Student grades are due tomorrow, but we went to church anyway - we had to sing, and anyway, after two years of semi-regular practice as a Unitarian Universalist, I have come to a place in my life where I find peace and solace in shared practice which starts and ends with love and service, togetherness and open-ended truths, and a shared commitment to social justice. Much of this is due to the particulars of our chosen worship setting. The UU church which we attend is in transition, with an interim minister who has my [...]
Regular readers know: Falcon Ridge Folk Festival is my home away from home, my happy place. An oasis amidst lush green farmland, nestled in the beautiful rolling hills of Hillsdale, NY, its four stages, dance tents, camping areas and vast vendor zones rise from the mist each summer to take over the alfalfa fields of Dodd's Farm, where they serve as much as 15,000 visitors with a cornucopia of music, food, fun and friendship. This will be our fourteenth year volunteering at Falcon Ridge. In that time, my wife and I, [...]
We've started the budget process over at the school committee table, and the outlook is bleak: State budgets are getting tighter, health insurance takes a bigger bite out of our state-determined minimum funding level every year, and here in Massachusetts, the only way to raise local taxes is to appeal directly to the voters - a tactic we lost by a factor of 5 to 2 just three years ago when we tried to get enough to reopen the middle school library. It's all part of a larger trend, of course. Since 2002, our school [...]
If we ever had doubts about the potential success of running a house concert series in a town of 8,000 people, this season's offerings have put them firmly to rest. After two years, A Tree Falls Productions has moved on to bigger pastures, thanks to the nice guys who run the B&B at the top of our local food chain, and the cascade effect has been miraculous: our guest list has grown larger, our draw is bigger, and the local building inspector has started sniffing around, trying to decide if our little private occasionals are [...]
http://www.mediafire.com/file/ 4tzzzztwmum/01_To_Whom_It_May_ Concern.wma John Wesley Harding: To Whom It May Concern [ purchase ] (scroll down to New Deal) In August 1997, I began an e-mail relationship with someone through the Dar Williams discussion list - by virtue of our shared love for Dar's music, our correspondence escalated to in-depth cyber-conversations about books, movies, parenting, marriage, and of course other musicians... which led to us sending each other mix tapes through the mail... and, in his first one to me, my new friend included John [...]
It's always fascinated me how, as social animals who can both project future possibilities and mutate our environment to our benefit, we're nonetheless driven to make peace with our own foibles, accommodate small stumbling blocks, and work around difficulties otherwise solvable and surmountable. A case in point: the 9 key on my laptop keyboard has been broken since last winter, and - as removing the key cap to clean underneath it proved ineffective - I have been forced to conclude that there is something electronically awry here, somewhere in the circuitry. [...]
Six months ago today I jumped into the world of music blogging with both feet and no expectations. Since then, Cover Lay Down has become many things to many people. To me, Cover Lay Down is sometimes a haven, often a playspace, always a way to try to put into words why I love what I love. But even though it is work, it is never a burden. And it is a place I am proud to call my home on the web. [...]
"No blog tracks found for: we're, about and 9 :(" I arrived at the Cat with my usual set of expectations: better than average means better than mediocre, and I go to as many of their free concerts as I can. I was blown away by We're about 9 almost as soon as they'd arrived on stage; both Katie Graybeal and Brian Gundersdorf have great voices for folk music, their songs are incredibly vibrant, and their lyrics are funny and smart. Not to mention the fact that they kept the audience laughing with banter between songs. Why had [...]
Cover Lay Down
Star Maker Machine
The Glorious Hum
the Weekender ::: New music from Catcall // the National // Summer Camp
KNIFE PARTY – RAGE VALLEY EP
Check Out: Ty Segall Band – “I Bought My Eyes”
