While setting up the show, I had a moment when I wasn't sure what would make the best order for the bands. Caithlin and half of her band are from Ranier fuggin' Maria. This will only be Corporal's 5th show I think, but with Mike fresh from the Oscars, a lot of friends are psyched to check in with him... no one in either band really cared and the matter was easy to decide, but it had me reflecting on some stories where order made a difference.

One of the best band-order stories was told to me by Ben Daughtery. In the late 80's, Squirrel Bait opened up for GG Allen in Cinncinatti. Even for soundcheck, GG was the consummate professional, knocking a light tech off a ladder and checking the mic by sticking it up his anus. When it was Squirrel Bait's time to check (for those that don't know, soundcheck order goes in the opposite of show order), Peter Searcy had to use the mic GG had christened. (As the story goes, later that night the show was raided and Squirrel Bait, most of whom were underage, were locked in a closet with GG who had been in the middle of a set where he was painting himself with his excrement. Showbiz!)

I realized writing this that Ben told me this story on the way to a Love Jones show in Phoenix Arizona where LJ was on a bill with All and (I think) The Descendents. Ben had a bit of a meltdown with the billing and we never played.

Which reminds me of the time I travelled with the Impressions for a show in Houston, but that is a whole story unto itself.

Other band order memories:

Playing after Foo Fighters. This was back when their 3rd album had just come out. It was my 5th show with Days Of The New.  This went amazingly well in part because after seeing them destroy the stage, I felt like there was no point in being psyched out. I never noticed David Grohl and Taylor Hawkins sitting behind my drum riser during the set, which would have freaked me out. I remember Taylor's drum tech telling me about when FF's had played with Alanis Morissette that Alanis had made a stink about who played when and Grohl stormed into her dressing room, said he didn't give a fuck and played before her for the rest of the tour.

Playing after Black Keys at Rudyard Kipling. That sucked. This was the first time the BKs came through Louisville and I, being afraid of nothing, did not count on how less confident I could feel singing and playing guitar rather than drums, which was what I was doing at the time. I spent the set staring at every open space in the room, which seemed to be many after the Black Keys set. 

IAJE 1991. Craig Wagner and John Skaggs and I were made the "host band" for a late night jam session. What a mess.

Days Of The New and Sevendust at Louisville Gardens. Travis and his management felt that because it was Louisville, Days Of The New should headline no matter what. By this time, (5 weeks after the Foo Fighters show,) I was beginning to understand the virtue of playing next to last. It is really the best time slot. It saves you from watching hundreds of drunk people stream out of the auditorium while you play the forth song of the set. I have great memories of the show, though. It was Dad's first quasi-arena show. Sidestage videotaping the topless chicks makes any set time a good time.

 

The week that totally was

I'm not making this up. We really have a new President. Traci really got a client. Shannon really got an Oscar nomination and Lucas really got a gig at Humana Festival. 

There isn't enough money between Traci and I to have a significant trip to the grocery this week, but there is food in our bellies, a world full of staggering change, and warm nights to share at home where we can shake our heads, look at each other and say, "Can you believe this?"

Inauguration Day

Yesterday I woke up in a place I could have killed myself in. I was feeling the age in my bones and thinking that every decision I'd made in the past three years was wrong. It took most of the day to recognize that I was only thinking of the choices I'd made that were unfortunate. They were piled like dirty clothes on the wrong side of my bed and they were the ones I rolled myself into when I woke. But I wasn't thinking of all the choices I had made. Some of them haven't sucked. 

The last line of the Hopi poem says, "We are the ones we have been waiting for." In the new year that started at 12 noon, I would hope that these words can be appreciated without a) sacrificing the whole of the poem they came from or b) being taken, mistaken or assumed for a slogan of arrogance. This Is about Inheritance. It is the work of the responsible to articulate all that can be imagined, and turn dream to action. These next few months are shaping up to satisfy those who can think freely. The searchlight for new ideas may not likely be this bright again (...one speech cannot sway nearly half a life of guarded cynicism...) or it could keep getting brighter.

I listened to the man speak, kicked myself in the ass once for the times I checked out and didn't continue to apply myself, and then resumed the uncharted program. 

The end always feels near if you feel yourself nearing the end. 

I spent Inauguration night with people who had been checked out of the system longer than I've been. Every one of us found reason to take a step closer, and reach for more in our thinking. 

A mouse walked into a hole...

This morning there are holes in the new snow that covers the sidewalk on Goodwin. These drops of nothing in the pristine white reveal dark wet concrete beneath, glistening like lizard skin. I think today that I could be the snow, boundless and insistent, or a hole, which I'd describe as an absence of something expected that is more remarkable for what it makes room for than what it is.  I'm definitely not the ground under my feet.

No, today I am a hole. Definitely. I make my footprints respectfully, and with caution.

In the shower I heard a quote from a Monk who once lived in Bolognia. He said something like "in the world of todays poetry there are many mice who, when dusted with flour, consider themselves millers."

But the holes in the snow are what speak loudest.