The hills are alive.....

Bele Cheer; That was the name of the music festival I went to this last weekend. Having heard so much about Asheville, N.C. I felt compelled to visit this mountain town and with a name like that, I could not, in fact, resist. The purple log cabin turned out to be something special, situated at about 3,000 feet in a perfect, unspoiled hollow in the woods. There were pastures, cows, wild flowers and lots of trees. In the evening this became like a fairy glen with thousands of fireflies giving us a show.

I actually got to play music for pure recreation and the whole cliché was completed with friends Matt and Robin, with yours truly, singing and playing on the front porch, while we all got slowly juiced on India Pale Ale. I really do get it now – how those old timers get to be such amazing pickers. When there is no traffic sound and no distractions, time stands still. Also, there is something about the air quality up there. Maybe it’s less dense or something at that elevation, but Matt’s Gibson J45 and my circa 1919 Gibson A2 mandolin sounded incredible together. Put Robin’s voice into the mix and I could have gone on doing this for days. I may just have found a perfect retreat for work on the next album!!

Anyway, back to the festival; we visited for just the afternoon and evening. (Thanks to old friend, Woody Winfree for making this happen). First of all, I loved walking around the town and getting in some good ‘people watching’. Boy, there are some faces there that hark back to Ireland and Scotland and some of the accents were priceless. Still, they were probably thinking the same about mine.

A local act called Gravy Pockets, were very cool, singing some old Hank Williams songs on a street corner and then local chanteuse Kellen Watson took to the Charter Stage and blew me away with her sultry delivery and her original songs. Killer back-up band too. I believe she’s going to break through. All the signs were there. Local all - female act, the Buckerettes were extremely entertaining, in a charming way. The serious stuff came when Doc Watson’s long time side kick, David Holt with his band the Lightning Bolts (truly) showed the crowd on the Biltmore Stage, how to pick like nothing else. These people really have been visiting Asheville and playing this music for many decades. Superb vocal harmonies, with that unique country blend, and everyone exchanging different instruments for each song. David even showed us how to tackle the mouth bow, which he learned directly from Mr. Ralph Stanley. He also did a pretty mean turn on the washboard too. Respect. I failed to catch sets by the Gin Blossoms and Rusted Root but it didn’t matter. I’ll be back next year, I think.

Earlier in this trip to North Carolina, we visited a music store in nearby Waynesville and got to playing some of the instruments and communicating with the locals. You learn a lot when you start playing. People shuffle up and start to clue you in with some of the local news. There is something to be said for a more laid back pace to life, which these people obviously have. It was a good time and to cap it all, we got to spend some quality time with old friend (and ex tour manager) Russel Sidelsky who worked with us back in the days when Wishbone first moved to the United States. “You have lost none of your culinary skills, sir!”

All this guitar picking and mandolin playing puts me in mind of a story passed on to me by another real log cabin dweller, a Connecticut friend of mine, Mr. Chris Davis. He’s the man who put the Dobro solo on the Bare Bones version of my song, Strange Affair. A collector and trader of rare Hawaiian, koa - wood ukuleles, as well as Dobros and National guitars, Chris told me a story where he and his brother, some years ago, were at the final concert by Tiny Tim. Remember him? He used to regularly appear on the Johnny Carson show in the 70’s and he’d pop up on festivals and so on. Chris and his brother were in the front row and Tim (he was a very tall man of course) was playing his ukule, peering out from behind his shock of long black curly hair, when his eyes rolled back and suddenly he keeled over, right there on the stage (a la Tommy Cooper – for Americans, a much loved British comedian – see You Tube). Anyway, the crowd thought it was part of the act. Chris knew better and leapt up on stage to try and resuscitate Tim, who was probably having a cardiac arrest. Anyway, sadly, Tiny Tim was rushed to hospital where he was to pass away 2 weeks later.

It turns out that Tim was in fact an aficionado of the late great Roy Smeck, who was multi instrumentalist supremo. (You Tube again) Chris later loaned me a video of him doing his stuff back in the 30’s or 40’s I believe. Incredible player. He passed on, of course, and I believe Roy’s wife gradually auctioned off his treasure trove collection of amazing acoustic instruments.

There’s something about these old instruments that gives you a glimpse into previous musical eras. You can actually feel it when you pick up an old acoustic guitar or mandolin for example. They sound warmer, less brash. It’s as if the very molecules, comprising the wood, have been realigned by the person who has played the instrument over the years. I’ve talked to carpenters and they say the same thing works with old tools that have carried out the same job year after year. Call me crazy, but I really believe this to be true. I do know that if you leave an instrument for a while you definitely have to play it in again to get everything working optimally. Kinda like waking it up.

Talking about waking up; I have a plane to Serbia to catch for the first of our summer festivals. It’s a funny old world. Did you know that the Serbs were the last of Europe’s warring tribes and right up until the end of the 1800’s, some of their warriors would actually have the heads of their vanquished enemies dangling from their belts? But that’s another story… We are to be playing for the happy, music loving Serbs this weekend, I’m sure. If you get a chance to catch Wishbone at the Cambridge Rock Festival and Fairport’s Cropredy during August, then we’d love to see you. Oh yes, and for our Dutch and German friends, we’ll be at Pink Pop Classic. There are some smaller shows as well. Just check the ‘tours’ section of this site. Later….

p.s just learned there are two ways of spelling ukulele/ukeleles