DIG THIS WITH BILL MESNIK AND RICH BUCKLAND- THE SPLENDID BOHEMIANS

There are certain artists with whom we share an affinity - those who have touched our souls in such a way that our lives are forever changed. 

Such an artist was Patrick Sky: a folk singer of Georgia Creek descent, whose professional trials and eventual retreat from public life tell a compelling story.

Blossom Dearie: what a great name! It was her real name, too. Well, Margrethe Blossom Dearie - she dropped the first part, and that was a good choice for Show Biz, I think. And, that voice: light, breathy, girlish, delightfully witty - I loved it from the first time I heard it.  And, not only was she a fantastic vocalist, but considered one of the great jazz pianists - Bill Evans was inspired by her chord work; that tells you something. 

Everything I’ve Got Belongs to You comes off of her first album for Verve, deriving from the Broadway show “By Jupiter” by Rodgers and Hart, which ran for 427 performances in 1942. The Amazonian lyrics juxtaposed with the little girl voice is kinky perfection. And, her articulation - hilarious and sexy, delivers a delightful confection. 

Though she was born in Upstate New York, she made her bones in Paris when she formed the vocal group The Blue Stars, which later became the famous “Swingle Singers”. Always entrepreneurial, she started her own label, Daffodil Records in ’74. I immediately recognized her voice from the educational recordings School House Rock and Multiplication Rock (the latter winning her a Grammy in 1973). 

Blossom Dearie - an unforgettable name for an incomparable singer. 

THE DIG THIS THANKSGIVING EXTRAVAGANZA-
AN AUDIO MOTION PICTURE-
MUSIC, GRATITUDE, INSPIRATION, LOVE, FAITH AND LAUGHTER- OUR GIFT TO YOU AND YOURS.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING FROM RICH BUCKLAND & BILL MESNIK-YOUR SPLENDID BOHEMIANS

BILL MESNIK'S HOLIDAY INVOCATION
1) CHAPEL IN THE MOOLIGHT- THE ORIOLES
2) THANK YOU FOR BEING A FRIEND- ANDREW GOLD
3) IN MY LIFE- DIANA KRALL
4) I THANK YOU- SAM AND DAVE
5) THIS IS ALL I ASK- TONY BENNETT
6) LONG LIVE OUR LOVE- THE SHANG-RI-LAS
7) THE TRUTH WON'T FADE AWAY- PROCOL HARUM
8) THERE BUT FOR FORTUNE- PETER, PAUL AND MARY
9 ) THE WHITE CLIFFS OF DOVER- THE RIGHTEOUS BROTHERS
10) i'LL BE SEEING YOU- FRANK SINATRA
11) VANLOSE STAIRWAY- VAN MORRISON AND GEORGIE FAME
12) A CHANGE IS GONNA COME- OTIS REDDING
13) THANK U- ALANIS  MORISSETTE
14) MANY RIVERS TO CROSS
15) IT'S MY LIFE- BON JOVI
16) MORE I CANNOT WISH YOU- PAT ROONEY SR.
17) ALMOST HOME- CRAIG MORTON AND JELLYROLL
18) LISTEN PEOPLE- HERMANS HERMITS
19) AMAZING GRACE- ELVIS PRESLEY

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In 1985, the British rock band Dire Straits released the song “Money for Nothing.” 
It is an undeniable rock classic. It also is a superb entry point for—of all things—judging the morality of capitalism. It is worth a listen as well as a classroom lesson.

The lyrics relay the perspective of a laborer. As he sees a video of rock musicians on MTV, he expresses envy. He strains in the delivery of appliances while the musicians enjoy great wealth and adoration with little hardship:

We got to install microwave ovens, custom kitchen deliveries
We got to move these refrigerators, we gotta move these color TVs

Listen here

Now that ain’t workin’, that’s the way you do it

You play the guitar on the MTV

That ain’t workin’, that’s the way you do it

Money for nothin’ and your chicks for free

As the song proceeds, the envy gives way to anger and resentment. There is injustice—even absurdity—in how wealth is distributed! An honest day’s work should be more valued!
No shit.
“Money for Nothing” is the dream of every generation. For society as a whole, there are two ways to get it. The first way is theft on a national scale. That means the extraction of goods and services from neighboring lands through warfare (i.e., pillaging and enslavement). The second way is through a set of property rights which aids the exchange of values and which permits innovation to flourish.

For ninety nine percent of human existence, we have chosen extraction. More recently, the right liberal attitudes toward commerce and diversity have won favor enough to inform our institutions.

While we still remain uneasy about the free-wheeling quality of markets, I think we can all agree that exchange is better than the old way to get “money for nothing and your chicks for free.”     - 

Scott Drylie -
Assistant Professor of Economics, Cost Analysis, and Acquisition Management at the Air Force Institute of Technology in Dayton, Ohio.

The Wanderer is two minutes, fifty-one seconds of pure swagger. Imagine my surprise when I read a quote from Dion where he said it was essentially a sad song, and that the one of lyrics demonstrated the singer’s existential crisis: “with my two fists of iron - ( I always thought it was “two fifths of wine”) - and I’m goin’ nowhere!”   Dion is a Buddha of self-reflection.

He has always been my rock and roll Sherpa since the age of 8 when my friend Larry Bader and I would play “Dion and Chubby Checker on tour”. Larry was Dion and I was Chubby (‘cause I was) - we’d put on the records and lip-sync our act. The Beatles took over as an obsession a couple of years later, but Dion was never far from my thoughts: he kept coming back through the decades: in the late 60s as a folky warrior for peace; playing coliseumson the oldie circuit in the 70s; in the 80s and 90s as a grizzled, born again survivor; then, producing a string of hit blues albums in the 2000s,  And, he’s still at it, sounding better than humanly possible. At the age of 84 he’s producing some of his best work ever.- just listen to American Hero, his latest with Carlene Carter, and genuflect.

The long delayed Norton release of “Kickin’ Child”, an album he recorded for Columbia that was scrubbed, posits the notion that it was perhaps Dion, before Dylan, who first took folk music electric with the master producer Tom Wilson.  He’s always been in my life, and I’m so grateful for that. If he had taken that doomed plane ride with Buddy Holly in ‘59… just think about what would have been lost. 

Vanguard Records is best known for its eclectic catalog of pivotal jazz, folk, rock and blues recordings by iconic artists like Joan Baez, Linda Ronstadt, Buddy Guy, Charlie Musselwhite, John Fahey, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Doc Watson, Country Joe and the Fish and countless others. Most recently, Vanguard has carried forward the label's legacy of artistic excellence with a diverse roster including Barenaked Ladies, Indigo Girls, O.A.R. and Collective Soul.

Riding the tail end of the popular boom of  commercialized  Folk Music, Vanguard's unexpected mega-hit "Walk Right In" soared to the top of the pop chart.  Looking for a long forgotten treasure to mine, Erik Darling and Bill Svanoe, doing what many had done before them, updated an old string band tune, composed by Gus Cannon and recorded with his Jug Stompers in 1929. 

They arranged it for TWO 12-String guitars (one of which, a leftie model, had to be specially constructed  for Bill), and adding the mellifluous tones of Lynne Taylor to complete the trio, the magic concoction was brewed to MOR perfection.

And, just in time for Gus Cannon, too!  He had recently pawned his banjo to pay his heating bill, and the royalties and national recognition breathed new life into a long dormant career. 

Samuel Laird Cregar (1914-1944) was the youngest of six sons of Edward Matthews Cregar, a cricketer and member of a team called the Gentlemen of Philadelphia. They toured internationally in the late 1890s and early 1900s. Laird’s mother was the former Elizabeth Smith.

Laird Cregar was educated at Winchester College in England, spending his summers as a page boy and bit player with the Stratford-upon-Avon theatrical troupe. Upon completing his schooling, Cregar won a scholarship at California’s Pasadena Playhouse, supporting himself as a nightclub bouncer when funds ran out. So broke that at times he had to sleep in his car, Cregar forced Hollywood to pay attention to him by staging his own one-man show, in which he portrayed Oscar Wilde.

After a few minor film roles, Cregar was signed to a 20th Century-Fox contract; among his first major roles was the middle-aged Francis Chesney in Charley’s Aunt, the first of several showcases for the actor’s delightful comic flair. With his sinister portrayal of the psychopathic detective in I Wake Up Screaming, he followed that up with the successful screwball comedy Rings on Her Fingers playing a con artist opposite Gene Tierney. Cregar became one of filmdom’s top “heavies” ? both figuratively and literally. Seldom weighing less than 300 pounds throughout his adult life, Cregar became obsessed with his weight.

After top billing in The Lodger, who may or may not be Jack the Ripper, the increasingly sensitive Cregar was growing tired of being thought of as merely a hulking villain. ...from: https://walkoffame.com/laird-cregar/

(From here the story takes a dramatic and tragic turn)

For more information:
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0187284/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1

There is a corner off Route 66, in Winslow, Arizona which has been memorialized with a statue of the late musician Glen Frey, in front of a Trompe-L’oeil image of a red, flat-bed Ford truck, containing a girl (my Lord) giving him the once over.  How many songs can you name that have been so celebrated?  

Take it Easy, written by neighbors Jackson Browne and Glen Frey, was the cut that launched the juggernaut that was The Eagles - America’s answer to The Beatles, in the shadow of the latter’s dissolution. The joyous, three part harmonies signaled the commercial ascendency of Laurel Canyon Country Rock - and provided a hopeful reset following the emotional bankruptcy of the late 60s. 

When I took my boys on a road trip to see the Grand Canyon, we stayed overnight in Williams, Arizona, also on route 66. I knew that Williams was not Winslow, but close, and that put a spring in my accelerator as I made the daybreak drive into the park.   

There is a great “Be here now” mantra in the line: “We may lose, or we may win, but we will never be here again - So, open up, I’m climbing in… Take it easy!” Viewed through that lens, every moment can be an opportunity.  

William Wyler’s intimate epic, from 1946—about three soldiers returning from the Second World War to their families in a small Midwestern city—profoundly and sensitively balances the private demons of scarred veterans and the press of public policies that leave their mark on daily life. Al Stevenson (Fredric March), a prosperous banker and paterfamilias, resumes his warm domestic life with a jaundiced view of country-club presumptions and a hint of a drinking problem. Fred Derry (Dana Andrews), a high-ranking bombardier with recurring nightmares, returns to straitened circumstances and a troubled marriage—and falls in love with Al’s grown daughter, Peggy (Teresa Wright). The third veteran, Homer Parrish, is played by a non-actor, Harold Russell, who, like the character, lost his hands in military service. Though adept with his prostheses, Homer, feeling diminished and dependent, breaks his engagement to the girl next door (Cathy O’Donnell). From lending practices to postwar Red-baiting, liberalized education to the fear of nuclear war, Wyler, working with a script by Robert E. Sherwood, captures the sense of history being written on the fly, of momentous shifts in mind-sets and expectations. In the movie’s nearly three-hour span, the chrysalis of an old world seems to crack open and a fragile new one begins to emerge; a deep and tender romanticism arises from the exposed vulnerabilities.

- Richard  Brody