Stand With the Generals

Two of the greatest army generals the world has ever known had faults. They also had great strengths, or we wouldn't have a country — or a university that means so much to so many.

A university is about learning, and it's about teaching values. Changing the name of Washington & Lee University would create a new school, based on different values than those the two eponymous generals imparted long ago, e.g.:

• Courage
• Wisdom
• Steadfastness
• Generosity
• Loyalty
• Fidelity

What would be the new values?

A new school built on yielding in the face of adversity, giving in to the heat of battle, and selling out friends cannot stand long. Appeasing the mob now makes not a firm foundation for the future. Placing popularity over reality and prioritizing the immediate over the timeless are foundational values doomed to fail.

The mob is never satisfied; it cannot be appeased.

Offer up Robert E. Lee today and the mob will come for George Washington tomorrow. One day the mob may even come for you. What will be your defense if you yield this time?

Stand with the generals and save the school. Stand with the generals to learn an practice the values they imparted. Stand fast, hold that line. Only in this way will the core values the assure a brave future for the school we love hold.

Determining a Winner in Virginia

A modest proposal for determining the winner in the 94th District Delegate race in Newport News* — which may affect the balance of power in the Virginia House of Delegates** — consists of an essay-writing challenge. 

Both candidates would be asked to provide their best answers to the following:

1) Virginia Founding Fathers — (33 points)

How will your actions as a representative in the Virginia House of Delegates for your district emulate the highest ideals of the Founding Fathers from the Old Dominion*** — as expressed in their writings, political debates, and contributions to our nation's founding documents?

JUDGES: Daughters of the American Revolution local chapter. 

2) Gas Pipelines Through Virginia — (33 points)

Describe how the two natural gas pipelines being proposed to run through the Old Dominion will help the state and your electoral district.

JUDGES: Chambers of Commerce from across the state.

3) Preserving Lives of Future Virginians — (33 points)

How will you apply the power granted to you in your position in the Virginia House of Delegates to preserve the lives of unborn Virginians, protecting them from dismemberment in their mothers' wombs — their baby parts being sold to the highest bidder — while preserving the physical, mental, spiritual, and moral constitution of future Virginia mothers?

JUDGES: Virginia Council of Churches.

RULES: Candidates shall have 24 hours two prepare answers to all three (3) essays; essay scores shall be based on composition, content, and construction; candidates shall receive one point each for signing their names; if the essay scores again result in a tie, the incumbent shall retain his seat.

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*The tie of 11,608 votes each to Democrat challenger Shelly Simonds and incumbent Republican Delegate David Yancey to the Virginia General Assembly David Yancey leaves it to the State Board of Elections to determine the winner by drawing names.
**A Simonds win makes it 50-50 Democrat seats vs. Republican.
***Jefferson?

Danny Knicely Appearing in Greensboro, Vermont - 11.18.17

The great Danny Knicely of Virginia appears with Autoharp Hall of Fame member Bryan Bowers and New England singer and multi-instrumentalist Geoff Goodhue.

With Beg, Steal or Borrow, winner 2017 Podunk Bluegrass Festival Band Competition.

"Come together for a special evening of American folk and Mountain Music."

VENUE: Highland Center for the Arts
ADMISSION: $20 in advance; $25 day of show
ADDRESS: 2875 Hardwick Street, Greensboro, VT 05841
INFO: 802-533-9075; info@highlandartsvt.org

Podunk Winners

"Don't You Ever be Afraid" by Bootsie Daniels

Sweet Virginia Calling

Eli Cook in Bethlehem, NH

Eli Cook came to town last night. Or at least he came northward enough for me to drive over and see him. It was like Sweet Virginia calling.

On the way into Bethlehem for the show,^1,2 Willie Nelson appeared on the radio singing my favorite "Funny How Time Slips Away". It might have been the single song that pulled me up and out of where I was at the time I encountered early Willie.³

Eli was the rising blues phenom.

