Dear Friends,
We're enjoying some sunshine here in the Shenandoah Valley
of Virginia, a commodity that was scarce during the month of
September. Twenty days of rain during the month made things pretty
soggy, so you can imagine how glad we all were, a couple of weeks
ago, when Hurricane Florence turned south. High winds and more
rain on already saturated ground would likely have led to some real
problems here.
Our days are filled with music and we continue to live by the old
adage, use it or lose it. We're playing for the 10th Anniversary
Celebration of the Middlebrook, VA library tomorrow, just a
half-mile down the road from where we lived for over forty years.
So we've ventured into the past and checked out some of the songs
we wrote about Middlebrook, most of which we haven't even thought
about in least fifteen years. Just because we wrote'em doesn't
mean we know'em. So we've had fun this week working them back up
for tomorrow, - and we do mean "working." Pulling back the chords,
the arrangements, the vocal and instrumental parts - a lot of them
originally farmed out to Kevin Maul, Jim Watson, Jimmy Gaudreau or
Chris Brashear but now resting fully on our shoulders - revisiting
songs like "Green Summertime," "October Light," "Home #235," to
name a few, is proving challenging. But we'll be ready by tomorrow.
And then there are the NEW songs we've been learning, most of them
by Leonard Cohen, in preparation for a show we're doing next month
with the Indiscriminate Lovers (Trent Wagler and Derek Kratzer).
Just selecting the songs from Cohen's immense catalogue has been
formidable and now we're transforming them from his laid-back, jazz
influenced spoken-sung style to our own whatever-you-want-to-call-it
way of doing things. I wonder if Cohen ever envisioned hearing
"Suzanne" played on the banjo. Luckily we have another month before
we have to sing them in front of the paying public.
And then there are the songs we're writing, a couple of them this
month nearing the point of us wanting to sing them for folks -
but not quite - and more in the pipeline.
Next week we'll get back on familiar musical ground, the songs on
our current "A List," and we'll head up to one of the most beautiful
areas of Virginia, Highland County, and do a show. And the following
week we'll be in Massachusetts. As we said at the beginning of this
letter, our days are filled with music.
Speaking of pipelines, we used some of our free time
in September singing at rallies for Jennifer Lewis, our
strong anti-Atlantic Coast Pipeline candidate for US Congress
(https://jenniferlewisforcongress.com/). We've stood side by side
with her for the last four years on street corners, in parking lots,
in motel conference rooms (most of these events before she put her
hat in the ring to run for Congress), doing all we can to defeat
this pipeline that could potentially devastate our county. As an
example of the power of song, we've found out the song we wrote about
Dominion Power's ACP (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77V_X00XwVU)
is being used by other anti-pipeline advocates around the country
and in Canada. We love that.
BUMPER STICKER OF THE MONTH: Never trust a skinny cook.
We've enjoyed our first summer in Staunton, VA and are looking
forward to fall. It's been fun getting used to living in this
wonderful, old house. A lot has happened since last year this time
when we started the process of uprooting our lives and moving. But,
as Tom Rush wrote, "No regrets, no tears goodbye."
We hope you all go out and vote next month. And we look forward to
seeing you at one of the stops along the way.
Your pals,
Robin and Linda
FOR BOOKINGS: Trish Galfano, trish@myriadartists.com, 919.967.8655
FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/robinandlindawilliams
TWITTER: https://twitter.com/Aredoubleyew