Tag Archives: Music

Bluegrass Jam, 5/31/11

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Wesley & Laura
Wesley Holtsford & Laura Liem (with Danny Ricketts behind the camera)

Last Tuesday, my cousin Wesley Holtsford and his friend Laura Liem, both in from west Texas, played some bluegrass music with Kevin and his dad, Ryland Hawker.

Their impromptu jam convened at James Lynch’s house. He’s Wes’ great-grandfather and my dad’s sister’s husband. (You really wanted to know the details, I know. ;)

It was so awesome! The four of them really sounded great to have never played together before!

Kevin played guitar and sang most of the songs. Ryland, of course, played banjo. Wes played mandolin and fiddle. And Laura played fiddle.

(I sang some backup and one lead, I think, but was mostly on Kid Patrol. ;)

James was dancing and singing along. He invited his brother and his fiance over to listen, too.

Even Jo-Jo, James’ little poodle had fun … although he probably would’ve had more fun if Lucas and Atticus hadn’t wanted to play with him soooo much! (I wish I’d gotten pictures of that.)

And Wesley and Laura? Wow. They are really great musicians. And both sweet as can be. I wish they didn’t live so far away!!

6/18/11 UPDATE:

I’ve finally been able to sit down and figure out my file-transfer issue from phone to laptop. What a mess!

I used my Droid X’s (awesome!!!) TapeMachine app to record eight songs … and then my phone died.

I didn’t get the beginning of the first song or the end of the last, and I only got eight songs from the several hours of playing. (I wish I’d remembered to grab the H2 on the way out the door, but we only had about 15-minutes notice.)

I’ll come back later and post the individual songs, but here’s the whole of what I recorded, talking and laughing and all in between:

7/17/11 UPDATE:

Here, finally, are the individual songs that I recorded.

The Man Who Wrote ‘Home Sweet Home’ Never Was a Married Man:

Going Down the Road Feeling Bad:

Moondance:

Cumberland Gap:

Faded Love:

Old Joe Clark:

Sally Goodin:

And some additional pictures from the evening:

from left: Wes, Laura, Kevin & Ryland

Every Second of Every Day: Our Theme Song :)

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I’ve been playing around with a tool called Cinch this week.

It’s a website and a synced app that allow you to easily record audio, attach a message and image, and share with Twitter and Facebook followers and friends. You can also download, link, or embed the MP3 file.

You can see the widget I add over on the far right sidebar. It will play all of the “cinches” I’ve saved so far, once of which is our theme song, finally on our website:

Yay. Sounds pretty good considering it was recorded on the laptop at the Cinch site.

I’m not sure what happened to the player, so here is the same file, downloaded from Cinch.fm:

Here’s a YouTube video of the song. :)

And here are the lyrics:

Every Second of Every Day
by Jo & Kevin Hawke

Everything I do, every word I say
Every second of every day
I give it all to you; I give it all away
Every second of every day

Everything I am, every little flaw,
is a canvas on which you can draw.
I give it all to you; I give it all away
Every second of every day

And in the morning when I look out on the day
I can say it is good 'cause it is yours
And in the evening when I look back on the day
I can say it was good 'cause it was yours

Everything I am, all the bad and good:
All my thoughts, all my feelings, all my beliefs
I give them all to you; I give them all today
Every second of every day

And when I feel like giving up
And when I take pride in what I've done,
It's a travesty of your majesty

And in the morning when I look out on the day
I can say it is good 'cause it is yours
And in the evening when I look back on the day
I can say it was good 'cause it was yours

Everything I do, every word I say
Every second of every day
Copyright © Jo & Kevin Hawke –  
Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Neil Young at DPAC

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Last night, Kevin and I were fortunate enough to experience a living legend: the phenomenal Neil Young at the Durham (NC) Performing Arts Center.

I know you’re thinking that sounds like overkill. But trust me; if you’d been there, you’d just nod in agreement.

I’d never seen Neil in concert before, but I’ve loved his music for years and have heard and read so many different stories about his performances that I really didn’t know what to expect.

He started out on acoustic. After receiving a standing ovation for simply stepping onstage, he launched into a version of “My My, Hey Hey (Out Of The Blue)” that brought me to tears. Seriously. From the first strums of his guitar I was so choked up I had to grab a tissue.

Then, “Tell Me Why” and “Helpless.” Sweet! His voice was as crystal clear as ever.

Kevin: “That dude sings from a place most people have never visited.”

