“It’s over, Johnny! It’s over!”
“Nothing is over!”
Rambo said that, and how right he was. Same goes for the music, Johnny.
Nothing is over!
At least not down at Bronstein Park in Manchester where the homeless and peddlers past their days just trying to stay alive. The park is really nice, dipped just under street level with cut grass, cast iron benches and full trees where people cool off under or just kiss with dirty teeth until the sun goes down.
Last week I’m down at Bronstein watching my daughter and the other members of the Central High School Marching Band practice for their first big half time show at Gill Stadium. I didn’t realize how much I missed the sound of a marching band. How all the pipes blend as one, that thunderous beat of the drums, the bending flags, the energy fully built to capture a crowd.
Their performance was spot on with the students snaking around in unison, centipede style, two hands on the blade, owning their parts. The entire park erupted in applause as they finished off “I’m a Believer.” The sunburned stragglers filling out the corners of the park pounded their palms with wild appreciation for what they’d heard.
We all did.
Then, after practice, the marching band hosted a cookout for everyone at the park. And I mean everyone! That’s what a marching band will do to a mixed crowd sweating it out in the summer heat at Bronstein. It will get you a nice hot brownie at the end of the night if you promise to always love the music.
Which reminds me. This coming Wednesday, the 14th of September, down at NEC on Main Street, there’s a can’t miss kind of show going on called “Songs from the Last Waltz.” The Last Waltz, for those that don’t know, was this great rock documentary filmed in 1976 by Martin Scorsese about legendary rock band called The Band.
The remarkable songs that came out of this particular evening were brought to life in film. Each song that was sung by various artists as big as Dylan and unsung as Ronnie Hawkins means something to somebody, it seems. Wild songs, deep ones, stoned ones, salty ones, raucous ones, rambling ones. On that night in San Francisco, every song was a stinger.
Well, at 7:30pm next Wednesday at NEC, some of the very best musicians from around the state will be singing those songs. Matt Poirier, Jasmine Mann, The Cole Robbie Band, Kate West, Jenn Whitmore, Derek Rudzinski and Walker Smith will be putting their own spin on their favorite Waltz tunes.
And making his return to the Granite State, the man himself, Dusty Gray, will also be performing at the show, marking out his own version of “Mystery Train.”
Free show. Great memories.
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The Grebes, the six piece folk rock band from Concord, have a new EP out called “Dark Days, Winter Nights” and it’s fantastic. Heartbreaking lyrics, like the ones on a song called “Colony” about an estranged father and son (“A stranger born a strangers son/ At least act like you know me.”) explodes with rich emotion on this harmonious gem. Definitely a band ready to take flight.
***
The Baza Blues are, well, a blues infused duo from Nashua made up of Geoff Goodall on harp and Doug Philbrick on the guitar. I caught a set by Baza outside N’awlins Grill on Elm Street in Manchester last weekend and they absolutely torched the folks on the patio with their deep south sweaty sound. At one point during the night, the patio crowd grew anxious when a couple took to the sidewalk just feet from where the guys were performing. The couple were saddled with backpacks and bags and looked to be living hand-to-mouth, yet, by all accounts, just enjoying the blues — and living it.
At one point, someone in the audience became anxious and started saying, “Those two over there are just waiting to do a grab-and run-with the bands equipment. Just look at them.”
I went and said hello to Chris, one of the would be robbers. Turns out, Chris was far from a street urchin looking to snatch up a portable speaker and retro microphone. Turns out Chris just loved the blues.
“My step father raised me on this stuff down in Florida,” said Chris as he cranked down on a cigarette and pulled a harmonica out of his backpack. “He gave me this harmonica.”
See, music has the ability to wash the dirt off us all and make us believers instead of skeptics in those that don’t shine quite as bright as the rest of us.
Maybe we all just need a hot brownie and some faith in the human race before we dash off silly assumptions without realizing the power within the music.
Or maybe.
– Rob Azevedo
Rob Azevedo, from Manchester, has been hosting a weekly radio show called “Granite State of Mind” for the past three and a half years which showcases musicians from around New Hampshire and beyond. “Granite State of Mind” is an hour long program that features artists performing live in-studio each week, now exclusively on WKXL. Azevedo also writes a weekly music column called “Sound Check” for the Concord Monitor and hosts a monthly “Artist in the Round” style series at New England College in Concord.
