Season 479 - Destination Known

The first trucker's song of the season, if I'm not mistaken. Naming Pittsburgh and the eastern seaboard (but mostly inland, no ocean in sight). Been there, done that. Interstate 95, mostly. Pretty dull. Long drive. That's another reason Dave was in a hurry to get home, I guess.

 
I thought it was time I went abroad. This is the second song I've posted this week that I first heard sung by a pub band, though this time it was rather closer to home, in St Andrews, Scotland. I've been to five of the seven cities mentioned in this song (I'm missing Warsaw and Moscow). My favourite is either Berlin or Glasgow, probably depending which of them I'm in at the time. Until [waves hands about] I was lucky enough to visit Berlin quite regularly since I have a research collaboration going with some people in nearby Potsdam. Hopefully I'll be able to go back soon!



That's probably all I'll manage this week, although I do have a list of about 5 or 6 Half Man Half Biscuit songs which namecheck various towns and villages in the UK. So who knows!
 
Goin' To Chicago - Joe Williams, Jackie Washington, Count Basie and a bunch of other people have done this. I took a bit from each of them and changed a few words to make it more politically correct.

This is a traditional 12 bar blues.

I screwed up the second last verse which should be:

I won't be back no more Baby. It's all over now.
Goodbye Baby. I hope you make it somehow.


But since this was "Take 3" already, I didn't want to do it over.

I have been to Chicago a couple of times. One thing about Chicago that reminded me of New Orleans was the presence of a shop that sold Voodoo stuff. It shouldn't have surprised me since Chicago musicians like Muddy Waters and Sammy Lay sang, Got My Mojo Workin', and other numbers with references to Voodoo.

 
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The Flower Of Kilkenny - First collected and edited by Elisabeth Bristol Greenleaf and recorded in the field in 1929 from the singing of Patrick Mooney [1856-ca.1945]

In 1968/69, I took a year to do some traveling overseas. I landed at Shannon Airport and went to the road and stuck out my thumb. It took me a couple of minutes to realise that I was on the wrong side of the road. The first person to pick me up asked, "How long have you been in Ireland?"
I told him that I'd just arrived less than an hour ago and he said, "Then you haven't had a Guinness, have you?"
I said, "What's a Guinness?"
He took me to a pub and bought me my first pint of Guinness. I took a sip and said, "There's something wrong with this beer. It tastes burnt."
He explained that it was supposed to taste like that and I'd learn to love it."
A week or two later, early in the morning, near Kilkenny, I was picked up by an elderly gent who asked me, "Are you goin' to the Fleadh?"
I said, "The what?" and he explained that a Fleadh Cheoil was a traditional music festival and it was being held in New Ross.
I said, "Yes, I am going to the Fleadh."
As we were driving to New Ross, he asked if I had heard of a dulcimer. I had a recording by Jean Ritchie, playing the mountain dulcimer and when I told him he said, no that he meant a hammered dulcimer. He stopped the car and set up his dulcimer on the side of the road and played me a few tunes. That was my introduction to the hammered dulcimer by Mr. Andy Dowling (He pronounced it Doolin).
I spent the day with Andy and what a wonderful day it was. The town of New Ross was taken over by musicians and there were sessions in ever pub, church and schoolhouse in town.
Andy told me that he'd just had a chance to act in a movie starring Christopher Plummer that had been filmed in Kilkenny called Lock Up Your Daughters. I have seen the movie four times. It's not a great movie, but I love seeing the townsfolk dancing in a circle around Andy as he plays his dulcimer.
I also saw uilleann pipes for the first time that day. Similar to Guinness, I had to be convinced that "They're supposed to sound like that and you'll learn to love them."
Here's a photo of Andy that I took in a parking lot in New Ross. That's Andy's car behind him. I'll always treasure the time I got to spend with this wonderful old man (probably younger than I am now).
Andy Dowling sepia.jpg
And here's a photo of a younger Andy that I found in Google Images:
Andy Dowling younger.jpg



By the way, I love Guinness now and it's my regular drink at our local pub. I am also married to a hammered dulcimer player.
Here's Maggie on dulcimer, me on mandolin, our friend Al Kirby on guitar and our son Darcy on bass at a festival in Aylmer, Ontario.

Maggieat fred's.jpg
 
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What a wonderful day. I've had nine (9) new submissions today! 8 were covers and one was an original. Here we go: Marc took us to Mexico by way of Texas, Ryan took us to Los Angeles, California, where he spent a chunk of his childhood, Loftur transported us to Copenhagen, as seen through the eyes of Tom Waits, Lynda introduced me to the Chalice Well in Glastonbury, which fits nicely into her original lyrics, despite its 4 syllables, or is it 3...? Amsterdam was the next stop, with a bleak reality imparted by Wim, Rick takes us on a road trip which includes Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, through the eyes of a truck driving man, Edwin gives us a tour of seven wonderful cities, 5 of which he's seen, and Jim Yates takes us to Chicago and then to Kilkenny, in Ireland. Ahhhhhh. Big contented sigh from the gatekeeper. Sleep well, all, and we'll see where we go tomorrow.
 
certainly wasn't born in a prairie town like Randy Bachman but believe i have been to every major Canadian prairie town - also been to every province and provincial capital except Newfoundland and Labrador - we spent a year in Canada in 1995 - don't have as many photos as i would have liked because they used to cost money - even the bad ones

the bear was just out of Winnipeg - we stayed at Birds Hill provincial park
IMG_20210422_144435.jpgIMG_20210422_144514.jpgIMG_20210422_144909.jpgIMG_20210422_145250.jpgIMG_20210422_145418.jpg
 
I covered this one from memory so you may find a couple of pauses where the brain Is trying to recall what comes next. I've always loved holidaying in Spain and usually stay in places where tourists don't descend 'cos there's nothing worse than being stuck by a hotel pool and watching the Brits and the Germans competing for the sun loungers. Here's some romance for ya Liz ...........