He moved to his black Les Paul and then to his white hollow-body Gretsch. And then, he was on upright piano and organ and back to Gibson and to the baby grand and back to acoustic. His classic dissonance and refined distortion. (His latest album is called Le Noise, after all. ;))

Neil seemed to swirl through his various musical personas, a big wooden Indian and on-and-off guitar techs his only companions onstage, all before an almost psychedelic set of four stage-height lighted window panes that altered and mixed colors based on the mood of the songs.

We could have stayed there all night listening to him perform his catalog … and it would’ve taken at least that long, as prolific as he is. I really wish I could’ve heard “Old Man” and “Heart of Gold,” especially, but he did play a whole lot of his classics, including a scalding version of “Cortez the Killer,” and all things must past…

On the way back to the parking garage, we stopped at his tour bus (above) to see whether he’d be coming around to sign autographs or speak. One of his tour guys allowed a handicapped young man to enter the bus door area, and Neil came down to meet with him. (Aww! We all applauded.)

We headed around the corner, and there he was! Tired, yes, but still smiling. And such kind eyes. :)

The picture’s terribly blurry, but given the lighting situation, the constant movement, and the other people moving about, it was the best I could do.

This is what I posted on Facebook late last night:

He was amazing!! It was just him and guitars and pianos and organ and harmonica and lights and feedback play … and sweet, sweet vocals … and vibrancy of all kinds.

I thought 20th row back was close to his genius. And then he was one foot away. I didn’t get to shake his hand, but he looked right at us when he waved goodnight, before he pulled himself up the stairs of his bus.

p.s. Thanks to the guy who gave us the picture out by the bus! So glad you got your print signed and thanks for letting me know I wasn’t the only one who cried through half the show. :)

UPDATE: Thrasher’s Wheat has a setlist, pictures, and info on the DPAC show and Twisted Road tour it opened.

UPDATE: After I tweeted about his picture from the Thrasher’s Wheat post, DanSchram tweeted me a link to the video of the DPAC show he’d uploaded to YouTube:

UPDATE: DrHGuy of Heck of a Guy excerpted this post at his site with a very nice intro. He also posted a link to a bootleg of this show!

Durham’s American Tobacco Historic District

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Neil Young’s at DPAC (Durham Performing Arts Center) tonight, and we’re there! (I mean here, I guess, since we are…)

LOVE Neil Young! Woohoo!

And we haven’t had a *date night* in forever! (A big THANK YOU to my parents for sitting for us!)

We just devoured a small gourmet white pizza from Mellow Mushroom and are headed to see NY’s opening act.

I love the old brick all around! What a great way to revitalize a warehouse district! (Hint, hint, Danville!)

Spell What You Can

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Way to go, Attie! He made what he could and then made do with the rest. Ha! A couple more sets of these magnets, and we’ll be in vocabusiness. ;)

Notice the first two words: UP and DOWN.

Atticus spelled them after I recorded him (at his request) singing an old Jimmy Reed song called, “Baby, What Do You Want Me to Do” in front of the fridge. (You can hear Kevin’s version — better than the original, IMO — at number 11 on the 2/5/2010 Kitchen Concert.)

Here’s the video of Attie:

Atticus Sings the Gloria :)

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This is one of the songs we sing in church every week, except during Lent and Advent, the “Gloria.”

Four-year-old Attie’s been singing it for a while now, but it wasn’t until about the first week in March that he could get through the whole thing without any prompting. Since way before then, we’ve been hearing it at least 5-10 times a day, easy. When he’s building something or playing with his cars or superheroes, you can usually find him singing it. <3

Glory to God in the highest
and peace to his people on earth.
Lord God, heavenly King,
Almighty God and Father,
we worship you, we give you thanks,
we praise you for your glory.
Lord Jesus Christ, only Son of the Father,
Lord God, Lamb of God,
you take away the sin of the world:
have mercy on us;
You are seated at the right hand of the Father:
receive our prayer.
For you alone are the Holy One,
you alone are the Lord,
you alone are the Most High,
Jesus Christ,
with the Holy Spirit,
in the glory of God the Father. Amen.

Village Murals

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We were headed toward Washington Square Park, guitar in tow, ready to play some music for our favorite black squirrels.

Or at least we meant to be headed that way. Even after six NYC visits together (and two before that for me), we still find it quite easy to find things we never meant to see on the way to someplace we think we’re headed but really aren’t.

And then, we saw this awesome trio of murals, which were painted by Rico Fonseca, “the artist of Greenwich Village.” (It’s on West 3rd Street at MacDougal. Here’s a picture of the whole set.)

Here are the other two:

And here’s a video about the artist: