Old Town School – On The Road

Dispatches from the road from our wayfaring travelers.

Why Bluegrass

What is it about bluegrass music that drives people in far flung parts of the world to invest in instruments, form clubs and bands, and play and perform the sacred music of the American South together? In this June 2009 Finnish/American cultural exchange designed by Bau Graves, the role of bluegrass in the Finnish music scene was initially a concern for us teachers. The obvious question going in was “are we bluegrass enough for them?” I’m always a little concerned when my co-workers look to me to be the bluegrass authority, but on this trip I was never really worried. As we prepared to leave and put together material for our little band, I got the strong feeling that bluegrass would became a vehicle for communication with the Finns and not just a bad script that none of us could really follow.

Certainly the history and rituals associated with bluegrass are compelling, and after picking with the Finnish people I can say they know their history and seem to be naturals at the reserved, patient, focused group rituals that are necessary to bring bluegrass to life. Like the blues, bluegrass provides the participant and the listener the chance to exercise emotions–from the most personal and specific to the most mystical and general. Half of the bluegrass songbag deals with the perfect, natural state of early, rural America and the other half deals with all the ways we became divorced from that state. It was a thrill to hear my new Finnish friend sing songs like Old Home Place, Lamp Lighting Time In the Valley, or Danville Girl because I knew right away that they understood the emotion that they were communicating. Here is a clip of the Clayhill Brothers singing in church on Sunday morning (right click on the link to listen).

mountain-railroad.mp3

Fortunately the Finnish are way too smart and talented to turn bluegrass into some wooden code of conduct or, worse yet, a secular religion. So, in my next couple posts I will introduce you to some folks we met and explain how we used the elegant rituals of bluegrass to get to know one another. Hopefully these pictures of Paul and John in bathrobes will tide you over until then (jet lag is like a big pajama party).