 
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I studied at strathclyde university which is in Glasgow
it used to be called the royal college of science and technology
before it became strathclyde. This is an Eric Bogle song about
a drunkard and his long suffering wife.

I got special permission to enter an old song to this season.

 
Big hit for Danny Kaye.Visited on a Baltic cruise about ten years ago.As I recall a very pleasant city with a charming little mermaid statue and nice beer.
 
It's funny how the universe sends you a song. Friday last week during a conversation with a client at work at some point it was brought up that 1996 was 25 years ago. That's the year my family moved to San Diego and it seemed a profound realisation , as these things often do to me. A little bit later I was putting together a video for my artist page on facebook (please follow it! Link in sig) of me switching the desk in my living room from work mode to home studio mode as I've got a week off and planned to do some serious work on my album (managed to get three tracks laid down in addition to my seasons vids so time well spent).

Anyway, I soundtracked that video with a little improv but there were some parts that I really liked although I didn't think they'd ever end up as a song because normally I need to write lyrics first. Then comes Liz with this theme about places from your past, and her encouragement to keep doing videos. So I figured let's write one about San Diego. On top of that my eldest has recently become obsessed with riding his scooter and I'm getting a nostalgia hit because the street we live on is on a slope similar to the one that me, my brother and all the other kids in our street used to take ownership on every afternoon having scooter races and bad as it sounds it got me thinking that that age, probably 7 or 8, just a bit older than my son is now, was probably the last time I was properly happy and anxiety free, but then maybe we all are at that age before adolescence and cataclysmic changes to your life hit you.

Anyway, I've managed to compress all that into a three minute song that I've contorted around some riffs I made up on friday.


 
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I have been to all these places, too. Lived in LA for the better part of a decade!

 
This song is one of the first that I ever learned to play by ear, on guitar, back when I was in Junior High School.

I used to sing it with Susan Marinucci and Ken Bascue - I wonder where they are now?

Little did I know at the time that I would spend 1975-1979 in Salem and Clarksburg, WV going to college and working as a Top-40 DJ.
(But I got better, and became a firefighter/paramedic)

So without further adieu, from the archives of Henry John Deutchensdorf, Jr - a.k.a John Denver - Take Me Home, Country Roads.
(In my little green-screened Zoom classroom, without a fake background...)

 
This song is one of the first that I ever learned to play by ear, on guitar, back when I was in Junior High School.

I used to sing it with Susan Marinucci and Ken Bascue - I wonder where they are now?

Little did I know at the time that I would spend 1975-1979 in Salem and Clarksburg, WV going to college and working as a Top-40 DJ.
(But I got better, and became a firefighter/paramedic)

So without further adieu, from the archives of Henry John Deutchensdorf, Jr - a.k.a John Denver - Take Me Home, Country Roads.
(In my little green-screened Zoom classroom, without a fake background...)



Hi Kurt! I am unable to view your video... Liz
Liz
 
I have been to both Scotland and Hawaii - Technically I was in Scotland twice, having flown into Paisley, meandering down to Wolverhampton, over through Wales, up through Cambria, and back to Glasgow. But it was a single trip, so only once, I guess, in the grand scheme of things.

Hawaii, three times : Once to plan a Science Fiction Convention, once to help put on the science fiction convention, and once for a wedding. So Hawai'i, Maui, and O'ahu.

One of these days, I'll go back...


A couple of instrumentals - a very brief "Scotland the Brave" and what I originally learned as "Hawaiian War Chant"... until aHula Dancer I met told me that it had nothing to do with war, and that her mother would spank all the kids for singing "that dirty song".

According to Wikipedia, ""Hawaiian War Chant" is an American popular song whose original melody and lyrics were written in the 1860s by Prince Leleiohoku. The original title of the song was Kāua I Ka Huahuaʻi or "We Two in the Spray." It was not written as a chant, and the Hawaiian lyrics describe a clandestine meeting between two lovers, not a battle. The English title therefore has nothing to do with the song as it was originally written and performed in Hawaii."

I like that explanation a lot better - and I never did hear it played in Hawaii on any of my trips there... I never heard it played when I was in Scotland, either!

To the best of my knowledge, both of these songs are in the Public Domain.

 
Ok, folks, we've passed the halfway point, and we are up to 38 submissions for the season! Today I received 8! Lucky me! Six covers about every far-flung place and 2 wonderful originals. Here is a short recap: PaBrizzer, Mark C, Rob, Stanley, Rick, and Kurt sang me songs about Canada prairie towns, Spain and it's romantic vibe, Glasgow, Copenhagen, Los Angeles/San Francisco/Montana in ONE SONG, and beautiful West Virginia, respectively. The originals today were from Ryan and Pa and were about growing up, with all that that entails, in a town in California called Temecula on a street called Corte Carmello (findable on Google Maps, trust me) and about Sydney Harbor. Spoiler Alert: YOU GET TO SEE SYDNEY HARBOR!!! Needless to say, I am one happy chappy, even though I'm not really a chappy at all. Where shall we go tomorrow???
 
After a lengthy break from most social media and online stuff, I really wanted to get something posted for Liz's first week as a host. This song mentions Lake Poncartrain which is an estuary that connects with the Gulf of Mexico in Louisiana. I've been through there and across that bridge many a time :) Being from the South, there is a lot of language in this song that describes what the weather is like down here. Thanks for taking a turn as host Liz ~

 
Ah, Chicago on a nice summer day in 2007... didn't expect to get into an argument with my ukulele.

 
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