In Gr. 11, when I think I was 17 , I was still doing academics. I left this one English class and went to another. I believe her name was Mrs. Kavanaugh. She was an incredible whip and taught me a lot
We had a political science teacher and I have forever remembered her telling exercise.
She showed the class excerpts from three famous documents on human rights and freedom. They were all typed the same and looked vaguely familiar. No one recognized them. She had the class vote on them. We voted individually for each. The percentage of the class who embraced each of these glowing promises for the future was seriously telling.
The excerpts were from. the Communist Das Capital, Nazism Mein Kampf and Thomas Jefferson’s Democracy, Declaration of Independence. The latter was the least attractive to the suburban predominantly white kids who voted instead principally for Das Capital and Communism (International Socialism) and next Fascism Nazism (National Socialism). Democracy simply had little appeal for children living at home with Mom and Dad paying the bills. Democracy is work, accountability and responsibility.
The message our teacher wanted to get acrosstoo ‘don’t believe the flowery speeches’ . She wanted us to look for substance. Look at the ‘actions’. Year’s later we’d say if a politician’s lips were moving he was telling a lie. Arendt’s study of Nazi Beurocracy at the trial of Eichman, the ‘banality of evil’, were later powerful learnings. At the time I had learned and was singing Universal Soldier by Canadian Buffy St. Marie. I was in the peace movement. I walked 50 miles for peace on a whim one day with thousand of others in the first walkathon. I thought I’d never be able to get out of the hot bath I needed after that.
The aetheist communists would succeed in short years being the greatest killers of all time murdering hundreds of millions of . The Nazi holocaust was well known. Yet here was Thomas Jefferson, of the American constitution, the greatest democracy to date and the response to the dictatorship of the left overs of the Roman Empire coupled with the last of the post Magna Carta, English Royal empire.
As Canadians, like children, we lived under the wing of Daddy US and continuously criticized the US like a typical modern teens. That lesson in realpolitik never left me. I began to read more history and economics and biographies of political figures economic and philosophy. As a teen a lot of information about the world comes through the back stories of novels,historical suction.. Science fiction was chalk full of advanced notions and discussion of government and utopia.
Theatre was about playing the role of what Jung would call different archetypes. I really did feel and appreciate the sense of power I had playing a king in a play only to then get the sense of powerlessness playing the peasant in another. We explored our own views and feelings in the theatre and in discussions in the YMCA Leadership Group and at the church where I remained President of the Amalgamated Baptist Youth Groups.
At school I’d become friends with Karey Asseltine. In Gr. 11 Cathy and Karey were the school girls who could easily win any Penthouse or Playboy centre fold contest. Many a boy lost his faith in prayer and God because he never did get a chance to see these ladies nude. They were truly voluptuous girls who caused the greatest spontaneous erections and ejaculations in the school. They were the first to wear mini skirts and boots. Karey had an older boyfriend who had a motorcycle. When years later Nancy Sinatra would put out her song and video These Boots were Made for Walking the image of Carey riding out of the school parking lot would come to mind. Cathy was just Angelina or Marilyn perfect, and aloof. These were ladies. Sophia Lauren era perfection. One guy expelled from class, departing would touch Cathy’s breasts. A girl today would spend years in therapy. Cathy slapped his face. He left and all us guys understood the desire even if we condemned the crime.
Gr. 11 was the year half the best looking girls in one class didn’t return because they went to visit an aunt in another province. It was really common for girls to get pregnant, go away for a year, complete school, give the baby up for adoption, everyone wanting to adopt children. Rarely would a teen age girl keep a child. None or hardly any would want an abortion. Life was precious.
Karey was into art and poetry and paired up with me to put out a school poetry magazine. Poison. I believe it was her idea,. I often found myself around these amazing women who seemed to like my company, God knows why, and would make these projects work. I’d get some stuff done on my own but with someone like Karey on a project it went from mediocre to excellence. Her father was a psychiatrist.