Bob Taylor⁴ at Rapunzel's in Lovingston⁵ was perhaps his biggest proponent. I caught Eli play at that venue, in Scottsville for the Fourth of July, and later at a weekly gig he had in downtown Crozet.

Admiring his 12-string guitar in Bethlehem, I was wondering who made it when thought I just caught the "R" and maybe the "dge" of a logo on the headstock. Rockbridge Guitars?

That's a name out of my past.

Sure enough, it was the Randall Ray and Brian Calhoun luthier operation, which started in Lexington where they are from.^6,7 They made his guitar, a (for them) rare 12-string. My interest in bluegrass started while a student at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, and it was a Lexington bluegrass band that opened up the music scene for me in Charlottesville many years later.⁸ Brian and Ray both played with them.

I got to compliment his sweet parents on how well-mannered they raised him. Eli agreed to play a charity performance at a summer festival I helped organize in Harrisonburg several years ago. His dad helped him set up.

Speaks well of the whole Cook family.

On the way out of town after the show "A Place in the Sun" by Pablo Cruise came on the radio. As far as I can recall I have never heard this song on the radio before, even during the group's heyday.⁹ I only know the song because it was played over-and-over on my roommate's stereo in my Washington and Lee dorm room.¹⁰

Maybe the Gods of Music put this particular song on the radio at that precise time in case I missed that Eli coming to town was like . .

Sweet Virginia Calling.

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1. find any meaning in the town name?
2. just across the Connecticut River from where I live in Vermont.
3. in Houston, just popping out of "corporate America", and thinking about pursuing my writing.
4. then proprietor of Rapunzel's who was at the Prism Cafe in Charlottesville the night I became a poet, Bob subsequently named me poet laureate of that coffeehouse/bookstore/venue.
5. where Eli was born and from where he currently hails.
6. they've now moved to Charlottesville.
7. as their website says: "Rockbridge Guitars takes its name from Rockbridge County, Virginia, as homage to the homeland of the luthiers."
8. I also bought my first guitar at Rockbridge Music in Lexington.
9. the title song of the group's third album (1977), the single only reached 42 on the charts.
10. his high school girlfriend had just left him, so perhaps the way-more popular single "Whatcha Gonna Do?" was soothing; he's also nephew to Boz Scaggs.

Blues Artist Eli Cook Appears at 42 Maple in Bethlehem: 11.19.16 @ 7pm

Eli Cook from Virginia

 “AMONG THE TOP 3 SOLO BLUES ARTISTS WORLDWIDE" - Blues Matters Magazine

"The best blues singer of his generation..." - All Music Guide

Eli Cook’s blues expresses raw honesty in a unique blend of contemporary and old-school styles, creating an original sound.

WHO: Eli Cook
WHAT: solo performance
WHEN: Saturday, November 19, 2016 from 7-10pm
WHERE: 42 Maple Street, Bethlehem, New Hampshire 03574
HOW: tix $30

Get Her to Sing "Julie"

If not for a Devon Sproule fan who sat by himself at the closest table to the tiny corner stage at Little Grill Collective,* I might have missed an amazing musical experience.

I took him to be a James Madison University student. Where or how he first heard the song, I don't know, as it was not yet released.**

When Devon asked for requests, this intensely-focused fan shouted out "Julie!"

Having never performed it live, his request posed a bit of a challenge. Devon turned her back on us for a moment, gathering the lyrics and chords.

When she turned back, she gave what was for me a transformative musical experience, like being at the Dawn of Music — like watching All of Music being created right before me.

I have since been the intensely-focused fan shouting out "Julie!" when I get to see Devon Sproule live.

Having finally listened to the recording of the song on  Don't Hurry for Heaven,*** I can say you must hear it live to get the full effect.

Go see Devon Sproule, and shout out "Julie!" You're in for quite a musical experience.

---

*on July 6, 2007.
**she wrote the song based on a letter sent to a radio station, responding to some sort of on-air contest.
***which I purchased at a house party in Hartland, Vermont on May 17, 2016 (and listened to over-and-over again till I wore out the CD).

They Got Religion?

Never miss a chance to catch Walker's Run with Danny Knicely on mandolin and Will Lee on banjo. These two were founding members of the Telluride-winning phenom known as Magraw Gap — along with Larry Keel and John Flower — and each is a legend in his own right.

Hitting the big time . .

If these legends — plus Walker's Run founder Brennan Gilmore on guitar and original member Zach Blatter on bass (not to mention Nate Leaf on fiddle) — could possibly be outclassed by the venue itself, The Hamilton certainly made a bid.

Brennan Gilmore

What a place. Beautiful, formal, fun. Like something out of Vegas. You can't sit there without thinking: "These guys have really hit the big time!"

Next Big Thing?

If you needed any more reason to go to the March 10, 2016 show in D.C., that reason was The Rondo Rigs — with Eric Robertson* on mandolin, Duncan Wickel on fiddle, and Nicholas Falk on drums. If my predictor still works, this group is going places. Super-smart lyrics, excellent musicianship. Great stage presence.

Where's the booze?

But the most remarkable thing about the show to me — having seen a few Walker's Run performances, and those of other bluegrass groups — is that not a single performer was drinking alcohol on stage. Each had a water bottle prominently displayed instead. None of those ubiquitous beer bottles.

What the heck happened!?! So many bluegrass songs are about booze, being drunk, or hiding the still from the revenuer. How can you possible perform real bluegrass music without being half-soused? 

Could the venue forbid performers from drinking on stage? Could the group have decided to go alcohol-free? Maybe their last number provides a clue. Mr. Gilmore invited members of the opening act to come back out and they did a really fun Jesus song ("if you want something, just ask Jesus").

Did they get religion?

SEE ALSO: "Knicely Done"

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*with this surname and The Band-like sounds, one wonders if he might descend from Robbie.

The Rondo Rigs & Walker's Run @ The Southern in C-ville March 11, 2016

"To My Mum . ."

TO MY MUM . .
Olenka a lover of the celestial..

by Teig Hogan

a week before the solstice
the hunter yet travels North
  his belts aligned due East
                          and West
his sword is towards the South

what NEWS he harbinges
I'll not deign to know
yet before he must retreat
I'll bet there will be snow

may you go back from whence you came
don't worry me a thing
for I am old and cold and not so bold
and waiting for the spring

I'd rather not observe you
upon my northern sky
for when at last you dip for good
another year's gone by

"Too Good to Check"

"The Rolling Stone story was simply too good to check. It perfectly advanced the narrative — featuring brutal, predatory rich kids (from a southern school, no less), indifferent administrators, and a devastated victim. And, like many of the “poster child” campus rape cases of the last two years, it was fundamentally false. If campus rape is such an epidemic, why are poster kids so hard to find?"

David French, National Review

Lawn Jam Line-up Saturday, June 27 @ Our Community Place

Lawn Jam Band Line Up and Performance Times

12:00-12:30 Scott Murray
12:45-1:15 Lightning Lucas Shrock-Hurst
1:30-2:00 Tom Weaver with Eric Olsen-Getty
2:15-2:45 Jeff Gorman with Eric Olsen-Getty
3:00-3:45 Bryan Elijah Smith (solo)
4:00-4:30 Many Nights Ahead
4:45-5:15 Greg Ward
5:30-6:10 kat & the travelers
6:15-6:45 Dr. How and the Reasons to Live
7:00-7:30 Charlottesville Community Drum Choir
7:45-8:15 Nic Melas
8:30-9:30 Regular Sauce Reunion

In other local music news, Old Crow Medicine Show has donated something for the charity auction or raffle. Wonder what it could be? Be at Our Community Place in Harrisonburg, VA on Saturday!!

"Not Serious"

"Rolling Stone Magazine admits its staff engaged in reckless behavior while covering this story, yet . . The reporter in question not only failed to apologize to members of Phi Kappa Psi, but doesn't even acknowledge the three witnesses she quoted in the article but never interviewed. This is a clear and sad indication that the magazine is not serious about its journalistic obligations."

Stephen Scipione, president

UVa Phi Kappa Psi chapter

"Too Good to Not Be True"

“It was too good to not be true, and that’s what’s going on in this case as well. You don’t want women to be gang-raped in a fraternity house, but you want to believe this terrible thing is happening and therefore you can expose it.”

Daniel Okrent

former public editor

New York Times

"Never Sort of Allowed for the Fact"

“We didn’t think through all the implications of the decisions that we made while reporting the story, and we never sort of allowed for the fact that maybe the story we were being told was not true.”

Will Dana, Rolling Stone

Chevy Chase Coincidence

Hippest Spot in C-ville

Having just returned from visiting Bennington College in Vermont, hoping to see a Charlottesville musician attending there, I was interested to overhear the group of young C-villians sitting next to me at the C&O restaurant discussing that very school.

Turned out one was a musician, which made me nod inside. Most all of my central Virginia coincidences involve musicians. These kids were discussing their dorm "pod" at Bennington, relating stories thereof.

We were enjoying the live act—The Skip Castro Band—and I saw my musician friend Paul Curreri sitting at the bar. Conditions for coincidence were ripe.

I opened up a conversation with the young gal sitting next to me—Anna(?)—opening with the usual question: "What are your plans now that you've graduated college?"

"I don't know."

"Some kids go to grad school."

New "house" at Bennington

"If I had to, I guess I would." (Oh.)

It transpired that her father was from Hawaii and her mother from Maryland. The latter fact drew me in.

(with a gulp)

"What part of Maryland?" "Montgomery County," she replied.

(gulp again)

"What part of Montgomery County?" I asked, fully sensing where this was going. "Bethesda-Chevy Chase."

(big gulp)

"What street did you live on?" "I don't know," she said "But it was right next door to Donald Rumsfeld." (Oh.)

I took another look at her and said, "Your mother would be about my age." "How old are you?" she asked. Telling her my age, she said: "Yes, she's the same age as you."

Paul Curreri

"So," I said, building up to something big. "I probably went to elementary school with your mother. I went to Chevy Chase Elementary School."*

"She went to Chevy Chase Elementary School."

After naming the two teachers who taught our class there—Miss Page and Miss Kopp as a duo—and mentioning the names of some of my classmates, I said it was absolutely certain that I went to elementary school with her mother.

She seemed unsure as she got up to go.** I guess I just couldn't help myself when I added . .

"You know, if things had turned out differently between your mother and me in the sixth grade . ."

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Other schoolmates in Miss Page and Miss Kopp's 6th grade class at Chevy Chase Elementary School in 1970-71 that I remember (perhaps imperfectly) included Phil Urquhart, Phil Augustine, Rudy DeSeife, Louis DeSipio, Sharon Flood, Adam Kolker, Maya McGee, Carol Engler, Jack Roche, Mike Spaulding, Harold Patch, Diana Stone, Beth (?) Stoner, etc. 

Many, including myself if we had not moved again, would have ended up Class of 1977 at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School.

*for just one year (1970 to 1971) because we moved to Vermont (the tie-it-all-together coincidence in this Vermont-Virginia story).
**she would later confirm that it was all so horribly true.

Coincidence Corner: Part II (Vermont extension)

When I first relocated to the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont — aka "Moose Country", with Canada immediately north and New Hampshire east — I was in a desperate search for public WiFi. 

Electricity finally reached this area in the late 1930s, why would there be public WiFi anywhere in 2008?

The nearest town had no cafés, not like you'd see elsewhere in the United States. McDonald's had one electrical outlet for all of its customers, and that one source of power put users in direct sunlight in the afternoon.*

Hope came in the form of indications that a real-life café was coming to town.

First, a sign above the building appeared. Peering in hopefully, I could see an acoustic guitar leaning up against the wall. Furniture slowly appeared. 

