1. Twice in July of 2019, I went up the North Fork of the CdA River to listen to the Ole Mountain Opry, an affiliation of acoustic musicians and singers who played spirituals, country, folk, acoustic pop songs. and more. The musicians sometimes soloed, other times played in duets, trios, quartets, and maybe even quintets and sextets. The first performance I attended was at Country Lane River Resort (now Hook's Landing) and the second was behind the Prichard Tavern.
I loved them. They reminded me of my favorite outings in Eugene when I attended the weekly Bluegrass Jam at Sam Bond's (and for a while at Hop Valley a few blocks away and earlier in the evening) and the Irish Jam at Sam Bond's.
At Country Lane, Steve Allen, a banjo player, evidently determined I was more than a casual listener to the music, and he struck up a conversation with me and told me that some of these musicians participated in a Friday jam at the Silver Lake Mall in CdA.
That month, I went to a Friday jam, enjoyed it a lot, but attending these jams got lost in the scattered, incoherent, ill-planned mess of my life.
On Thursday evening, just last night, Liz informed me that the Friday jams now happen at Christ Church on the corner of N. 4th and Hanley in Dalton Gardens.
Liz's husband, Mike, is a regular and acts as what I would call the stage manager of the jam, getting things set up, helping musicians with their mics and chairs, when needed, etc.
I told Liz Thurs. night that I'd be at tonight's jam. Joan and Jane said they'd also come.
It was a terrific jam.
2. I love listening to musicians for whom playing and singing is an avocation.
I love listening to amateurs who give amateurism a good name because they are not amateurish.
I don't need live performances to be almost sterile in their perfection.
I don't know if any performer tonight was flawless, but they were all dedicated, earnest, generous, skilled, happy to be making music, and uplifting to me.
I heard several performers play familiar songs with their own style, their own vocal range, their own energy; I never once thought about the original. I focused on the performance in front of me, appreciating what each performer brought to popular songs like "Sixteen Tons", "Amarillo by Morning", "Sweet Baby James", "Have You Ever Seen the Rain?", "Paradise", or "You Fill Up My Senses", to name a few.
I heard sentimental songs, very funny songs, songs glorifying Jesus and praising the Lord, lonely songs, songs of longing, joy, endurance, and self-delusion.
This is my carpe diem. It's how I seize the day. I go to jams. I read. I go to the symphony. I listen to string quartets. This Wednesday I'll go to the Montvale Event Center to listen to an author I've never heard of, Kendra Langford Shaw, be interviewed about a book I know nothing about, The Pillagers' Guide to Arctic Pianos. I go to symphony lectures, exhibits at the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, and watch videos on my computer created with AI featuring cats dancing to hip hop music.
3. I like seizing the day with people, too. For the second consecutive day, Liz, Jane, Joan, and I, with the wonderful addition of Liz's husband, Mike, enjoyed dinner together. We went from the Friday jam to Capone's in Hayden and to tell stories, talk about maladies, bemoan grievous occurrences and losses in our lives, rejoice in blessings, and recall those halcyon days when we were nineteen years old and were discovering the intoxicating joy of having friends we could be ourselves with, experiencing our worldviews expanding, and starting in earnest the lifelong effort to shape ourselves and resist, as best we could, those who would shape us.
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