She was the first one to explain Creativity and Insaniety to me.
“It’s a bell curve, Bill, with 10 as the most Creative. The idea is to get to 10 but not beyond because the other side of 10 the numbers go down. You get more and more crazy rather than more creative.”
Years later I’d meet Crosby of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young and James Taylor. They’d both talk about the loss of their years of heroin addiction.
Years later I’d review Dr. Vaillant, head of Harvard Psychiatry’s book on creativity. Frankly, Karey was more succinct. Neuroscience has shown that having three genes of a particular type and place were most associated with schizophrenia but 2 of the genes were associated with genius. Karey’s idea all over again.. The Canadian female doctors in the 30’s were into eugenics planning on sterilizing schizophrenics and developing a euthanasia program to remove schizophrenia. It hardly got to the discussion phase because it was noted all the great leaders of society had a batty aunt in the attic. Hitler would tragically take the findings of the Canadian eugenics movement and use them to develop his Final Solution.
We called our magazine , Poison. It was great.
I ran against Carey for Student Council Publicity Representative simply to get more dances. I had a following and friends as musicians. So there was a group behind me. I was interested because I was studying politics and campaigns and marketting and wanted to ‘wow’ the school, winning the contest against Karey who simply was our greatest artist and everyone assumed would win. She was brilliant, talented and beautiful.. Mine was a selfish agenda driven plan. I’d voted for my friend Doug in the election in which I became the President of the Baptist Youth Groups and was coming to realize that the ‘best’ person didn’t necessarily win elections. Doug and Carey were obvious far better candidates than me.
Yet I had fun with the campaign. I got my friends to dress in bathing suits and let me paint my name on them. They wanted rock and roll and more art in the school. They were intellectual and radical. Because I was technically a jock I was able to get all the athletes to wear 8x10 glossy pictures I’d printed up en mass in my dark room. The models were a couple of the super good looking but also very bright people in the class. Everyone wanted a picture. I did some other ‘guerilla theatre’ campaign stuff and frankly years later I saw Kellyanne Conway as the greatest genius of campaign I’d ever followed. Having approached the subject as a win/lose proposition, not as who was best or whatever, I pulled out the stops. I felt badly because Karey was my friend. Karey meanwhile having lost graciously took the position of actually doing everything with me as the figurehead.
It’s funny thinking back to this time. What came of it though was that for years I’ve be able to say, “I hired the Guess Who for our high school dance.” One of the guys in our school was a friend of the band and Blue Blue Blue was playing on the radio. I was in charge of dances and entertainment and the publicity so had the greatest say in these matters. Wes Hazlitt was president. We voted for the Guess Who and I’m so glad we did. Like betting on a winning horse.
We also had Jim Donahue playing folk songs during intermission. This was a weird mix. The dance party thing coupled with the intellectual Dylan thing.
But by then I’d received a call from another amazing woman who was president of the YWCA women’s leaders group. They wanted to run a business venue, as the girls were interested in learning how to have coffee houses and sales and wanted someone who would bring in entertainment. I had this good reputation in the Y’s and the experience with coffeehouses. Mostly I think I had this network. I also had some idea of the right combination of entertainment. A folk singer intermission in a rock and roll dance wasn’t a great idea but Jim Donahue who’d play with Dylan, Lightfoot and Joni Mitchell, one of the icons of Winnipeg music at the time, somehow pulled it off . I believe he single handedly introduced Winnipeg to Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen despite being Irish with the haunting Irish voice more like Bono than Dylan by a long shot. He’d play lots of nights at the YWCA coffeehouse.