Some nine months later, The Grindstone Café opened — and they did indeed offer WiFi with ample electrical outlets. The owner-founders were two guys out of Keene, New Hampshire — one of them a musician, teacher of guitar, and guitar fixer.**

Lounging comfortably in my new spot, consuming way less coffee than would compensate for the WiFi and electricity I was consuming, I regaled these new barista-owners with stories of my musically-driven, central Virginia coincidences.

When I'd hear my Virginia musician friends' songs play on the radio station at the café, I'd excitedly make the connection for the barista-owners.

One day an older guy tried to enter the coffee shop but had difficulty getting up over the threshold. He'd step up, then fall back. Overcoming that barrier, Otto Kremer (1943-2018) energetically grabbed for the guitar and started singing.

He wrote songs, one of them having just played on NPR the Sunday before. He told tales of having once run a live music venue in St. Albans, Vermont — a story with a very wild ending.***

Here he was, a true musician, in fulfillment of the signs.

Months later Otto came in with a bag over his shoulder and asked if either of us — the non-musician barista-owner or myself — knew anything about streaming. "I'm sure Ben can help you on that, he's the technical guy around here," I deflected to the co-owner.

"That's good," he said, "because I have a movie I want to watch that my nephew produced. It's called The Parking Lot."

"Oh?" I asked, my coincidence bell ringing. "What's the film about?"

"It's about this parking lot in Charlottesville, Virginia. A bunch of musicians work there taking money, and this is their story."

I knew that parking lot. My room in the Chancellor Apartments looked out over it. I'd walked across that parking lot many times.

The Corner Parking Lot was at the heart what I'd come to call "Coincidence Corner" because of all the coincidences that had happened to me there.

Two of the biggest synchronicities I experienced on Coincidence Corner involved Buena Vista Social Club, a record the musician-friend who kicked off all my Charlottesville coincidences had recommended to me.

"Your nephew worked on this film, Otto?" I asked, returning to the matter at hand.

"Yes, my nephew Mark. He's a musician, too."

"What group did he play with?" I asked sensing where this might be going.

"6 Day Bender," he responded.

"I know Mark," I said. "I watched him play in that group at their CD release party."

"Oh," he said. "My sister lives in Charlottesville."

So many times this exact sort of thing happened to me, even outside of central Virginia, I should have long since gotten used to it.

Then Otto pulled a CD out of his bag, intending to give it to Ben to play for his customers. Catching a quick glimpse of the CD cover, I asked tremulously, "What CD is that, Otto?"

He pulled it up, coming closer for me to see. I covered my eyes with my hands and lowered my head. 

"Don't tell me," I said.

It was indeed Buena Vista Social Club.

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*they have since made amends, converting their restaurant into a cross between a swanky 1990s restaurant and a lawyer's office, replete with outlets everywhere.
**they had been thinking about offering guitar-related merchandise in their café.
***involving drugs, escaping police capture to another state, etc.

"Wrongly Disbelieving"

"Ultimately, the costs of wrongly disbelieving a survivor far outweigh the costs of calling someone a rapist. Even if Jackie fabricated her account, U-Va. should have taken her word for it during the period while they endeavored to prove or disprove the accusation. This is not a legal argument about what standards we should use in the courts; it’s a moral one, about what happens outside the legal system.

The accused would have a rough period. He might be suspended from his job; friends might defriend him on Facebook. In the case of Bill Cosby, we might have to stop watching his shows, consuming his books or buying tickets to his traveling stand-up routine. But false accusations are exceedingly rare, and errors can be undone by an investigation that clears the accused, especially if it is done quickly."

Zerlina Maxwell, Washington Post

"Affected by the Story"

"We were trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault and now regret the decision to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account. We are taking this seriously and apologize to anyone who was affected by the story."

Rolling Stone

Contact Sabrina by clicking her image

"Misplaced"

"In the face of new information, there now appear to be discrepancies in Jackie’s account, and we have come to the conclusion that our trust in her was misplaced."

Will Dana, managing editor

Rolling Stone