I agreed to MC and bring in the entertainment. 3 sets a night. The girls sold cookies and cakes and ran the business. I told the bands and individuals what I could pay and only found out a year later the girls had managed the coffeehouse so well that they’d had thousands of dollars of profit that they invested in their YWCA charitable functions. I was this accessory to this powerful women’s group who were all business and truly loved the coffeehouse. Mainly because I was bringing in famous locals. Downchild Blues Band was one of many. I even convinced Danny Donahue to play as a single act. He had this really popular band and had never played solo. Well he was an incredible success and those early songs he did went on to form the basis of his truly original and brilliant ‘Long Distance Runner’ album. My friend John Cowtan would play Elusive Butterfly there. A black and white guy did covers of Simon and Garfunkel sounding better than the originals. My ‘formula’ was not talking during the half hour set and a half hour of talking and such buying coffee herb tea etc in the half hour between sets. I had a list of a hundred people who wanted to play and would try to organize a good mix of sets. The red haired beauty with the haunting Lorena McKinnitt voice could definitely have got a job as a Siren. I just loved music and the talent that came out.
My friend Kirk loved the Wise Eye and my friend Nina would come out lots of nights. I loved convincing my church friend to bring down her harp and everyone thoroughly loved that. There were several coffee shops going on. The Wise Eye was Sunday Night. The Winged Ox was Saturday or Friday. I’d go to another club hear acts and invite them back to play. This was when Young was playing in the coffeehouses of Winnipeg.
The Winnipeg Folk Festival grew out of the coffee house scene. The Coffee House Scene mostly worked because the liquor age was 21. That meant that our audience was a mix of 16 to 25 year olds generally, the youngest group wanting to hang out with the older guys and the oldest guys being really into music and not into booze and the middle guys unable to get into the pub. It also meant we had the pick of the best 16 to 21 year old groups in the city.
I loved the Wise Eye. I loved especiallya night I had for Jim Donahue in which he told stories and played guitar and sang all these songs which weren’t on the radio. He was travelling around the country picking up tunes as people did in those days. Older, he knew everyone. That night with the candles and the girls herb tea and his mesmerizing music with it’s tales of love, politics and war, I felt like the ancient villagers of Ireland felt when the troubador and story teller came to town. Jim was of that Irish tradition. Part leprechaun, A true minstrel.
I was playing chords on my untuned guitar and reciting poetry there and in other coffeehouses. It was very Beat, the only guy talking and playing bad guitar. I didn’t think I could sing. I was right but ego got the better of me and I’d eventually start to sing in coffeehouses. I loved to sing Leonard Cohen songs because I didn’t think he could sing and Dylan songs because I didn’t think he would sing . I avoided Gordon Lightfoot and the Beatles material because those guys really could sing.
Years later I’d hear a funny story about Dylan. Woody Guthrie’s wife would tell about this kid befriending Arlo and liken to listen to Woody imitating his voice and songs. She was concerned and talked to Woody who said, never mind, he’s Arlo’s friend. But the thing was Woody had Parkinson’s then and his wife said “He used to sing like Frank Sinatra, he had such a fine voice but when Dylan was around he could hardly sing anymore his throat was so ruined by the disease. “ So there was Dylan imitating Woody with a diseased throat and me imitating Dylan. My singing soundedly that.
I’d one day years later, in Stanley Park Vancouver, come across Arlo Guthrie and Pete Seegers sitting alone playing guitar and chatting. I recognized them immediately and asked if they’d mind if I sat and listened. They said, ‘no join in.” And I’d sit for a couple of hours listening to them exchanging songs and practicing for a concert they had that evening. By the time they had to go there was about a hundred of us sitting there but I’d been there from the start. I had one of the truly mystical experiences watching great professionals and old friends sharing. It only happened because everyone like me just sat and listened. It was magical.
That’s what Wise Eye was like. It was about the music and the space. Lots of laughter and good fun.
It was all before drugs and alcohol. Indeed when they lowered the drinking age everything changed and the coffeehouse scene died as kids instead went to the bar where they got shit faced and legless. I know, because that’s what I’d be doing in a few years even though I’d be a roadie for a group then. The fine craftsmanship and deep thoughtfulness was invaded by another element which looking back I enjoy today though at the time I was sorry that loud replaced the skill of soft.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment